Landscapers - HELP US!

I felt really good after my last post on Thursday because the backyard was really growing and I was thinking I may have a green thumb after all. It appeared that the garden, flowers, and plants were doing really well. We do however need some help and we had landscapers come on Saturday to discuss some work we needed done. Nothing too difficult but we needed someone who knew what they were doing. We needed our lilac bush, evergreens, and cherry tree trimmed and while they were at it we needed new mulch put down. Not difficult but having someone do the physical labor is music to my ears. So I showed them around the yard and was very proud of everything growing. Until.....I learned that one of my perennials that I thought was growing like gangbusters was actually a WEED!

Can you see the difference between the weed growing in the front and the actually perennial in the back? I was utterly embarrassed and wanted to crawl in a hole. They were really nice about it but they were amazed at the size of the stem - we are talking 2 inches thick! And to think that I watered and nurtured that weed to about 3 feet tall! Yet another reason why we need help.

Here's what it looks like with the weed removed. It was hard to pull out and needed to use a shovel to get out that bad boy.

And there she is -the largest weed every known to man! The landscapers will complete the work within 2 weeks and the sooner the better, we need some help!