Heather's Garden

CREEPY

I'll steal an idea from Layanee and say Happy Halloween:

 

Looks like she has her dinner ready...what will you be dining on this evening?  I'm making stew and am excited to use my own carrots harvested expressly for said stew:

 

Those 4 habaneros (the only ones harvested this year) will probably heat up some chili.  No salsa for us this year, just not enough good tomatoes.  Though some parts of the garden still think it's growing season:

 

Those little eggplants will never make it to harvest, but the flowers are pretty to look at.  As are the zucchini's that likely won't amount to much either:

 

That's it for me on this beautiful almost 70 degree Halloween.  I almost wish we would just have a hard frost already so I could pull all the plants and get this horrible gardening-season behind me. 

THERE'S STILL SOME COLOR OUT THERE

Our windows have been closed for days, but I'm adamantly opposed to turning on the heat.  It was a gloriously sunny day here in CT today, but I was stuck in the office all day only sneaking peeks of the blue sky and puffy clouds through my boss' window.  I did get out to the garden 2 days ago and I was so excited to see a new dahlia blooming (I neglected to see if there was a tag though so I have no idea what kind it is):

 

At least one of the tomato plants is thriving:

 

And an actual habanero changing color:

 

Very calendar-worthy in my opinion:

 

What do you think?

FALL IS HERE?

The leaves are still green, but there's a nip in the air.  I'm buried under another volunteer project.  This is actually a fun one.  If you're in CT and you have a young lady who's interested in American Girl dolls, check out this event -- American Girl Fashion Shows to benefit The James Blackstone Memorial Library.

I have briefly ventured out to my garden for a few minutes here or there, just long enough to find my first zucchini:

Yes, I have a bunch of mums to plant:

But as long as there are still bees and dahlias in the garden, I'm a happy gardener:

Are there a few warm days left before fall truly descends?  I hope so!

HEATHER'S ALIVE

I kid, but I really did feel like death warmed over for a few days.  Whatever virus I had is gone now and I enjoyed an afternoon in my garden, cheese, crackers, and a cocktail to kick off the long weekend!  Produce was the focus of my photos today, but first I had fun with the handful of strawberries growing:

Different light and angles led to some nice photos:

I can't decide which I like the best:

They're all so different:

But I think the most fun I had with the strawberries today was discovering 2 runners that had escaped out the back of one of the containers and potting them up:

The little zucchini plant is getting a little bigger and growing plenty of male flowers, but no females yet:

The big zucchini plant still shows no sign of actual zucchini.  As you know you need to have male and female flowers at the same time to get zucchini:

However we do have habaneros!  This is so exciting:

And lilac bell peppers:

Purple bell peppers too:

And shockingly the flowers on the Scarlet Runner beans are finally turning into beans:

Decent sized ones too:

But I'll have to do some research on how long to let them grow, because clearly this one was not ready for harvest:

I'm thinking it's probably time to start picking some of these peppers:

A pretty and pretty bountiful harvest today (in the sun):

And out of the sun:

Tell me which of the strawberry photos you think would be calendar-worth, if any.  And which of the harvest photos is better?  I wonder if you'll agree with me...

IF THE SUN EVER COMES BACK...

The rain stops, and the thermometer gets up over 70 degrees, I'll be back out at my current favorite spot in the garden.  We found raccoon prints on the edge of the wading pool one day and we just couldn't go in it anymore.  So off it went to a friend's house (cleaned first) and the double-lounger went into its place (please note my nifty watering can table):

The dahlias are beautiful and since they're about the only thing flowering in the garden right now, really doing a great job of attracting pollinators:

Wait, I take that back...I've got marigolds blooming too!  the ones I grew from seed are finally flowering:

I'm inordinately proud of them:

And the peppers have suddenly started getting color out of nowhere:

 

And best of all I have a big beautiful Black Russian tomato sitting on the kitchen windowsill to have with lunch on Monday (our luncheon guest, Christine, doesn't know how lucky she is yet).  Now we just have to get through moving SS2 back to school tomorrow!

SLOWLY BUT SURELY

I'm just digging out from under a pile of work, but I'm trying to get outside for at least a few minutes a day.  And it's paying off...potentially October's calendar photo:

I sprayed the web with the mist setting on the hose...pretty:

And slowly but surely the veggie garden is starting to produce.  Sunday's harvest included lots of beans (Royal Purple Bush beans, Kentucky Wonder beans, and French Filet beans), a cucumber (likely the last since the plant appears to be dead now), and 5 Green Zebra tomatoes:

Today's harvest yielded the first eggplant, the first 2 Black Russian tomatoes (the ones at 10 and 11 o'clock), a Brandywine Pink tomato, and a bunch of Perfect Plum tomatoes:

Yes, it's been slow to get started, and no it may not last for much longer, but for today at least, I'm quite pleased with my garden!

NOT THE PRETTIEST GARDEN EVER

Let me start with the good stuff though:

Did you see that Brandywine Pink tomato on the back left?  First one of the summer and it was as great as I remember them being last year.  VPH made me up this little plate for lunch on Friday -- chicken salad, potato salad, and a little dressed, sliced cucumber.  He apologizes to you for the presentation...he said had he known I would be photographing he would have arranged the cucumber nicely (and those are our own green beans in the potato salad):

The nasturtium twining around the tomato cage is one of my favorite things about the garden this summer.  It it's just lucky that the yellow ones ended up by the Green Zebra tomatoes:

Also pretty is this dahlia (whose name I can't remember and I'm too comfortable to get up and go outside to check):

But I'm not sure that either photo is calendar-worthy.  I was rather surprised when these peppers started turning red:

But they're not the only peppers in my garden at long last:

It looks like I might actually get some blooming zinnias this year:

And the lawn looks great (one upshot of so much rain):

The veggie garden should be a lot lusher than this, but from a distance it's not too bad:

In fact, even up close, parts of it aren't too bad, like the Perfect Plum tomatoes:

But the Black Russians are downright scary looking tomato trees:

 

The zucchini have plenty of male blossoms hiding under all those leaves (shot from behind the table for scale), but no female blossoms, and therefore no zukes: 

And I just found that it's covered in the dreaded larvae of the cucumber beetle:

Am I the only gardener in the world who can't grown zucchini?

FINALLY...SUMMER

The current heat wave started on Saturday which coincided with my first summer meal of homegrown heirloom tomatoes.  Planted way back on May 13th, I present my first two Green Zebras (supplemented with a few Husky Cherry tomatoes):

This was my first taste test of a green tomato.  Very odd sensation eating a green tomato that tastes just like a nice red tomato.  Delicious!  VPH said, "It was oddly different.  I'm glad I experienced it."

And thus, more than 3 months after planting and halfway through August, I declare it at long last to be summer!

FIRST HARVEST

I've had a few veggies here or there, but this was the first real harvest.  Some Husky Cherry tomatoes, tomatoes from the greenhouse plant, teeny tiny carrots, and a cucumber!  A short, fat, and very tasty cucumber:

I hate half of my salad without dressing it was so delicious:

The first of the home grown tomatoes are coming now.  Stayed tuned.

WOULD IT SURPRISE YOU TO LEARN...

That I've only had to water the garden twice since I planted in May?  And I grow vegetables in containers?  Just another example of the crazy summer we're having (or not having depending on your point of view).  But amazingly I have sunflowers blooming:

Granted not even half of them came up and the only ones that seem to have made it are the little short ones, but they're sunflowers:

The last day-lilys that I saw bloom (there was one more bud, but I didn't get to see it bloom, darn work and volunteer responsibilities):

Staying in the patio garden, but moving on to veggies...zucchini -- large on left, extra small on right (in front of the light next to the bird bowl -- seriously, it's there), and not a single zuke growing:

And the eggplants may not get much larger than this, but I'll give them a few more days before I harvest one and let VPH eat it:

The cheating garden center tomato plant has pretty much done its job by giving us 10 or so tomatoes and it looks just about finished:

Just in time for the heirloom tomatoes to be ripening, starting with the 'Perfect Plum' (we've picked one, but haven't tried eating it yet):

Switching gears entirely, I'm loving the deep purples in this gorgeous container, but I can't get them to reproduce correctly in a photo:

Can you spot the absolutely terrifying sight in this photo:

The dreaded tobacco budworm (I found 2 on this plant and crushed them both):

But I spotted a much more interested insect in the garden a few minutes later...is it calendar-worthy: 

And then I saw the weirdest looking thing...turns out it's a plume moth...who knew?  Would be calendar-worthy if I did a vertical calendar:

Then this dragonfly insisted on having a photo session:

Seriously, it kept flying away and coming back.  Wow that's a face only a mother could love:

VPH likes the detailed shot of the wings below.  I think it's cool, but I don't know if I like it as much as the photo above:

 

What do you think?

ABOUT AS CLOSE AS I GET TO MY GARDEN THESE DAYS

It's been a hellish work week, my volunteer responsibilities have sucked every free minute out of my life, we've had two days of torrential rains (coincidentally the two days I worked from home this week), and I've seen 2 Shakespearean plays in a week.  Is it any wonder that this is the closest I've been to my garden in 2 days:

The good news is that those tomatoes are from my garden (though they're from the cheating greenhouse-started tomato plant) and they were delicious.  I also got my first ripe cherry tomato a few days ago -- a Husky Cherry tomato -- and it too was delicious.  I've got to stop volunteering for things and damn we need to get the new shed up!

WHY WOULD I GO ON VACATION WHEN I CAN STAY HERE?

It almost goes without saying that I mean stay here and do nothing!  Which is pretty much what I did all weekend.  I did manage to take a bunch of photos though.  My beautiful Endless Summer hydrangea:

 

I'm sure you've noticed something's missing here:

We love having a huge vase of hydrangea blooms on the kitchen table:

 

The veggies benefited from almost a week of sun.  You read that correctly...a week of sun!  Of course, as I write this post we're in hour 12 of absolute non-stop rain.  The Kentucky Wonder beans on the trellis are exactly what I pictured when I planted them, well they're a little sparser than I thought they'd be, but maybe I'll plant a few more for a late crop once the rain stops:

 

Same with the Scarlet Runner beans:

 

I still haven't thinned the carrots, but I did pull a pretty big one and eat it (and yes, it was delicious):

 

My cheating tomato plant has given us a few tomatoes, but uh-oh, that doesn't look good:

I don't think it's late blight, but whatever it is, it isn't good:

And my last veggie photo...eggplant!   The Japanese eggplants are doing quite well.  In fact they're already about 3x the size they were in this photo:

The patio garden is making me so happy:

Especially the big yellow daylilies:

And at least one of the zucchini plants is flourishing:

 

The bee balm isn't blooming yet and I have to imagine it's because it's not getting enough sun, so I switched it with the dahlia that was on the little table:

 

But I am loving how this container is filling out:

 

Since the dahlias here are so tall I hope that the coleus will fill in down there:

 

But overall, I'm quite pleased with this portion of the garden:

 

I love photographing this container:

 

But I realize I hardly ever show you the other side of it:

 

My Mother's Day garden is looking great:

On Sunday we drained the little pool and rinsed it out (how does it get dirty so fast?), so to cool down while sitting in the sun I used the mist nozzle on the hose.  It was a little windy that day and a lot of the mist landed on this row of dahlias:

Photo op!  I think a bunch of these are calendar worthy.  My mother wants me to request opinions from readers on which photos should go into the calendar.  I suspect it's because she has something to say about it, but I will be a dutiful daughter and request that you readers comment on which of these photos you'd like to see in this year's calendar.  Number 1:

 

Number 2:

 

Number 3:

Number 4:

 

Number 5:

 

Number 6:

 

Please do let me know what you think!

WHERE HAVE YOU GONE?

I'm getting 15% fewer hits per day all of a sudden.  Am I boring you?  Is everyone spending more time in their garden now that the weather is nice and less time on-line?  My blogging productivity usually increases when the weather is nice because I spend more time outside, have more to photograph, and more progress to report.  That said, I don't actually have that much going on out there right now.  I'm a little overdue for thinning the carrots (and still wandered away after pulling just those four): 

 

The scarlet runner beans are blooming away on the fence:

 

We picked these and ate them 5 seconds later -- delish:

 

The Hootenanny dahlia in front is kind of blocking the rest of this grouping, but after those few blossoms flower I'm going to cut it way down:  

 

The poor man's hose pot, but it sure keeps those 40 feet of coiled hose more organized.  But once the new shed goes up, those stakes will finally get out of that old container:

 

And I saved this for last.  Is it raccoon poop?  In the veggie garden again for the first time in weeks:

 

Sorry to leave you with that disgusting photo, but I'll be back soon with a product review.  Aren't you excited?

ONLY A MONTH OR SO LATE

The rainy month of June put us behind on a lot of our garden chores and many of the plants behind in growth.  All I can say is we'd better have a mild fall to make up for it!  It took a while, but we've finished nearly all the garden chores and the plants are behind the norm, but catching up.  The hosta/azalea bed is done:

The hosta/rhododendron bed looks great:

He not only mulched, he made us dinner!  VPH and the perennial shade garden:

  

Yummy mustard glazed pork, grilled zucchini (wish we had our own zukes to eat), and brown rice:

 

The veggie garden on May 16th:

 

On July 9th:

Let me take you for a little tour...always left to right.  Bush beans, carrots, habaneros and Brandywine tomatoes:

Habanero, dahlia, lilac bell pepper, dahlia, lilac bell pepper:

Same lilac bell pepper, scarlet runner beans, carrots, habanero, carrots, Kentucky Wonder beans, purple bell pepper:

Black Russian tomatoes, bush beans, peppermint, lilac bell pepper, Perfect plum tomatoes, habaneros, and another dahlia:

The Green Zebra tomatoes are one of my favorite things in the garden right now.  They're so beautiful in their blue pots.  The planter table looks great too with Royal Purple bush beans, nasturtiums, and the one cucumber that survived the rain:

A close-up of the gazillion blossoms on the Royal Purple bush beans:

We have teeny tiny eggplants growing:

 

This nasturtium is blooming despite it's 2 relocations (note to self--a little grass seed here wouldn't be a bad thing): 

 

The marigolds are doing their job and attracting pollinators to the tomatoes on the gravel patio (calendar-worthy, no?): 

 

I think we'll have a daylily bloom on the other plant tomorrow.  I have this sneaking suspicion that it's yellow:

 

These are our old trash containers.  I hate to replace them, but both have gaping holes in the bottom and no longer do much in the way of holding trash or keeping the raccoons away from it.  Rubbermaid apparently would replace them (they're less 3 years old), but only if I had the receipt.  You'd better believe that I kept the receipt for the new ones.  We will drill more holes in these and use them for composting:

 

We're enjoying the garden and being able to spend time on simple maintenance like weeding rather than looking around and seeing all the things still undone.  We still have the shed project and a couple of other little things to do, but really, we're done.

OKAY, DON'T LAUGH

This is what happens when you ask your husband to plant while you're at the office.  Once I got home and we stood together staring at the 12 coleus plants in the ground, he said, "Yeah, it might have made sense to put the tall ones in back along the rocks and the short ones in front."  I added, "And maybe mixed up the colors a little?"  Well he's sweet to plant them regardless and they'll fill in soon.  Plus he mulched the whole bed, so really I'm not complaining:

 

Remember how it rained for June?  At some point during those weeks of rain, I decided that the sun would return and we would need a way to cool off.  But this is the summer of cheap and as you know we don't own this property.  4 years ago, before we started gardening, we asked the landlords if they had any objection to us putting up one of those big blue inflatable pools...they did, turns out their insurance premiums would have gone up.  Which is retrospect really worked out for the best.  We never would have started gardening if the yard was dominated by a big blue pool.  Do you see where I'm going with this:

 

Hey, it was only $20.12!  Though it's on clearance now for even less.  This is the sunniest part of our garden with full sun from about 9:00 am to 3:00 pm.  We put down a tarp we had on hand (luckily it was about the right size and blue) to try and protect the bottom of the pool since once the grass dies (sigh), there won't be much between the pool and the glass and rocks that seem to be the main components of our soil:

 

This is also about the flattest section of our garden, but it's still not level.  There will be a deep end of this pool.  I should stop calling it a pool.  The package called it an aqua lounger, which amused VPH to no end:

 

We also picked up a solar cover at a local overstock store for $33.  But even the smallest one they had was more than twice as large as needed, so we cut it in half and stored the rest for future use, so I'm only going to include $16.50 in the aqua lounger expenses.  (The directions for the solar cover recommended letting the cover sit for a few days to straighten out before you did the final trim to size and shape, lest you think we're just dumb.)  Another $7 got us a skimmer.  So that's a total of $43.62 -- well we already got an afternoon's amusement out of setting it up, in my mind that's money well spent.  VPH included in photo for scale:

 

I am so excited to see what color the daylilies on those tall stalks will be and still taking endless pleasure in the patio garden:

  

The Green Zebra tomatoes are definitely going to have the first ripe fruit, I'm just not sure how I'm going to know when it's ripe.  Lots of squeezing tomatoes I guess:  

  

The first beans are Burpee's Stringless Green Pod, though the Royal Purple Bush beans (not pictured) are running a close second:

 

See how much better the weather is (knock wood) -- basil that's not rotting: 

 

The mystery bush in a long weedy hedgerow on our evening walk:

 

We walked down to Dave & Dottie's house, which we do several times a week.  Remember them?  They gave me my first dahlias last year and serve as inspiration for all who pass by their home.  Walking by their garden these days smells like walking into a florist shop.  They have easily a hundred lilies blooming right now.  Their dahlias are all in, growing like crazy, carefully staked and labeled:

 

I love all the different types of hosta under the tree:

 

Some of the scads of lilies:

 

I don't know what this was (can anyone identify it? I remember seeing it on someone's blog not too long ago), but it was sharing space on an obelisk with a clematis.  Each bloom? seedhead? was about the size of a silver dollar.  Definitely calendar-worthy:

 

Nor do I have any idea what these Dr. Seuss-like plants were:

 

But the bees were loving them:

 

I have to go into the office on Thursday, so no time in the aqua-lounger for me, but VPH is going to complete the mulching and mow the lawn, so he said he might relax in it once he finishes if he and the weather are warm enough.  Remember, don't laugh!

WHAT A TEAM!

VPH and I are quite the team.  On Monday morning he weeded the hosta/rhododendron bed (which could use a little mulch):

And weeded the hosta/azalea bed and put a circle of stones around it (which needs a lot of mulch...and don't laugh at his odd circle, he's going to adjust it as he finds more stones):

He finished weeding the veggie garden and driveway for me too -- that's love.  Once I completed my workday I went out and did my share.  Peppermint and a calibrachoa in the veggie garden:

 

It's tough to see, but those are marigolds in with the tomatoes and dahlias planted in the actual soil (gasp!) between containers : 

 

More marigolds in the tomato containers -- those with blooms are nursery grown, those without were grown from seed:

 

The rest of the herb seedlings I grew from seed went into larger containers cause I just couldn't bear to toss them.  This is about the sunniest spot in my garden (at 6pm):

 

The coleus I stuck in the empty spot in this container looks really red for some reason.  It's much more burgundy in real life:

Some really pink impatiens in the blank spots here:

 

White in this one:

 

I trimmed back the petunias, moved the basket of glaring pink petunias to another hook elsewhere and replaced it with a different hanging container with the 2 recently purchased and newly planted coral pink petunias:

 

One of VPH's tasks for Tuesday is to plant the rest of the coleus in a row along the rocks here, which involves pulling up the tree roots growing in a mat on top of the soil:

And that is it!  The table is clear:

Now we're down to mulching and tidying up.  For instance I want to come up with a better solution for the coiled hoses here.  Any suggestions would be welcome:

And the shed, we still need to do the shed project.  We've run out of more urgent tasks though, so I should be able to guilt VPH and SS2 into helping me get this done.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

In honor of the day:

 

What is it about the Fourth of July, idiots, and fireworks?  I hate, absolutely hate, that any tool can walk into the grocery store and buy fireworks.  What happened to the good old days when nothing was legal in CT?  And what is the definition of sparkler anyway?  I swear some of the things I hear going off cannot be sparklers.  Can you tell that my ass of a neighbor has been setting off really loud fireworks for hours already and it's just getting dark now?  Well we have the Independence Day DVD playing and we've had our burgers, dogs, potato salad, corn on the cob, and strawberry shortcake.  VPH, SS2, and I honored the wishes of our forefathers today by each pursuing our own happiness.  VPH cooked up a storm, read a book in the sun, and hung out with SS2 listening to The Beach Boys Pet Sounds.  No one asked SS2 to do a single thing today.  And me?  I gardened my butt off!  First up was the Jet Star tomato plant purchased earlier this week:

 

I decided it could stay on the bar since I really only care about it giving us the tomatoes already on it.  The weak stake the garden center used snapped over under the weight of the plant at some point.  I decided that trying to stake it back up was going to be too difficult and would only result in tomato loss or breakage, so I grabbed some heavy rocks (one thing we have a lot of is rocks) and filled the opposite side of the container which will hopefully prevent the tomato from flipping off the bar:

 

Then I gave it a haircut to hopefully allow for better air circulation.  Now you can see that there are already a few tomatoes ripening:

 

Then I turned to photograph the 4 daylilies that bloomed today and my frustration with the patio garden became too much for me:

 

I cut back the grasses that had bent, pulled the daffodil and tulip foliage remaining (if they didn't get enough nutrients to come back next year oh well), moved the struggling zucchini over to a sunnier spot, relocated the birdbath, planted a few more dahlias and caged them, cut down the stalks from the deadheaded iris blooms, and weeded:

I stopped for a moment to admire the blossoms on one of the bush beans (don't remember which one):

 

And then did some more weeding of the vegetable garden, planted some dahlias in the ground (not pictured), hooked up the hose cart (but not the hose to the cart yet since watering hasn't really been an issue), planted beans where they never came up, and spread some mulch:

 

I still have a lot of work to do there:

A friend of ours just sold her house and will be moving to Colorado to be closer to her sons and grandchildren.  We were talking about the process of divesting oneself of 30 plus years of stuff and she said she still had some left -- marble chips and bricks -- I said when can I come over?  The bag of marble chips will go down around the grill since we can always use more rocks there, and now I have 50 mostly whole bricks with which to play:

 

VPH entertained himself by making a little wall as he unloaded them from my trunk.   I think I know where I'll be putting them, but for now they'll just sit by the front of the house...fingers crossed that they don't walk away from there.   I hope you're all having a fun, safe holiday!

IT WAS A GLORIOUS DAY UNTIL...

Luckily there was no lasting damage.  A few pics from before the storm.  Royal Purple Bush beans:

 

I'm ridiculously happy to see dahlias blooming and bees in the garden again:

 

This is pretty close to what I was expecting the patio garden to look like, but not so much with the grass this early:

 

Not sure what happened here.  It's been sitting on the potting table for months without incident.  Could an animal have attacked?  I cleaned it up and put it into a large Ziploc bag:

 

And after the rain I'm even less pleased with the grass flopping all over the place.  I may very well go out and cut it all back tomorrow:

 

I really have a lot of planting to do tomorrow since my mental stop date is the 4th of July.  I'll be up and out there early, I just hope it doesn't rain.

I JUST CAN'T RESIST A SALE

Before I get started...this is the bush that I'm trying to identify.  I posted a close-up of the bloom the other day.  They're used as hedges all over our neighborhood and the blooms smell rather honeysuckle-like.  A little help, please:

Back to "I Just Can't Resist a Sale"...

But if I told you could get everything on the table and both chairs for a total of $24.34, could you?

 

VPH made chicken salad on Wednesday with some leftover grilled chicken (which had been seasoned with herbes de provence).  It was delicious (like all his food), but we both wished we had fresh tarragon on hand.  I know that at some point in the spring I asked him if we should grow tarragon and he said no, but I should have known better.  I also never got around to dividing the 2 eggplants and using the funky new box/planter for one of them (now that they're flowering I'm loathe to mess with them), so I had the brilliant idea of buying one of those nursery tomato plants with fruit already growing on them that I've been seeing all over the place (including the grocery store) so we could get a ripe tomato before August (even if I do agree with Carol that it's cheating).  I had a $15 certificate for Van Wilgens so off we went.  I used the $15 certificate to get tarragon, fernleaf dill, silver thyme, and fernleaf cilantro and paid $1.02 out of pocket (I know, I wouldn't normally pay $3.99 an herb plant either): 

You're wondering where the petunias and ornamental edible peppers came from?  The tomato plants at Van Wilgens that had fruit already were $25 each.  Well I may be crazy, but I'm not nuts enough to pay $25 for a tomato plant, so I passed and decided to go to Vaiuso.  I'm telling you, I love that place.  Remember the $1 perennial herbs I picked up there a few weeks ago?  Just about everything's a $1 now.  I got tired of waiting for this:

To look like this:

 

That's marigolds, coleus, parsley, and basil all $1/each.  I'll transplant my grown from seed tiny little plants into larger pots and see if they'll do anything for me, but like I said, I am tired of waiting.  Speaking of being tired of waiting I picked up this tomato plant for $8.  Yup, $8.  I love Vaiuso so much!  More on this tomato when I get it into a container:

 

I took a brief walking tour of the garden and found tiny little flowers just forming on the scarlet runner beans:

Then I sat down for a well-deserved hour reading.  Every now and again I looked up from my chair to the freshly mowed lawn, my humongous hydrangea, and blooming/nearly blooming dahlias: 

 

Then I'd look a little to the left and think about all the work we still have to do putting up the new shed, taking down the 2 old ones, a new project I'll tell you about soon, reorganizing everything...oh well back to my book:

 

Before I headed inside I did a photo session with a spider on the eggplant cage.  I can't decide which of these photos is more calendar-worthy.  A good close-up:

 

Or a more interesting composition:

 

Do let me know what you think.

IT SMELLS LIKE SUMMER

The rain's back, but hopefully not to stay.  At least it's much warmer than June was, even on an overcast, rainy, cloudy day the thermometer's at about 75 right now.  These photos range from 1 week ago to today, but give a decent view of what's developing in the garden.  First up -- zucchini flowers!  Not likely that we'll be grilling our own zucchini on the 4th of July as we have years past, but at least they're flowering at last:

 

Beans!  I'm hoping it stays warm and dry enough to get the rest of my beans in this weekend, but all the bush beans that survived the rains are flowering: 

 

And the vining bean varieties are growing (and yes that's still the new shed under a tarp, hopefully this next week will see the shed project get underway):

 

I can't for the life of me remember what kind of bush my friend said this was.  Can anyone tell from the flower (it's about 3 inches long)?  It smells rather honeysuckle like and wafting in through the living room window reminds me of my childhood:

 

I was pretty excited to see hosta leaves at long last from one of the bareroot hostas I planted this spring:

 

The beautiful blooming lamium that I can see from the living room (and I don't care if it is practically a weed in your garden...it's pretty in this container!):

VPH has since raked this area, but I'm too lazy to go out and take a new photo:

 

And then today in the middle of the rain showers another daylily (this looks orangey on my monitor, but it's almost burgundy in real life):

 

And the first plum tomatoes:

 

The first Parkland Glow dahlia, but it's a much darker red in real life:

 

The eggplants are flowering!!!  VPH was very happy:

 

I wanted to get out into the garden today but it's so cloudy that the mosquitoes are out in force and I just can't do it.  Tomorrow, even if it is supposed to be "humid" according to the weatherman, will be better than spending days scratching bites.

OVERHEARD

I live on a small one-way street and in the summer we keep our windows open.  We don't get many people walking down our street so when I hear people outside my Mrs. Kravitz comes out.  Sunday afternoon I heard quite a ruckus and turned around to see what was going on outside.  It was a group of about 6 adults clearly enjoying the break in the rain with a walk.  And then as they passed the house I heard: "That's pretty."  I saw several of them turn and look back at this view:

"Oh, yes it is." 

Well my heart swelled. 

I also took advantage of the lull in the rain by walking my garden for the first time this week.  I really have no idea how much rain we've gotten, but I did just read that the area has received more than 2.5 times the norm for June already.  But even with only rare sunshine some things are blooming.  Lamium:

 

My first blooming dahlias!  It's the micro-mini plant:

But the Bay State Angel isn't too far behind:

There's nightshade in the bastard garden:

The hydrangea:

Which is just loving this weather:

It's funny that all of a sudden the Japanese painted fern is showing color since I was lusting after these on the garden tour last week in other people's gardens.  Who knew I already had one:

 

VPH can't get over the grass sprouting on top of the blue stone after the dirt and seed washed down in the first of the torrential downpours: 

 

I really must get mulch down, these beans turned, and string trellises up:

 

Something's eating the heck out of the scarlet runner beans, but I remember the morning glories were hit just as hard in this spot last year:

 

And the vegetable garden (complete with weeds) is growing like crazy:

 

If the rain is keeping me out of the garden, at least its not keeping me out of the stores.  Some new garden additions include glow-in-the-dark stepping stones (the white parts glow):

 

I thought it was cute that the moon glowed on this one:

This one is a little too cutesy for me, but buried under the grass the cheesy inscribed saying isn't too noticeable:

And the local garden center was selling perennial herbs for $1/each.  How could I not buy a few, or eight?  2 peppermints (one is for my friend Mary), 1 pineapple mint (which has one albino stalk), 3 purple sages, and 2 lemon sages:

And you think I'm kidding about the rain?  Any idea what this is:

Did you guess the bottom of my bird feeder?  Not sure what I'm going to do about this yet, I'd kind of like to see what plants we'd get:

 

How's your garden surviving the deluge?

WELL THIS IS ALL MY FAULT...

It seems like without fail if I water, it rains the next day.  Yes, we had 3 sunny days in a row starting last Saturday, but I got a mid-range sunburn after sitting outside for 45 minutes that day reading with VPH.  No gardening for me the rest of the weekend.  Tuesday was the first rainy day of what is predicted to be 2 weeks of rainy weather and it brought absolute deluges at times.  Really good for the grass seed VPH put down on Sunday (that's the bluestone lintel in front of the little shed):

Once that dries out I'll re-scatter it.  Lest you think I'm engaging in hyperbole about the torrential downpours...clearly a river ran through here:

Much of the rest of the garden is looking lush with all the rain.  I think it would benefit from some sun myself.  The shade containers are lovely and full:

 

Well most of them are:

 

This lamium is staging a coup in the big square blue container:

 

Pull it back and you find some teeny tiny astible growing:

 

I'm loving this container with the Purple Gem rhododendron, creeping jenny, and impatiens:

But its twin on the other side of the steps is lagging behind (must be that this one gets slightly more sun):

I have to guess that the excess rain led this coleus to fail (the coleus is the single stalk in the empty spot):

And there are buds on this dahlia (micro-mini)!  Aren't they beautiful:

If the soil ever dries out at all I will move the purple fountain grass over a little to balance the container.  I took the few stalks of coleus left and stuck them in the seedling tray hoping that they would set roots in there:

And a few in the cup of water like the basil:

Which is almost ready to plant:

As long as I'm on this side of the house...every day I've had to empty the overflowing drain tray so my seedlings don't drown:

The dahlias don't seem to be suffering from all the rain and I found a taker for 1/2 of the pass-along plants from my friend Mary so I will pick 4 of these 8 to keep tomorrow:

I didn't think I would get the first ripe strawberry and sure enough the birds beat me to it.  But I cut off the very bottom to taste and it was delish:

Moving toward the veggie garden, the germination rate of the sunflower seeds along the house foundation wasn't great, or I just can't recognize the smaller varieties:

The hydrangea is promising many beautiful flowers:

Some of the beans must have rotted, like this container with a 0% germination rate:

I'm not stressing about it though, I'll just consider it unintentional succession planting.  That is, of course, provided the rain ever stops and I can plant more beans.  The scarlet runner beans have huge leaves and are already starting to climb:

The planter table containing the Royal Purple Bush beans must have flooded during the rain:

Lots of carrots, decent germination on beans (which I must remember to turn and give netting to climb up soon), and more signs of the rain that washed through (note to self - mulch ASAP):

Finally!  Blossoms on the Husky cherry tomato plants: 

 

And many of the heirloom tomato plants (though I didn't note which one this is): 

 

Continuing the tour, let's move on to the patio garden.  Bit of a jungle:

But not out of control.  The foliage from the tulips and daffodils is finally starting to yellow.  The moonflowers are starting to climb (and the clematis is still alive there in the middle):

 

The grass along the back is blooming.  Pretty:

This cracks me up.  I noticed that one half of the siberian iris clump second from the left didn't bloom, but I thought it was just an oddity.  Nope, turns out it was a day-lily after all:

  

The clump to its left has a single stalk coming up from the middle, so I guess there's some lily there too:

 

Last, but certainly not least, my new lavender is about to bloom!  I'm loving this spot more each day:

 

Saturday will be spent at the Guilford Secret Garden Tour.  Which reminds me, I'd better charge my camera battery now.  I just hope the forecasted break in the rain holds for long enough.

UM YEAH, THEY'RE IRISES

As several people wrote to tell me (thanks, ladies), the plants with buds that I thought were day-lilies turned out to be Siberian irises.  Much to my and my friend Mary's surprise:

 

They're beautiful and a darker purple than they appear in the photos:

I still have to mulch the patio garden, but it's looking pretty good:

These petunias are almost obnoxiously pink and I'm not sure if I like them or not: 

 

But I'm loving these, a double petal flower?  I had no idea when I bought them:

 

And I liked the colors and textures of the bud on the perilla:

 

I stopped into Joann Fabric for a ribbon of all things and their garden stuff was 50% off.  I couldn't resist this adorable wind-chime for $9.99.  I can even drill drainage holes in the bucket and stuff a little plant in there.  Now what plant and where am I going to hang it:

 

It took visiting 3 different stores to find small tomato cages for the other 4 dahlias here:

 

The sunflowers along the wall are popping up, but something's eating their leaves:

 

I have Royal Purple Bush beans and nasturtiums in the planter table, but one of the cucumber seedlings didn't make it:

I'm pretty excited about all these carrot seedlings:

 

I wonder what today will bring?

I HATE WHEN WORK CURTAILS GARDENING

Once upon a time I worked a job that kept me out of the house from 7:00am to 7:30pm.  This evening I arrived home after an unusually long day at the office at 7:30pm and was reminded that there was a good reason why this is only my 3rd season gardening.  I'm not the kind of person who could only garden on the weekends.  I feel for those of you who have to squeeze in a few minutes in the morning or evening and do the bulk of your work on the weekends.  I don't know how you do it!

Over the past few rainy days (you can always tell a non-gardener when they complain about a rainy day after a week of beautiful sun), I've found a few minutes to run outside and snap a few pics, though not many minutes nor many pics.  No idea what this pretty little flower was, but it made me smile:

  

The scarlet runner beans are coming up:

 

As are the Kentucky wonder beans:

 

Lots of radishes, but what do I do about thinning them?  Really, tell me:

 

Some little, tiny carrots:

 

And I think the buds were prettier than the flowers:

 

Still have to mulch and get that damn shed up.

#@$^@$# THING STRUCK AGAIN

And this time I'm really upset.  What ever the fuck it is broke off two fiddle-heads in the largest shade container (now full of plastic forks, but too late):

And it went for the hosta in the upper container again (which now has even more forks):

Further annoying me, the loud, trashy neighbors put up one of those self-supporting blue pools today while we were out.  This is not good, not good at all:

 

But we do have two flowers on the rhododendron, so that cheered me up a little:

 

And man, those radishes do pop up quickly:

 

Whatever is attacking my shade containers had better stop.  I am getting really pissed.

A MARAUDER!

I walked outside on Friday afternoon, looked up at my container on the stump and gasped:

  

It was even worse up close.  What interloper would have the gall to dig up my hosta:

 

I replanted the hosta and filled in the other small holes.  I had clear plastic forks on hand and really hope they 1.) prevent any further attacks, and 2.) don't hurt any animals in the process:

 

You can't even see them from below:

I never tire of the fiddle-heads on the ferns.  Should I ever do a vertical calendar (doubtful) this would be calendar-worthy, I may even print and frame this pic I like it that much:

 

I suddenly realized on Friday morning that the tomatoes in the pretty blue pots by the fence on the side of the house weren't getting enough sun.  The sun hits the top of the fence around 9:30am, but doesn't get down to the bottom until nearly 11am and then the shadow from the house covers the whole side of the house by 2:30pm, so they had to move to the gravel patio. 

Friday afternoon we went out to Old Saybrook to visit Carole at Maynard Greenhouse.  After a pleasant but short vist (Carole was working and I had VPH in tow and he's not endlessly patient), we headed towards home with 2 Cherokee Purple tomato seedlings (you didn't think I could visit a greenhouse without buying something did you?).  We passed two Ocean State Job Lots on the way home, so of course we had to pop in to see what containers they had left.  Success! 

 

The two blue square ceramic containers on the ends were only $37 each.  Look at the size of the those things!  They each took 2 cubic feet of potting soil and a Cherokee Purple tomato:

 

I really like the splash of color they give the patio.  I asked VPH if he thought we should get a blue umbrella now.  He laughed and said we could put a white tablecloth on the table and celebrate the 4th of July all summer.  Note that the containers of beans are now inside the trellises:

 

The patio garden is growing like mad.  See the lupine in front?  I think it may actually flower.  The herb pots are all planted up now:

I love this photo.  If I had planted the cilantro and dill and taken this photo on Friday, I would have entered it into the GGW photo contest:

I have a feeling that variations of this angle will be a frequent subject this summer as the herbs fill in.  But I include another here so you can see all the herbs growing on the corner.  Back row left to right -- spearmint, basil, rosemary, lavender (goodwin creek); middle row left to right -- lavender (I gave this some fertilizer today, it has growth, but it's taking its sweet time to come back), fernleaf dill, lemon thyme; and at the front right -- cilantro (I picked up this pot on Friday too...hey at only $8 how could I not?):

And while I'm in the patio garden...the moonflowers are growing nicely with a new set of leaves and I was shocked to see the clematis growing down at the bottom of this photo (sorry it's out of focus), I thought for sure it was dead.  Now if I can just get it to grow towards the trellis:

We're still trying to get the grass to fill in before we put the chairs back in their normal spot, so for now we'll relax here:

 

The greenhouse went back into the basement today and the containers and furniture are in their rightful spots:

 

I'm quite pleased:

 

All of the dahlias are really taking off this year.  Small cages will go on each of these containers as soon as I can find 4 more:

This is essentially my to do list now.  The hose has to go on the fence so I can get running water to the vegetable garden, fresh mulch needs to go onto all the mulched areas, and the plants all have to be potted up (though I'm still not sure what to do with all the impatiens):

 

The new shed needs to be assembled and then the rest of the mess will be stored away out of sight.  We're close now.

DELAY OF GAME

Well I'm freezing.  The rain brought some rather chilly temps with it.  I am now waiting for it to warm up some before I plant the beans and sunflowers that I've been soaking:

 

There's 2 varieties of beans in a few of the cups (and 3 types of sunflowers):

 

But I'll refrain from boring you until I actually plant them.  There will also be carrots (3 types), radishes (2 types), nasturiums, zinnias, and more moonflowers.  Stay tuned, Tuesday's supposed to be a beautiful day.

THREE PEOPLE GET A LOT MORE DONE THAN JUST ONE

VPH and SS2 joined me in the garden this afternoon and started by planting my Mother's Day gift of an azalea, my recent hosta purchases, and passalong hostas from my friend Mary:

 

VPH dug up the rescued hosta from the bastard garden and I set all of them out in sort of a two line arrangement.  I went off to do other stuff and was called back to view the finished project, which will henceforth be known as the Mother's Day garden:

A little bit tighter grouping than I would have done and a little strange from above, but when I walked down the hill, which honestly is how I will normally see this garden...I like it!  Pardon the slightly blurry photo, the only one I had from this angle:

 

Can you see it all the way out there on the right:

I was right, the Elijah Blue Fescue (a perennial!) is perfect in that new container:

 

The "Oriental" eggplants went into the large container together, but I think they'll have plenty of room.  Two ever-bearing strawberries went into each of the two tall containers, and one in the little one.  More on the herb container later:

When I rearrange the furniture I may move the Green Zebra tomato pots.  They're shoved against the bench because the cages are just missing the petunias hanging on each post:

 

And as you can see, I should be putting the greenhouse away any day now and rearranging the furniture:

 

Oh, and I finally figured out what to do with the bee balm that Layanee gave me last year when I visited her garden.  I was concerned about what I read on-line concerning the propensity of bee balm to spread like mint, so I was hesitant to put it in the ground or one of my herb containers.  So I settled on a smallish container in the frog sculpture because I will always think of the frogs when I think of Layanee's garden:

Once VPH and SS2 finished the Mother's Day garden, I set them to work on the project that had been keeping me from planting the vegetable garden.  I asked them to take soil out of the containers leaving them two thirds full, mix in tasty tomato and veggie natural fertilizer to the potting soil in the wheelbarrow, and top off the containers.  I don't know if that's the best way to do it, but that's the method that we came up with.  All I can say is thank God they are so helpful.  I was dreading doing it myself.  The veggie garden is mostly planted now:

From left to right I planted habaneros in the hanging planters and Brandywine tomatoes in the trellis planter (note the new larger cages this year):

Lilac bell peppers:

 

Purple bell peppers in the green containers and Black Russian tomatoes in the trellis planter.  The trough planters to the left and the 2 brown containers are all prepped for beans, but since we're expecting lots of rain on Sunday, I didn't plant them yet:

 

This last container is new to the veggie garden.  I planted 2 Perfect Plum tomatoes and 2 habaneros in it.  I think there's enough room: 

 

Two Bandywine Pink tomato plants on the gravel patio again this year and the planter table will be full of bush beans and probably a cucumber growing from each end (again holding off on planting until after the rain).  You can just see 2 large round gray containers in back.  They will have more beans in them, but I was just too tired to lift up the trellises and place them inside:

 

You may have noticed that I didn't show an individual photo of the really big containers in the middle of the veggie garden.  I'm about 80% sure they'll have carrots in them, but I haven't actually sown any seed yet.

I've had VPH saving his coffee grounds for about a month to fertilize the hydrangea.  I'll throw mulch on top when we get to doing that in other portions of the garden, but it looked pretty like this:

 

I finally bought longer screws so if you're driving down a road in Branford and see this, you've found Heather's Garden:

 

I am quite pleased with these containers by the front steps:

 

Don't they just say welcome, a gardener lives here:

 

Walk around the corner and you'll know for sure that a gardener lives here:

But at least my potting table is nicely organized:

Speaking of organizing, I need to decide what is going in the herb barrel and what's going in the blue ceramic container.  I have creeping thyme, sage, chives (half of that huge clump is going to Mary), golden oregano, thyme, hot & spicy oregano, garlic chives (3), golden sage, lemon grass, golden oregano, basil, rosemary (2), and purple sage:

The problem is, I'm growing a bunch of herbs from seed and they're not big enough to throw into a large container yet.  The Cilantro will go into a small pot on the retaining wall, but I need to find a spot for the fernleaf dill and fennel:

 

Sweet basil, Purple Ruffles basil, and Cinnamon basil:

 

Two of the cucumbers will go in the planter table and two of the zucchini will go in the front of the patio garden to grow over the fading daffodil, tulip, and crocus foliage:

 

The marigolds will be planted in with the tomatoes and if the coleus ever gets big enough to transplant, I'll find a spot for them on the shady side of the house:

 

The shallow trough by the trellis will be home to more moonflowers, but isn't the rest of it looking good:

 

So Sunday will be spent examining seeds for about the 80th time, soaking beans and sunflower seeds to ready them for planting, and probably diagramming herb plantings, because yes, I am that obsessive!

FAILURE

A complete and total failure to achieve my objective of having everything planted by May 15th.  Mother Nature and the corporate overlord conspired to keep me down.  It poured on Thursday but it didn't matter, I had so much work to do I couldn't get away from my computer.  Then it was absolutely gorgeous on Friday, but I had promised to stuff invitations at that non-profit arts organization for which I serve on the board of directors.  By the time I got home, the gardening day was over.  I did however, make some time this evening with VPH and SS2 to stop by a few locations that sell plants.

The green hostas are a passalong from my friend Mary, but I bought the white tipped ones.  I also had to buy the golden oregano, it's next to the one that over wintered and I'm just not doing a great job waiting for it to grow:

I'll be reading up on ever-bearing strawberries because I came home with six of them, along with a golden sage and a lemon grass:

I bought a blue fesco grass for a theoretical pot to complete this trio (remember it from the other day?):

 

The pot selection at Ocean State Job Lot was rather slim, but I was pretty happy with the 4 pots that came home with me (the 3 small blue ones will be used for strawberries) and the blue fescue grass will be perfect in that container:

 

You may have noticed that the shower is gone in the second photo.  I didn't use it at all last year.  Yes, a hose pointed up in the air does exactly the same thing.  So I threw it up on freecycle tonight.  If you're a local reader and would like it, send me an email: 

On the to do list:

• Plant azalea and hostas in new border garden (this is VPH's job)
• Plant the vegetable garden
• Plant zinnias
• Plant sunflowers
• Go through the gazillion seeds I have and see what I'm forgetting
• Plant up herb barrel and blue pot of herbs
• Get new shed up

I'm still behind where I was this time last year in terms of seed-sowing, but ahead in terms of planting.  My new goal is to have everything in by Memorial Day.  Fingers crossed, all!

YOU CAN GET A LOT DONE IN 3 HOURS

I was getting pretty sick of stepping over all of these pots:

 

Three hours later I'm down to:

I went simple and easy with the dahlias and emptied about half of the soil out of each container (the old soil went into large containers that will be used for vegetables), examined the dahlia tubers as I went, and then I topped off the containers with new Miracle Gro potting soil.  The five pots along the cellar doors went right back over there:

This container had annuals in it last year, but this year I decided to put the Ebony Star dahlia in it.  It was a very late bloomer last year, so I decided to put some calibrochoa in there too for some visual interest while I'm waiting for the dahlia to grow:

I like this pairing, but I really think I need a third container here: 

 

Looks good with three, but not this purple one...it needs a green (and I'm not sure what to plant in it once I buy one):

 

I can't really arrange these containers until I put the greenhouse away and the furniture goes into the proper location:

 

I even planted two dahlias in the patio garden amongst the irises -- a platinum blond and this hootenanny.  We'll see how it works out:

 

I also planted 2 calibrochoa in a hanging planter: 

 

Yet another addition to the shady side of the house.  This was the last container with a dahlia in it and the tubers had rotted.  Perfect vessel for the 3 tiny ferns I had growing on the kitchen table (on the left):

I have to say I'm pretty happy with the way things are looking over here:

And lastly...the first tomato has been planted!  A Green Zebra heirloom plant in a matching large ceramic pot on each side of this bench:

I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!

THAT SMELL

The scent of tomato plants and herbs.  OMG, I'm swooning.  My friend Mary and I assaulted North Guilford Nurseries Saturday afternoon.  $119.78 will buy you:

 

Aren't they pretty:

 

The greenhouse is in full effect:

 

VPH brought the dahlias up from the basement today.  Three had significant growth including this one:

 

The others aren't so growy:

But you know what is: 

 

More details to follow on the specific plants as they go into the soil, but oh the scent of those tomatoes and herbs on my lap during the drive back to Mary's house from the nursery.  I missed that smell over the winter.

BEFORE MY ARMS GET SO STIFF I CAN'T TYPE

VPH really did most of the "heavy lifting" this weekend, starting on Thursday.  Luckily his school vacation (have I mentioned he teaches?) coincided with the first truly lovely days we've had this spring.  Call us wusses, but we're not gardening unless it's over 55 and sunny (or over 65 and cloudy)!

He got rid of all the leaves along both sides of the house on Thursday (believe it or not, we actually have more grass this year than we did last year):

For one reason and another I didn't end up helping very much on Friday despite taking the day off of work specifically to do so.  But on Saturday I jumped right in and cleaned up the Endless Summer hydrangea:

My next task for the day was to get this garden cleaned up:

 

First VPH vacuumed up the leaves for me:

 

But then I cleaned up all the old grass and day lily foliage by hand and weeded the rest of the bed (I hate marsh marigolds so much):

So much nicer, but I think I'll wait a little while to put down fresh mulch:

I also planted a bare-root clematis in front of the right-hand trellis.  I had planned on planting two, one in front of each trellis, but when I opened up the package only one was in there.  We'll see if the one I planted actually grows.  I may have to buy more mature plants down the road. 

I just love sitting on the patio looking at all the happy daffodils (the tulips look to be a day or two from blooming):

I did find a remnant of the wildflower garden, a lupine, growing in front of the row of bulbs and I decided to leave it and see if it actually blooms for me this year:

Speaking of unexpected flowers...this is right smack dab in the middle of VPH's bastard garden.  Anyone know exactly what it is?  About 6-8 inches tall and in such an awkward spot I couldn't bend over to see if there was a scent.  It sort of looks hyacinth-like to me:

 

The sad looking broken bamboo fence is now down, soon to be replaced with a 6' tall x 16' wide reed fence and VPH has cleared all the leaves from this area (the hostas are hiding under all the marsh marigolds):

The forsythia is in full bloom:

I think this mum is coming back, but I think it's highly unlikely that I will go to the trouble of finding a sunny place to keep it and waiting all the way until the fall for it to bloom:

The Branford fern is all fiddle-heads: 

 

The cute little astible (and yes, the perennial shade garden needs weeding and mulch desperately):

 

Today (Sunday) I planted up 3 new containers with shade perennials for the side of the house by the grill where the trees were removed.  Bare-root hostas and astible predominantly, though you can just see the creeping jenny that overwintered in a hanging planter on the top right (creeping jenny has turned out to be just about unkillable in my garden):

 

I can't say yet if I'm going to like this area or not.  I'm planning impatiens in any blank spots for all the containers and we still have to put the grill back.  In a month or so I should be happier:

There is much work still to do.  Including locating and probably transplanting all the perennial herbs like this woolly thyme:

Finally cleaning up the vegetable garden and prepping containers for new plantings:

And the biggest job of all...assembling the new shed, which VPH and I are both dreading.  It's in this box (now covered by a weighed down tarp), the foundation is in a box in our kitchen and its anticipated location will be the site of the current ripped shed at the back of the garden:

Our plan is to assemble the foundation on the gravel patio, get an accurate measurement and then build a simple gravel base surrounded by 2x4s just like the gravel patio, build the shed on our nice level concrete patio, and then move it to its final location (which will hopefully be level).  This will be our most ambitious plan to date and you can clearly see why we're not excited about doing it.  It may quite possibly be put on hold until SS2 comes home from college and can help out.

PEOPLE ACTUALLY THINK I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING!

I've been getting emails from people asking my advice about gardening.  I guess I'm a little past novice gardener now, but certainly I'm a long way from expert.  Here's an inquiry I received today:

Hi Heather!

 

This is my first year gardening and I'm doing snow peas too.  I noticed in your pics that your leaves have tiny white spots on them.  Mine have those too.  Is that disease or something I should be concerned about.  Also, there are very tiny black round bugs clustering on the leaves.  Maybe about 5 or 6 at a time.  Any idea what those are?  Thanks for your help!

 

Jenn

And this was my response:

Jenn,

Congratulations on joining the gardening world!  It is really fun.  I don't think I'm the right person to ask about peas though.  I've never had much luck with them.  From my on-line research, I think my white spots were from too much nitrogen, which is impossible to control in pre-mixed potting soil.  But whether that's the answer to your problem or what you can do about it?  I don't know, nor do I know what the tiny black round bugs could be.  I have found in my gardening adventures that plants produce pretty well despite my obsessing over every little thing that doesn't look "right."  Granted, sometimes things are really wrong, but some amount of bugs and stuff is pretty normal, especially if you're gardening organically.

Sorry!  Wish I could be more helpful,

Heather

Readers who actually know what you're doing -- did I answer correctly?  Got any advice for Jenn?  And Jenn, thanks for the wonderful compliment of asking for my help.  I'm very touched.

LAST HARVEST?

I haven't had a ripe tomato in I don't remember when, but I'm still getting something of a harvest:

 

And that's all I've got.  Instead of working in the garden today I went shopping and along with some new fall clothes, got this cool canvas print for $1.99 at Kohl's:

 

And this china platter for $2.99 (it's a much darker blue than it appears here and the pen is for scale):

 

Nothing else is going on at all.  I'm a complete slacker so I haven't gotten around to planting all those bulbs yet.  But I will.  Soon.  Really.  I swear.

LAST NEW PROJECT OF THE YEAR

I've been collecting bulbs as they've appeared for sale in the stores that I frequent.  The top row was acquired at BJs, the bottom row at Home Depot with a buy one get one free coupon:

 

My intention was to get them in the ground today, but it's only 50 degrees out there, cloudy, and it looks like rain, so instead I'm going to sit in front of the TV and veg.  So you get to see a few photos I took yesterday when it was much nicer out, but I wasn't ready to get dirty yet...oh well. 

I still can't believe that I'm getting so many ripe Red Peter peppers:

 

Even if they don't look like peters at all.  I'm going to try and dry them on the bottom shelf of the bar on the patio, one of the sunnier spots in the garden these days:

 

It's been pretty wet and cool and I'm finding mushrooms everywhere:

 

Still lots of bees buzzing around the dahlias (this one is Platinum Blond):

 

Keep your fingers crossed for warmer weather so I can get those bulbs in without numb fingers.  Some of the packages say plant at 6 inches, some 4 inches, and others 3 inches -- I'm thinking one trench at about 4 inches deep out of sheer laziness.  Those of you with bulb experience -- is that a horrible idea?

CREEPY!

On this last day of September there are too many signs of the rapid approach of Halloween in my garden:

 

That's a morning glory leaf the spider's hiding beneath:

 

It's a beautiful web:

 

This is some of the last planting I'll do this year.  Rhododendron 'Purple Gem' and creeping jenny in matching containers flanking the front door (don't you love the slope of our parking area?):

 

This is hysterical...I clipped some basil and left it in water in a container on the kitchen table.  For weeks we grabbed from it as needed until one day I noticed that roots had developed on the stalks beneath the water.  Well I wanted some to grow in the kitchen over the winter, so I potted up 3 stalks:

 

The large vegetable garden around the corner is looking pretty sad:

 

Their zinnias are large, but they just scream fall to me: 

 

Crafty people must drive by and covet those drying cornstalks:

 

Are the signs of autumn in your garden throwing you into a fall funk like me?

IT FEELS LIKE HARVEST-TIME AROUND HERE

I am actually awed that I have red Red Peter peppers (try saying that sentence fast):

The Big Early Bell peppers are big, but they weren't that early: 

I still have eggplant blossoms (calendar-worthy?): 

 

And Ichiban eggplants:

 

Skip this one if you're squeamish.  I found this hanging off a branch on the tomatoes -- at least it's dead:

 

This is a much prettier photo -- I'm getting a second crop on the Husky Cherry tomato plant:

 

Isn't it interesting how 2 photos of the same subject can be so different in mood?  Taken about 20 seconds apart and of the same plant.  One reads spring:

 

The other fall:

 

The harvests are really slowing down:

 

But the veggie garden still looks good (ignore the pile for the compost bin in front of the hose cart):

 

I'm going to miss fresh tomatoes so much when they're done.

LET ME BRIGHTEN UP YOUR DAY

Another dahlia is finally in bloom.  This one is the Platinum Blonde:

And two days later:

 

Now it and a few of my other dahlias seem to be covered in ants.  Should I be worried?  Should I do something about it?

This Aitara Majesty dahlia is so close to blooming for the first time: 

 

Some of my containers look like crap after 5 months.  Time for some new color.  At 4 for $10 I decided there were 8 mums that had to come home with me: 

This mum bloom (lower left side of the above photo) looks so much like a dahlia:

This bell pepper pool made me smile imagining it as a watering hole for the bug population: 

This creepy spider was on the underside of a Red Peter pepper leaf: 

And the last bit of color is Wednesday's harvest.  The red bell pepper from above, 4 Brandywine Pink tomatoes, beans, dahlias, and zinnias make for a colorful composition: 

 

And pretty tasty meal or two!  We're knee deep (well ankle deep at least) in planting the new patio garden, so I should have a pretty good post for you Monday morning.

WE MADE IT THROUGH THE STORM

Tropical Storm Hanna (and the thunderstorm that preceded it Friday night) brought us 5 inches of rain in about 24 hours.  There were high winds, but other than a few downed branches:

 

And a near miss or two:

 

The biggest inconvenience was a 30-second power outage during Hanna.  Best of all my tomatoes seem to have come through unscathed:

  

They're good and bent, but no fruit lost:

  

Even the jungle mess looks good in its own way (on the left you can see a glimpse of the white trellis I picked up cheap at WalMart -- stay tuned for its intended home):

I just loved the different textures on this eggplant blossom and leaf: 

 

And the funky shapes of the Red Peter Peppers: 

  

Most of all I'm loving the ongoing harvests we're getting from our little veggie garden:

   

And yes, that's this year's first red pepper, carefully harvested before Hanna hit because after watching it ripen for a month I wasn't taking any chances!

WHY YOU SHOULD HAVE INVITED US TO YOUR LABOR DAY PARTY

Because we would have brought this:

Heading out the door to our friend's house who did invite us over as soon as VPH throws some more basil on the platter (he thought the photo would be better without it).  Hope you're all enjoying the long weekend!

SO WHAT'S IT LIKE WORKING FROM HOME, HEATHER?

On a slow summer day my office is:

Please note the cell phone and home phone on the table so I'm always reachable.  I know, you still hate me.  In my defense, there have been few of these slow days this summer.  Most days I'm inside all day on the couch with the laptop typing away.  I look up and suddenly it's 4pm and the sun is gone from our shady garden. 

My co-workers:

I had to go back and look at a photo of this same container just after planting on May 29th:

This is a close up of the mystery basil.  It has short stubby purple buds with white flowers.  Really pretty:

Whereas the opal basil has tall, spiky, dark purple stalks with light purple flowers (different container):

This is the sweet basil that I grew from seed.  I've taken 3 large harvests from it already, and I expect to get one, maybe two more:

Now that the cucumbers are dead, the nasturtiums are thriving:

The Red Peter peppers aren't red yet, but VPH reports that they are quite hot (and my work colleague fears for any man whose peter looks like that): 

These tomatoes are slated for fresh mozz, tomato, and basil salad for the picnic we will be attending on Saturday: 

Have any zucchini buds ever been so eagerly rooted on?

The volunteer tomatoes are out of control, but I'm really rather enjoying seeing what will happen (yeah, I'll probably tie them up tomorrow):

The veggie garden's not looking too bad overall though it's really been feeling like fall here lately with beautiful days just under 80 and nights dropping to the low 60s: 

VPH says this is what San Diego feels like.  If so, sign me up! 

CALENDAR-WORTHY?

Sunday was a beautiful day in the garden.  The bees were loving the sunflowers and so was I:

Now I need your help.  Which of the following photos is calendar-worthy?  Make sure to click on them to view full-size so you can make an informed decision.  Number 1:

Number 2:

Or Number 3:

  

I really need your opinions, readers!  Whereas I'm pretty sure this photo is calendar-worthy (I particularly like how the near petals are out of focus):

The rest of these photos have not been deemed calendar-worthy, but I thought you'd still enjoy seeing them.  I can't seem to stop shooting this dahlia (Hootenanny):

And these small eggs on the underside of a morning glory leaf begged to be photographed:

I thought you'd get a giggle out of how heavy the Brandywine Pink tomatoes are and how lazy a gardener I am for just letting the bent branches stay that way:

And lastly my Big Early Bell peppers are finally showing some color. Big, yes; Early, not so much:

Seriously, please tell me which of the sunflower shots is calendar-worthy.  I'm totally stuck.

PHOTO FRIDAY

It's alliterative and easy.   Here's a little lesson in the development of a sunflower along the side of the house:

Then you get:

And finally:

Next year I'll do a whole row in the ground here, cause the 3 are kind of sad (though you may remember I started with 6 seedlings in pots): 

This post needed some color:

And a little more:

 

Excellent news...the volunteers tomato plants have TOMATOES:

And the zucchini might get a last minute reprieve: 

Because if you look closely at the photo above there are female flowers forming.  Here I'll help:

Off to bring youngest step-son to college.  I'm going to be a blubbering mess later today.  How can the little boy who used to hold my hand in the Walmart parking lot be old enough to go to college?

FINALLY, SOME DAHLIAS

I still have a few that haven't bloomed yet (and a few that I'm pretty sure won't), but two more dahlias are in bloom in Heather's Garden.  The micro-mini:

Which is indeed micro-mini, but beautiful up close:

This is the hootenanny -- totally gorgeous even if it isn't fully flowered yet (and more burgundy-hued in real life): 

It's definitely tomato season: 

One of the Brandywine Pinks on top of the frittata with zucchini from a local farmer's stand (and it was as delicious as it looks):

And lastly, when you're a girl from the U.S. spending a year living in the boonies in Ireland, this is apparently the stuff that you miss from home (and you can, of course, buy Crocs in the U.K., but they're a heck of a lot cheaper here):

There's no Japanese restaurant anywhere close to where they're living either, but sushi doesn't ship very well.

STATUS QUO

I've been having trouble getting motivated to post.  I don't really have anything to say about gardening...because there's not much gardening going on around here these days.  We're still harvesting a decent amount of tomatoes, eggplants, purple peppers and beans (though no beans today):

But I sincerely doubt there will be any more zucchini or cucumbers from our garden (this was Thursday, it's even worse now): 

I'll just have to live for the promise of more tomatoes:

 

I have plenty of herbs:

And enough lemon grass to "feed Thailand" according to VPH:

Speaking of feeding...I think we've finally found a recipe that helped me to enjoy eggplant.  I present ratatouille:

We sprinkled a little fresh grated Parmesan cheese on top and scooped up the yummy melted cheese and juices from the bottom of the bowl with fresh bread.  Our last zucchini, our own tomatoes, purple peppers, eggplants, and basil went into the dish along with store bought onions, garlic, and olive oil.  I gotta say yum.  The eggplant wasn't as cloyingly sweet mixed up with all the other veggies.  I'm blogging with a lovely aftertaste in my mouth.

VPH very sweetly prepared a B meal in case the eggplant once again threw me off.  The bread was the above mentioned scooper and the rest will be tomorrow's lunch:

Ratatouille left me dying for a frittata so tomorrow night VPH will make those yummy potatoes on the grill and Thursday will be a frittata.  Now I just have to go beg a zucchini from my neighbors.

CHOW'S ON

I'm having a very busy week, so I'm not spending much time in the garden, but I did find a few minutes to take some photos tonight.  The wildflower patch is as chaotic as ever:

VPH told me this morning that he'd make me fresh mozz, tomato and basil for dinner and asked me if I could go outside and pick some tomatoes.  I was in a rush so I said, you can do it, honey, I trust you to pick tomatoes.  I called him this afternoon during my hour commute home to touch base and he reported that he had purchased 2 tomatoes for me at the store because he "didn't see any that were ready to pick," but I could look when I got home.  Seriously?  This evening's harvest (and what will most likely be the last zucchini we grow this year):

That's our first Brandywine Pink on the right above.  I can see why he might not have realized it was ready to pick, but what's his reasoning on the others? 

Because the momentous first heirloom tomato grown in our garden requires its own photo: 

All sliced up for my supper (and one of the little Early Girls to round out the right side of the plate) -- and yes, it was freaking awesome: 

VPH did make himself a big batch of pesto today:

He also used the leftover corn from Monday's dinner to make his world famous corn salad.  He tossed in a little bit of one of our purple peppers, so there was one home-grown ingredient on the plate to make it blog-worthy.  That's leftover barbecue chicken which is pretty darn fantastic too: 

What did you have for supper?

CALENDAR WORTHY

Slow weekend in the garden, which was exactly what VPH and I needed.  No real gardening being done, just harvesting and tidying up. 

First, as promised, a picture of the morning glory in bloom:

Which is difficult because all the blooms are above my head:

 Another climber that's making me happy these days is the purple hyacinth beans:

The dead cucumber was ripped out today and the other cucumber is not looking too good (after I took the photo I removed the bad leaves):

The zucchini still has beautiful male flowers, but no female flowers:

The volunteer tomato plant is blossoming:

The wildflower patch was so over-shadowing the dahlias in pots on the lily pad stepping stones that I decided to pull them out of there.  When VPH saw this micro-mini dahlia in the pretty pot sitting on the bar he said it was like we went out and bought a whole new plant.  I said just wait until it blooms:

Speaking of blooming...some of these guys are lagging behind:

Bet you're wondering where the calendar worthy shots are.  Wonder no more.  This one's good: 

This one's better: 

I think this one's the best: 

I was checking on the cherry tomato plants this morning when I spotted a really big bug on the sweet potato vine (aren't I nice to give you a box so you can see it?):

Is it a katydid?  It's really pretty: 

And this one is definitely calendar worthy:

Isn't it funny that I just said I haven't seen many butterflies and then poof there's a monarch on the zinnias.  I just love that last photo of the mystery bug.  I think I'll go make it my wallpaper now.

MIXED MESSAGE

I finally have a morning glory flower, but I haven't made it outside early enough yet to photograph it in bloom:

I have a Brandywine Pink tomato coloring up, but it's got some mystery holes:

The green ones on the other plant have something going on too:

And what is clearly a hole:

And I don't think the cucumber is going to bounce back:

But overall I'm pleased with the veggie garden:

A little white butterfly was loving the zinnias, so I present a series of nicely cropped photos for you to enjoy: 

I have not seen a lot of butterflies so far this summer, but I remember that last year they didn't start visiting my garden until late August/early September, so I have some time yet.

HELLO OLD FRIEND

A wise man once said: "Life goes by pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Life has been pretty crazy around here the past few weeks and I haven't been able to spend much time in my garden. The last time I took any photos of my garden was July 29th -- that's just not like me. I need to get out there and walk around, check things out, and decompress.

You may recall that the zucchini wasn't looking too good the last time we checked in on the veggie garden (July 29th):

It got worse. On Sunday I did make it out to the garden, took one look at the mess and pulled all but 2 vines. I think the problem may have been caused by the heavy vine trailing over the side of the container and crushing the stems of the leaves. So I angled one vine to trail over to the other container (now empty) and used the weeding stool to hold up the heavier, more developed vine:

The leaves don't know where to go, but I'm hoping this will help these guys produce some more zukes for me. I also read that you should pluck the male flowers if you don't need them for pollination to encourage female flowers to develop, so I'm going to try that. I'm also going to hand-pollinate every female blossom I get. I must be the only gardener who has to work this hard to get zucchini. Maybe next year I'll use a trellis (too late now to try and bend the vines up, I'm afraid they'd snap). It's not all bad...the nasturtiums are doing great in the wide open and I can actually reach the beans to pick them.

The Red Peter peppers are coming right along (I'm still shocked I'm going to get actual peppers from these plants I grew from seed since they took so long to sprout):

Plenty of pollinators are attracted to the zinnias (I love how this guy's legs are just covered in pollen):

Those pollinators lead to harvests like this:

We've harvested about 8 tomatoes so far and I'm relieved to report that they all taste better than that first Early Girl. The other Early Girls will be used in gazpacho and the tastier varieties for more fresh mozz, tomato, and basil, which seems to be my dinner just about every other night. I am afraid that signs are not pointing to a never-ending supply of tomatoes this year.

They all seem to be ripening at the same time though I'm seeing signs of developing blossoms on the volunteers:

Did you identify the speaker of the quote yet? I'm wondering who will and who won't.

TOMATO LOVING

This post is a little delayed because I actually picked my first tomato on Saturday, July 26th:

It was an Early Girl and I'm rather disappointed that it didn't taste any better than the very expensive vine-ripened tomatoes that VPH has been buying at the grocery store.  Probably letting it sit around for 2 days until I finally got around to eating it on Monday with some fresh mozz and my grown from seed basil didn't help with the excitement of the tasting, but we had a crazy busy weekend.

I have another Early Girl ready to pick and a Park's Whopper too.  I hope these do more to wow me:

The Celebrity and Bonnie Original are a few days behind, but showing some color too:

The Sweet 100 cherry tomato is going to yield at least 100 tomatoes since I know I've taken at least 30 off already.  It's too bad that I don't like them as much as the Husky Cherry tomatoes (too sweet for my taste):

The zucchini plants are completely failing though and I just don't know why.  I should be harvesting more zucchini than I can handle and I think I've picked 7 since July 4th:

The Red Peter peppers are blossoming like mad and setting little peppers all over the place.  The sudden increase of pollinators in the garden is certainly helping to form all those peppers:

The Royal Purple Bush beans have the prettiest blossoms: 

Rapidly and awkwardly changing topics...I have been posting on veggies pretty heavily and have neglected to update you on the rest of the garden, though I haven't been neglecting it.  I had to cut back the evening primrose (and sadly only days after discovering what it was) because it was completely blocking the walkway to the side door:

 

Sure I could have staked it, but I missed seeing my little retaining wall, heather plant, rosemary thriving in a pot, and the calibrochoa that needs some more sun:

A nice shot of the wildflower patch last week:

You can just see the beautiful hydrangea flowers dragging on the grass on the right side of the above photo.  Here's the whole bush on July 7th:

After I cut off half the flowers and raised the wire support beneath it, VPH said "Who took away my hydrangea and left that baby bush?"  Note the sunflower on the ground behind it:

The roots of the sunflower grew right through the drainage hole into the ground throwing it off balance until it fell over:

Now they're all staked and forming flower buds, but they're still ugly:

The Parkland Glow is reliably giving me red dahlia after red dahlia:

And the Bay State Angel is covered in white blooms:

I'm loving this whole arrangement including the purple hyacinth beans, though I'm disappointed that the cutback petunias aren't blooming yet nor have the cutback osteospermums:

This container is also a little bit disappointing and I'm wondering if I should just deal with it (it's not butt ugly), cut it all back, or pull some stuff out and plant different flowers there:

Suggestions?  Advice?