We don't have a lot of plants, and I refuse to grow annuals at all on principal. I have a wild red rose bush next to the stairs, a pair of dwarf spruces I call Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Some bushy things that have beautiful variegated green and yellow leaves that might possibly be boxwoods, a few tulips, three hyacinths (one purple, one pink, one white), three fast-growing hostas, a few wild things including greater celandine, purple-flowering creeping charlie and purslane. A squirrel gifted us a berry plant last year. I -think- it's a boysenberry. I let it grow to see what it would become. There were only maybe half a dozen berries on it last year. Once they turned red I took a taste. Tangy and sweet, definitely edible. Will be interesting to see how it expands in the next couple of months now that we've gotten through the thaw. Everything mentioned is contained within a raised railroad-tied garden that extends from the foundation of the front of the house out around 2.5 feet. I weed it when the celandine starts shoving itself through the bushes, and groom the bushes so they don't overflow onto the lawn. I also have Virginia creeper that I have to constantly yank out of the rose bush. It keeps climbing the iron railing and attaching to the house and trying to climb up into the eaves. If we had a brick house I'd just let it cover the brick and call it Art. But we have vinyl siding and it'd totally destroy the house if I let it creep.
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