David's Blog

Following the Yellow Brick Road - A magical, Educational Gardening Experience (5)

Posted on 10 Jul, 2007 0 comments

When the house stopped spinning, and came back down to earth with a gentle bump, Dorothy opened the front door and gazed in wonder at a beautiful scene. There is a very clear description of it in the book; lovely green grass, trees bearing fruits, banks of gorgeous flowers, a babbling brook, and colourful birds. This is Munchkinland as it was originally perceived. What did we do to construct it? Well, we had the grass (not so lush since it gets flattened with bikes, footballs, etc., but I did sow some new seed). The kids and I went on a shopping spree and bought 400 summer flowering bulbs, and moved perennials around (we are still in early March) trying to predict colour matches and contrasts. As the central part of the garden, i.e. the children’s play area is going to be Munchkinland, we need to have multi-colour planting with large, in-your-face flowers (which I normally hate) such as Asiatic lillies, gladiolas, sunflowers, nasturtiums, irises, etc, in all colours. We planted the bulbs and began sowing seeds in the greenhouse. The book states that blue is the favourite colour of the Munchkins and white is the colour of the good witches (hence Dorothy’s blue and white gingham dress!), and so these colours should feature in the final colour scheme.
Looking at the garden, I have decided that, plants apart, we need some vertical height, which will be provided by the use of trellis, rose arches, obelisks bearing e.g. sweet peas, and hanging baskets. On one of the shopping trips, we found Rudbeckia “Green Wizard” and “Toto”, and are now trying to tie in plant variety names with the story. This led me to buy Coleus “Rainbow Mix”, Geranium “Fantasy Mix”, and others. We had erected a white rose arch at the start of the “Yellow Brick Road”, up one side of which was growing “Golden Showers”, rescued from my parents’ former garden, and an alllusion to the rainbow and its creation. On the other side we planted another climbing, pink, rose “Dreamland”. I will always remeber the check-out girl’s changing expressions as she scanned the plants. Of course she recognised what we were doing, and I have not met a single person of any age since who does not know the story.
As for the babbling brook it does play a significant part in the story because both Dorothy and Toto need water to drink and bathe (it is vital to life, for both us and plantlife). I was not about to construct a stream in the garden, but we did have an old-fashioned well style water feature, with a lovely sound, given to us a few years back by my parents, and we moved it onto a corner of the “Yellow Brick Road” as a focal point and to provide the watery sound.

Yellow Brick Road.

If our own “road” had not already been in existence, I doubt whether any of this would have happened at all. Over the last 3 years, I had constructed a bike/roller skate/ whatever track linking the various parts of the children’s play area, and also this area to the veggy garden and main patio, so they would not have to cross mushy grass, etc and bring it into the house. I am proud to say that his 4 ft wide track was 99% constructed from recycled timber. Most of it came from a massive “summerhouse”, erected by the previous owners, which was open to the elements on its worst weather side. I tried to restore and improve it, but costs were going to be too high, and so I dismantled it plank by plank and got my bike trail, and also the climb frame (now the Castle of the Wicked Witch of the West).
As for the yellow, I toyed with the idea of asking the local Council for yellow road marking paint, but decided against it on account of shade and ease of removal. The shade does not show up properly in the pics, but it was the most lovely shade of golden yellow I could find – an own brand by a well-known large diy store – and, although it is simply exterior gloss – it worked well on the rough timber and is not slippery (although I worried about the fumes when applying it). My father was keen to mark out the brickwork effect, and so I left it to him (thank you, Dad!).
I dreaded painting the Yellow Brick Road but, now that the bikes, etc., have been up and down it a few times, it has worn and textured a bit, and I love it, because it forms a bright ribbon link around the garden, is a perfect foil for most plant colours, and so cheers us up on even the dullest days.