This was the beginning of the Circle Garden in the spring of 2001 after we cut down a 70 foot tall elm tree (stump on the right). We called the hexagonal frames in the foreground the "Strawberry Ziggurats" which I always thought would be a good name for a rock band.

We planted a vegetable garden in 2001 which grew well and produced a good variety of veggies. But the next year our plants were killed by a late frost. In 2003 we began planting rose bushes in the Circle Garden.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA The garden in June 2006 when it was on the Albuquerque Garden Tour. We had everything cleaned up, mulched and new pathways designated. We had lost almost half the roses we had planted in 2004 from a very late, and very hard freeze in 2005 that also seriously damaged the chitalpa tree we had planted in the center of the hexagonal bench; therefore, the Circle Garden looked a little sparse for the garden tour. By 2006, the Strawberry Ziggurats had been overrun with strawberries and whatever else we had planted in them, so they just looked like planted mounds.

The Circle Garden on August 9, 2015, 14 years after we created it. The trees have grown up, many of the surviving rose bushes are tall, we have arches at the north and south entrances of the garden with climbing roses growing over them. I re-mulched the pathways last week, but the tall sunflowers block the view of the pathways. The Strawberry Ziggurats are long gone — Laurie leveled out the remaining bumps a couple of months ago and planted wildflower seeds among the remaining strawberries.

A super wide angle view of the garden looking east toward the Sandias on August 9, 2015.