September is a beautiful time to work outdoors in Northern Michigan. The lakes quiet down after Labor Day. Most days it's just a lone Pillywiggin tending the flowers, lost in his thoughts, listening to the sound of nature, enjoying the spectacular views.

September gardens can be equally spectacular. While one Pillywiggin was enjoying his view of Torch Lake, another was visiting a girlfriend, enjoying the views in her gardens - Pillywiggins Petoskey project from a few years back. I shared photos of her summer landscape in our June 9th blog post "How Do Our Gardens Grow?" Now, the transformation to fall. Wow!

To revisit this project under construction click the links to our blog posts below.

• Rocking & Rolling Boulders
• Rock On!
• Block Party!
• Petoskey Project Complete!
• Petoskey Patio Project #2​

Apparently, it's Toad Week at Pillywiggins Garden. It started on Sunday as all weeks do. We decided to take the scenic route home down Toad Lake Road. It was a beautiful day & we stopped to enjoy the view.

On Tuesday Jason found a teeny-tiny toad in our garden. We've been watching what we think is the same toad for several years now and had affectionately named him Mr. Toady. Jason found the baby toad in one of Mr. Toady's favorite hangouts. Hmmm. Could it be Mr. Toady is a Mrs.?

Yes, I do believe it's so. Why? Because today Jason found another toad in our garden and this one was HUGE - as big as Jason's hand! It seems we have the entire Toad Family living in our gardens. Maybe we should rename them Small, Medium & Large?

We love sharing our gardens with toads. They eat insects, grubs and the slugs that attack our hosta. We're also happy to share our gardens with tree frogs. Several years ago we found a baby tree frog hiding in the hydrangea next to our door. Each year since we've spotted a tree frog hanging out under our porch light which sits just above the same hydrangea. We think it's a Gray Tree Frog or possibly a Cope's Gray Tree Frog. It's hard to tell because they share much of the same territory and are almost indistinguishable in appearance.

Carving a bed out of lawn by hand while carefully avoiding the birch & lilac roots is no easy task! So imagine my surprise when on a hot Sunday afternoon Jason said, "I'm tired of mowing around the birch & lilac. Let's put a new bed there."

I "dug it" but Jason didn't. Instead, he used materials we had on hand and a few "down & dirty" landscaping tricks.

• Black plastic & landscape fabric are the industry standards for weed barrier, but it's pricy. We used cardboard boxes as our weed barrier. It will work just as well, it's biodegradable and FREE! (Thick layers of wet newspaper work too!)
• Cover the entire area with cardboard. Use a carpet knife to trim the cardboard into the desired shape. Leave space around the root of any trees, shrubs or plants.
• Apply a thick layer of mulch over the cardboard. It's ok to mulch lightly around the base of trees & shrubs but don't let the mulch touch the bark of the tree. And for Pillywiggin's sake, please don't build "mulch volcanos" around them! We see this mistake made all the time, even by professionals.