Heather's Garden

You Wait A Couple of Days To Update...

And all of a sudden you've got tons to say.  It's been pretty nice around here lately.  A little on the warm side for my taste, but until today, pretty tolerable.  Not go outside and do much of anything weather though except for Thursday when it was practically chilly -- under 80 degrees at 9am!  We decided it was the perfect time to go for a walk.  You can't actually see our house in this photo, but it's dead center of frame behind those trees and we never knew there was this dock on the river through a mowed section of the field between two condo buildings (though it's probably not technically open to the public):

 

Back in our garden I sat under an umbrella and did some work.  But every once in a while I'd hop up to take a photo.  How could I not chase this blue-tailed beauty:

 

Ten minutes later a completely different one in nearly the same spot:

 

Still a face only a mother could love:

 

Lilac bell peppers, but how do I know when they're ready to harvest:

 

I knew this Black Russian tomato was ready:

 

Ugly as can be though:

And it was delicious with fresh mozz, basil from our garden, and some tuna-fish (the meal also featured egg salad and potato salad made of our own potatoes):

Malabar seedlings along the back of the container, but something dug down and took out a bunch and the other purple basil:

 

The wildflowers actually look pretty decent:

 

The whole patch:

 

I've been loving the growth of the cucumbers:

 

The Hillbilly tomatoes will apparently all ripen at the same time -- and soon:

 

The Roma tomatoes don't look too good on the bottom, but the fruit is ripening really nicely:

 

The Brandywine Pink tomatoes look just awful, though even these have fruit ripening:

 

The last day-lily came and went on Friday in the rain:

 

The hydrangea has a few new blooms, but most are old and fading fast.  I have to deadhead it (there's still a lot of warm weather left), but I haven't found the time yet: 

 

The ever-bearing strawberries are producing fruit all of a sudden:

 

I can't get a decent photo of this spot, but it's still one of my favorites in the garden:

 

Especially now that the moonflower has tons of buds on it:

 

I decided it was time to see what we got for beets and onions (though I left half the beets and probably missed half the onions under all the carrot foliage):

 

And while I was harvesting, I figured I'd grab the eggplants and cucumbers too:

 

Lee decided to pickle the beets, and he used some of the onions too:

 

I glanced over at the kitchen table and thought, "Wow it looks like summer in here."  Basil ready to be used, plastic dishes and whatnot for eating outside, empty pint containers for harvesting, empty pitcher for sun tea, and the fan in the window:

 

One of our favorite summer meals -- perfectly grilled hot dogs and veggies from our garden (first time beans have been part of a meal here this summer):

 

We have a new addition to the gravel alley next to the house.  SS2's grandparents were with us on the 4th of July and they noticed that we were composting and offered us their spin composter that they weren't using.  Uh, yes please and thank you:

I know right next to the front door is kind of a strange place for it, but that's where we keep our trash cans.  It's a pretty sunny spot and rather level, so we figured it made sense.  Lee's already loving the easy access and I don't think it's bothering me aesthetically:

Now what do I want to plant in the containers where we had potatoes?

Meanwhile, Back On The Home Front

It was very difficult leaving our garden for five days just when temps hit 90+ and stayed there.  We hadn't had rain in about a week and there was none in the forecast.  But luckily SS2 would be home the entire time we were gone and he promised to water.  Since we grow so much in containers the instructions were a little complicated, but he did a great job and even the herb seedlings that were just starting when we left, were alive and thriving when we got home:

We failed to give him any instructions on harvesting though.  But a lost cherry tomato isn't much of a price to pay for our wonderful vacation:

 

And since there's always the chance that this will be the only zucchini we harvest (given my terrible luck growing zukes), it's okay that it ended up the diameter of a baseball bat: 

 

The beans popped up while we were gone:

As did the malabar (at the base of the trellis if you can spot it past the moonflower taking over anything it can reach):

   

I thought about bringing Elizabeth a lamium from my garden, but ultimately didn't (it felt weird to show up to her house on that first day empty-handed).  When I mentioned it to her, she said she wished I had and showed me how her lamium were spreading, but developing a weird white stripe down the center of the leaf instead of the normal almost entirely white leaves.  When I got home I checked my self-sown lamium and sure enough mine were doing the same thing!  Just as well I didn't bring any with me:

 

The wildflower patch is doing really well.  There are actual flowers blooming though they're tough to see here:

But there was something that looked a little off.  The Red potatoes never flowered, but the foliage appeared to be dying back:

 

You probably don't remember, but I planted 4 seed potatoes in this black plastic pot, but didn't bother with hilling them.  I just plopped the potatoes in the bottom of the pot and filled it with soil.  So my hopes were not high when we tipped the pot over onto a tarp:

 

But we found 6 good size potatoes.  Lee said this wasn't much return on our investment.  I disagreed -- it's a 150% return on our investment!  And they're so pretty:

 

Then Lee dumped the wood box over onto the tarp:

 

I'm going to let the two large gray containers in the veggie garden go until the foliage on them dies back completely.  We found a lot of tiny little potatoes on the roots of the plants in the wood box and I wonder if giving the others a little more time will yield more potatoes.  But this wasn't at all a bad harvest from 4 seed potatoes:

 

Lee holding the first tomato, a Purple Cherokee:

 

And today's harvest which included 2 more tomatoes, a Brandywine Pink and a Purple Cherokee, and 4 different varieties of beans, mostly Royal Purple bush beans:

 

We had a friend over for lunch today and while we sat on the patio the butterfly bush did its job.  We couldn't believe this guy could still fly:

 

This one stopped by about an hour later, but I still didn't choose the right setting for my camera, though it would still be a rather sad photo with so much wing gone:

 

And yes, lunch included potato salad made from our own potatoes (delish!) and fresh mozz, tomato, and basil (our own tomatoes and basil of course).  There are quite a few tomatoes that are almost ripe (Hillbilly, a new variety to us and we hope a tasty one) and we still have all those beans to use.  I love growing our own vegetables!

Now I Really Am Done

Starting on Wednesday I finally got around to planting up the rest of the garden.  There's still something going on with the nerves near the incisions, but the doctor says it's normal up to 6 weeks after surgery and I'm just over 4 weeks post op, so she's not worried.  It's not keeping me from doing anything and my energy is back where it should be (though my stamina's not 100% yet), so I'm no longer limiting my activities.  What's the first thing I did?  Have a friend over to see the garden.  She couldn't come until teatime, so I made some sun tea and hit my new favorite place Sugar for cupcakes and cookies:

 

We had a lovely time together on a perfect day.  After she headed home with a rosemary and a lemon grass (I had a million herbs afterall), I wandered around taking a few photos here and there.  Habanero peppers have set on a few plants:

 

And bell peppers on a few:

 

I think the Roma tomatoes will be the first to ripen:

 

Though there are plenty of contenders in the wall o' tomatoes:

 

And how awesome does the planter table of Royal Purple Bush beans look?  There are tons of little baby beans growing, but I'm also digging how decorative they are:

 

The rest of these photos are from a few different days, but you don't really care and I know what happened when.  WARNING: These next three pics are a little gross.  Poor little bird embryo.  I have no idea where it came from though, since there are no trees over the veggie garden at all:

 

VPH was called in for the dirty job of disposing of it:

 

Oh well, cycle of life and all that:

 

But these photos are so much more fun!  Once again a dragonfly sat and posed for me.  I had about 30 good ones that I narrowed down to these three.  Please comment and tell me which is your favorite and why.  #1:

 

#2:

 

#3:

My mom sent me a pretty card right after my surgery:

I like the painting on the card so much that it might end up in a frame.  Doesn't my mom have the most distinctive hand-writing?  Not to be morbid, but some day she will be gone and I'm pretty sure just seeing it will make me cry: 

Since only one moon-flower seed actually grew, I had plenty of space for a climber in this container.  I planted cinnamon, opal, and purple ruffles basil (grown from seed with varying degrees of success) along the front and sowed a row of malabar seeds along the back:

 

I planted up two containers of herbs for my friends Jessica & John.  John said he'd take as much basil as I'd like to give him, so I put the sweet basil I grew from seed in the square container and golden oregano, purple sage, rosemary, and some big-leaf Italian basil from Vaiuso in the round container.  A pretty nice present for friends (who are loaning us their Tom-Tom for the drive to Buffalo) for way under $10:

I next turned my attention to the raised veggie bed.  I cut back the nasturtiums, especially the one vining up the trellis.  I decided the cucumbers didn't need the competition.  From left to right I planted lemon basil (from seed), big-leaf Italian basil ($1 from Vaiuso), and lime basil (from seed):

Here's the after.  Much better I think:

The herb barrel is probably over-planted, but I had a lot of herbs.  It took me a good 5 minutes to dig out the roots from last year's lemon grass, so I decided that this year the lemon grass could go in the ground behind the barrel, I just hope it gets enough sun, but if grass grows there, I figured lemon grass would.  Starting with the chives moving clockwise: I divided the chives and will give half to a friend, left the creeping thyme as it was (though next year I may plant a seedling of something in the middle of it early in the spring), a tiny golden sage overwintered but hasn't grown much, English lavender which I hope will overwinter for me, golden oregano, silver thyme, sage, and lemon basil.  In the middle there's red rubin basil, stevia, and parsley:

 

I still had herbs left (I know crazy, right?), so I planted up one more basket with purple sage, silver thyme, big-leaf Italian basil, and golden oregano:

 

The patio tomato was disgusting (I don't know what it had, but it went into the trash not compost), so these herbs will live on the bar on the patio.  I can't get over how huge the bar looks without the trays of seedlings on the bottom shelf:

A rare photo of VPH sitting.  He helped me put up the netting and had carried the chair over to stand on.  He didn't feel like gardening, so I asked him to sit and keep me company while I weeded.  I was on my way to get the weeding stool and snapped this photo without his knowledge:

 

And here's the same spot after weeding and now with Kentucky Wonder beans planted beneath the string trellis and behind the green metal trellises alternating Maxibel and Royal Burgundy bush beans (thanks Jennah!).  The green metal trellises are at staggered heights because I couldn't push the second one any further into the ground -- stupid rocks.  Luckily I think I like them better in that pattern than I would all at the same height:

 

I finally planted some white impatiens in the little blue pot and tucked it into the roots of the huge maple stump on the shady side of the house:

And this is kind of a funny one, but the bleeding hearts die back to the ground every summer when it gets hot (and it's been hot) and the container they're in is pretty prominent along the walkway.  I had a bunch of shade plants and an empty container, so I figured I might as well plop it on top of the "empty" glazed pot.  I used the coleus I grew from seed, white impatiens, lamium and creeping jenny.  I don't think it looks that weird:

 

So I'm left with only one shelf of plants.  6 containers of petunias which will be used to replace husky cherry tomatoes in the not too distant future, one lamium which could go anywhere, the Japanese maple seedling (growing really well!), a huge pot of chives for my friend, a lemon grass which could go into the ground next to the one behind the herb barrel if I don't find a better spot, a lemon thyme, one single lemon grass that I grew from seed that I can't bear to let go, silver thyme, an unidentified basil, lavender that I grew from seed, golden oregano, and hot & spicy oregano:

 

You can sort of see here that the cilantro and dill have already bolted, so they'll need to be replaced once they finish flowering.  I plan to replace the cilantro with the hot & spicy oregano and the dill with the silver thyme:

 

But really, I am done.  My goal was to get all the herbs in and the beans planted by the 4th of July and I beat that by a few days.  I've so enjoyed this spring/early summer and now I look forward to the first real tomato.  But first we're off to Buffalo on Thursday for Garden Bloggers Buffa10 and I can't wait to see some of my garden blogger friends face to face!  Now we just have to talk SS2 into watering the garden while we're gone.

Try Not To Turn Green

With envy that is.  On my kitchen table before dinner this evening:

 

In case you're having trouble making out VPH's unusual print, it says:

Carte Du Jour

BLT

Egg Salad

Tuna Salad/Stuffed Tomato

Corn Salad

Potato Salad

Tomato w/ Mozzarella

Caesar Salad

And yes, he made them all from scratch today, well not the Caesar salad, I have to confess we buy the bagged kits.  Then he came around and took our dinner orders with a little notepad and a pen.  I opted for our first garden tomato with mozzarella and basil Perpetuo (also from our garden), potato salad, tuna salad, and egg salad (parsley from our garden):

SS2 chose a BLT (tomato from the garden), corn salad, and potato salad:

And I didn't get a shot of VPH's plate, but he had corn salad, egg salad, tuna salad, potato salad, and a bit of the garden fresh tomato.  That tomato was totally worth the $12 or whatever I paid at Walmart for a plant with fruit already on it.  So yes, I know you're completely jealous and yes, I know how lucky I am!  I did manage to steal a few minutes and walk around the garden before dinner.  Look at all those day-lilies:

I wonder where this little eggshell came from since it's in a hanging basket with a Husky cherry tomato plant (that's the stem in the upper right-hand corner of the photo) that does not have any trees above it:

 

The Royal Purple Bush beans are going to give us an incredible crop of beans in a few weeks:

 

And now there's a cool breeze coming through the windows.  Tomorrow is going to be a perfect day for gardening.  I might just have to take a long lunch and transplant some herbs!

Two Hours Just About Killed Me

Saturday was a silly busy day for us with people coming and going, the U.S. team losing their World Cup game, and the town fireworks, so I didn't get a lot of gardening done.  I did, however, make a dash to the garden during half-time of the soccer match and cut the hydrangea flowers off the bush that were hanging on the ground.  VPH had a bit of difficulty mowing around it the day before.  I ended up with 2 large arrangements and the bush has loads left:

I'm still loving the hot pink astilbe in front of the blue container:

 

I couldn't quite get the photo I wanted, but this cropped one is pretty close to what I envisioned:

 

All the astilbe are putting on a show:

The Royal Purple Bush beans also caught my eye:

As did the ittle-bitty Ichiban eggplants:

 

Saturday morning brought the first yellow day-lily bloom (and three more rust colored ones):

   

And VPH and I both headed out to the garden at the crack of noon.  He had a host of chores to perform.  Finally fixing the rocks around the Mother's Day garden was one of them. Perfectly round circles are so boring, don't you think:

 

He planted the purple buddleia, though now that I look at it, maybe a little too close to the fence...oh well:

 

I can't wait to see it get enormous:

 

He also washed the cushions for the lounger, weeded the mulch area under it and put down another two bags of mulch.  Hopefully that will eliminate the need to weed again.  We also have two bags of mulch sitting in the veggie garden that need to be spread, but the heat and humidity did VPH in rather quickly too:

While he did all of that, I planted the pink buddleia in that purple container on the patio:

 

But what did I do with the zinnias?  A few went into a container of fingerling potatoes where only half of the seed potatoes sprouted:

   

A few more in another container of fingerling potatoes where only half of them sprouted:

   

And the rest went into the patio garden in two different clumps.  Once the day-lilies are done, there won't be any flowers in this garden, so I thought it could use some more color.  Not only for aesthetics, but also to attract pollinators to the zucchini.  They're planted so far back to try and avoid the row of bulbs along the front, but I found a few as I dug the holes:

 

I'm really loving the patio garden right now:

 

Right after I transplanted the zinnias I had to sit down rather quickly because I nearly blacked out.  I don't know if it was the heat and humidity or that I hadn't sweat that hard since the surgery (almost a month ago now), but it scared me.  I drank a large ice water and sat for a few minutes.  But I didn't do much more after that.  Monday's supposed to be insanely warm with violent t-storms here so I doubt the afternoon will bring much gardening, but I still need to plant all the herbs and get the malabar seeds mom sent me into some soil.  But I've set a July 3rd deadline for all planting to be completed and I think I'll probably make it.

What Have I Gotten Myself Into Now?

I spent much of Friday running errands.  On what felt like the 50th trip from my house, which in reality was only the 2nd, I dragged VPH along.  Our destination was the closest Redbox to return 4 movies (the dancing was the only part of Nine I enjoyed, Valentine's Day was predictably a pretty pointless chick flick -- but hang in for the over credit deleted scene that made me laugh hysterically, Big Fan was a big hit with the menfolk & so not with me, and Youth in Revolt was okay for me & very, very funny for the men).  Anyway...Vaiuso is on the way to the Redbox and I asked VPH if he minded if we swung by for a sec because I wanted to see if they had marked down the perennials yet.  He said we could do whatever I wanted to (dangerous, right?), so I quickly turned in that direction.  We came home with two $5 buddleia plants, otherwise known as butterfly bushes:

 

One purple and one pink.  Now my problem is where to plant them?  I understand they'll get pretty big and they definitely need lots of sun.  The sun requirement really limits my options.  I don't want to create shade over any of the veggie garden, so next to the raised veggie bed here doesn't work.  The area in front of the ivy wouldn't be an awful idea, but this portion of the yard was built up to sort of level by breaking up the old asphalt parking space and burying it under a not very thick layer of top soil:

 

To the right of the hydrangea wouldn't be horrible, but only if I really knew how big the bush would get.  I can't block the basement doors:

 

The patio garden is perfect as is.  Look how relaxed VPH is here:

 

I guess I don't really have any choice, both bushes will be planted by the shed.  One along the fence and the other just to the right of the shed (but we'll push that box back a little first).  I'll have to go to the back of the garden to see all the butterflies they attract, but I really can't come up with a better spot:

 

One last photo for everyone who's been admiring the "cheating" tomato plant.  See, I told you it looks terrible:

But we might have off the vine tomatoes this weekend.  Though it wouldn't count as the 'first tomato,' it would just taste better than the ones from the store.
 

Feeling Good, Looking Good

We've been having some crazy storms around here lately.  One moment it's sunny, the next pouring rain.  I snapped this photo of the patio garden just as huge drops began to fall.  I'm glad I did because a few minutes later the grass was flattened (don't worry, it popped right back up later):

See the rain sheeting off our gutter-less roof?  The tree canopy here let me stay completely dry as I took the photo:

 

One of the brightest spots in my garden is all the blooming nasturtiums.  Is it me or is this one kind of unusual?  Double-petaled?  Or just new to me:

 

These are more typical of the nasturtiums I have blooming:

 

The self-sown petunia is blooming!  It looks kind of red here, but really it's a nice dark pink:

 

The Yukon Gold potatoes are blooming...a pretty white:

 

And the Ichiban eggplant's flower is a pretty purple:

 

Potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants are all part of the nightshade family, which probably isn't news to you, but just in case it is, note how similar the flowers are on each.  Speaking of flowers...look at these cucumber flowers!  This photo is a few days old, today I spotted a tendril on the plant on the right.  I'll have to see if I can coax it onto the trellis:

 

The "cheating" tomato plant's getting ripe.  "Cheating" because I bought it at Walmart with fruit already on it:

 

But I grew these zucchini from seed right here in the patio garden.  Don't know why the one in the middle is so much larger than the other two, but all three have little teeny buds on them: 

 

And totally off topic, but I am loving these astilbe blooms against the blue container.  Such an 80s color combo:

 

Oh and in case you've read this far and you're still wondering what that title has to do with this post...I'm the one feeling good and the garden's looking good.  Still some tenderness, numbness, and sort of a pins and needles thing going on, but much better than it was before.  It only bothers me when I rub my stomach, which I just don't do.  Some day it will go away.

Happy Father's Day -- Can I Go Out To The Garden Now?

I use that title as a little bit of a joke because VPH doesn't really care what we do on Father's Day as long as his boys are here to hang out, which of course they are.  But today is also our 12th wedding anniversary, so I do feel a little bad about spending the whole day in the garden or playing Mario Galaxy 2 (my other current obsession).  Yesterday we got up and out the door early to watch a friend's son ride in a Trike-A-Thon to support St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Killingworth.  The 2-3 year old class -- try to imagine anything cuter:

Then we took a nice leisurely drive on the back-roads with no clear destination in mind.  We ended up having a fabulous lunch at a restaurant in Centerbrook that SS2 had raved about last month -- Gabrielle's.  They had a beautiful greenhouse in back of the restaurant, but I didn't take any photos because I would have had to ask for permission to post them and I didn't want to get into all that.  We headed home to our now shaded garden which desperately needed watering.  We were feeling lazy, so yup, we dragged out the hose and sprinkler, but the over-seeded sections of lawn needed the water too, so it's not really that wasteful: 

 

While the sprinkler ran, I finally thinned the carrots and 'pruned' the climbing nasturtium.  I was surprised by how many carrots I had to pull.  I didn't think I had seeded them that thickly:

I'm loving the nasturtiums in the raised veggie bed.  The 3 rows of carrots are now nicely thinned and the cucumbers have more sun.  They're growing slowly, but 2 plants have little tiny flowers, so that's kind of exciting.  I still have that empty space for basil seedlings to be transplanted: 

The veggie garden in all its glory (gotta do something about the Yukon Gold potatoes falling over, but I don't know what):

 

And the wall of tomatoes and bean centerpiece:

 

I couldn't resist the newly marked down herbs at Vaiuso.  Seriously, at $1/each, who could?  I came home with a silver edged thyme, an English lavender, and a hot & spicy oregano for my garden.  But I couldn't stop there.  I grabbed 2 each of lemon grass, rosemary, golden oregano, purple sage, silver edged thyme, and big leaf Italian basil.  Then I started thinking about what I would do with all those herbs.  Some will get plunked into empty spots in some of my containers, but not all of them.  I decided to grab 2 inexpensive containers there too and plant up herb baskets for 2 of my friends.  I didn't realize until I got home that the containers were actually intended to be hanging baskets (there were no hangers or discs for the bottoms on the shelf with them).  But the drainage issue is easily solved by drilling a few holes in the bottom-most sections of the containers and the holes on the rim for the hangers are small enough that they don't really bother me:

 

Now the sun's shining and SS2 put World Cup play on the TV, so I think I can sneak out to the garden without detection.  Happy Father's Day!

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day - June 2010

Carol's been hosting GBBD for years over at May Dreams Garden, and now I'm a monthly participant after years of observing.  But my garden is not cooperating with the calendar.  The Siberian iris, lupine, and the Blue Mist clematis have come and gone since the last bloom day.  I am going to "cheat" and use some slightly older photos because I like them better than ones that I shot late yesterday afternoon.  My favorite trio of planters right now:

I'm especially enjoying the heuchera blooms:

This heuchera on the shady side of the house is putting on a show (thought it's hard to see in this photo).  And the baskets of impatiens hanging next to the walk are quite cheerful:

Nearby the impatiens on the stump look great too.  If you look very carefully you can see the white blooms of an astilbe in the blue pot on the right (look at the top of the fence).  It's much more striking in real life:

 

The same pot from a different angle to show you the pretty pink flowers in my neighbor's yard:

I carefully walked through the poison ivy in the back of their yard to get a closer look (in flip-flops no less...good thing I still appear not to have a reaction to it, or I just rinsed off my feet and flip-flops in cold water quickly enough to avoid a rash).  Isn't it pretty from here:

 

I looked it up and it's definitely an eutrochium or Joe-Pye weed.  The poison ivy was making me nervous though, so this is the best shot I got and I'm not sure which variety it is:

 

While that wildflower isn't precisely in my garden, this Bladder Campion is:

Of the many astilbes blooming or just about to bloom on the shady side of the house, this is my favorite:

 

Heading back around the house via the front door, the containers with the Purple Gem rhododendrons flanking the front porch have filled out quite nicely:

Strangely, this is where VPH and I spent most of our time hanging out in the garden.  Maybe it's because we have all these places to sit.  And those Adirondack chairs on the right are in one of the sunniest spots in the garden, from 10am - 12pm.  The hanging baskets of flowers are all calibrochoa:

And one of the brightest spots in my garden each day isn't even a plant that I bought!  Remember the Gerbera daisy that I brought home from a fundraiser ages ago?  I swear it's given me 10 gorgeous flowers already:

 

And the osteosperum basket that I picked up cheap from Walmart also makes me happy, though dead-heading it is already getting old:

 

I took this photo from one of those Adirondack chairs with VPH walking away (in his lawn-mowing gear) to show just how huge the Endless Summer hydrangea is this year:

It's covered in beautiful blue flowers:

And right next to it the peas still have some flowers:

 

Another older photo, but the lemon thyme in bloom is so beautiful (and fragrant):

 

The rest of the blooms in my garden are veggies in bloom, like this nasturtium in the raised veggie bed (so far only it and one other of the 20 or so nasturtiums I have are blooming): 

 

Lots of marigolds around my tomatoes for color and to ward off aphids.  Please note that this beautiful Black tomato plant that I grew from seed has flowers:

This is a flower on one of the Lilac bell peppers.  I hope it sets, the ones on the Ivory bell peppers didn't: 

This cluster of flowers on one of the Brandywine Pink tomato plants got me so excited!  I think it almost looks like a bouquet and I'm tasting those tomatoes already: 

And that's it for actual blooms in the garden, but I do have a few buds.  Like on the Royal Purple Bush beans:

The Yukon Gold potatoes: 

I'm astonished by this, but one of the containers of petunias that self sowed from last year's hanging baskets and I carefully transplanted are about to flower: 

All of the hostas are about to burst into bloom, but this one in the containers up on the big stump by the road is the closest to blooming.  I love the purples of the bud with the dark heuchera in back:

 

And probably the most highly anticipated buds in the garden are the day-lilies in the patio garden:

Let's see if they're still blooming by July 15th! 

Resting Up

Tomorrow's the Guilford Secret Garden Tour, so I've been spending today (and most of yesterday) conserving my strength so I can actually stay upright for a couple of hours tomorrow.  So I didn't even get into my garden today, but yesterday I spent a few minutes outside with VPH.  First I picked all the peas (about a handful) and then I pulled out the netting on the right hand side:

VPH pulled out the peas and together we hung the netting on the fence for the Kentucky Wonder beans to climb.  Then I took a photograph of the first nasturtium bloom and the three cukes in the raised veggie bed.  Note how much bigger the two outside ones are than the one in the center:

 

See the two zucchini plants in front of the patio garden in this next photo?  There's another on the far side of the lupine, but it's getting less sun and it's smaller.  See how the blooming grass got knocked over by the fricking pouring rain we've experienced many days this week?  Yeah, I have a feeling that I'll be cutting those grasses back as soon as I'm physically able:

 

What you can't see in the photo above is that there are flower stalks on the day-lilies with lots of buds.  So excited to see them bloom.  Hopefully I'll get good photos of the gardens I tour tomorrow and will post about them soon.  But for now I'm exhausted and need to relax.

Slowly, But Surely, I'm Getting Back Out There

We've had some fantastic growing weather, lots of sun and warm temps.  Everything's growing like mad.  Since I'm on super light duty, I had to wait for VPH to hill the potatoes for me.  And boy did they need it (note the lovage in the ground behind the small pot of mint growing very nicely too):

I couldn't scoop compost, but I was able to bend over and hold the potato stalks while he poured compost into the containers:

The two big black trash cans of Yukon Gold potatoes will both need more hilling, but the big wooden box of Red potatoes has been topped off completely:

The fingerlings aren't doing quite as well.  Both pots seem to have only 50% growth in them.  But this  fingerling, phlox, and basil grouping is still one of my favorite things in the garden right now (chair included for scale):

The most highly anticipated crop in our garden is, of course, tomatoes.  These are teeny tiny little tomatoes on the Black Russian tomato plant and I'm ecstatic to seem them:

This is one of the Black tomato plants I grew from seed (thanks again, Jennah) and though it's a little tough to see in this photo, there are little flowers on it and the other one (impossible to see in this photo since it's not pictured):

You wouldn't believe that this handsome little Husky Cherry tomato:

 

Is on this sad little plant:

Not nearly as exciting or eagerly anticipated is Ichiban eggplant, but I was still happy to see the first flower on it a few days ago.  It was getting hit hard by what I presume to be birds digging in the soil daily so I stuck some of the clear forks in it.  One day later and no digging, let's hope it stays that way:

In the raised veggie bed, the nasturtium to the left of the trellis appears to be a climber (it wasn't supposed to be), so I wrapped it around the trellis.  A few of the nasturtiums are just about to flower and now that I can squat, I think I'll thin the carrots some.  I did thin the cukes to 3 plants at the base of the trellis.  The two outside ones look great, but the one in the center is lagging behind.  I will be transplanting some basil plants to the empty space left by the harvested radishes as soon as I have the stamina to do so:

All of the beans are doing well.  In fact, I need to tear out the peas so I can use the netting on the fence for the Kentucky Wonder beans.  There are a few containers where only 50% or 75% of the bush beans germinated, so I need to go around and fill those spots.  That is not a problem in the table planter.  Not every Royal Purple Bush bean germinated, but there are probably too many for the space (I won't be thinning them though):

And here's the entire gravel patio and wall o' tomatoes:

Remember I said the weather was beautiful and everything was growing like mad...take a look at the veggie garden today:

 

Apparently the way to grow good basil is to put the seedlings in the sun and forget to water them (lavender, coleus, and zinnia too):

 

The pots of herbs are doing really well:

The lemon thyme is blooming (calendar-worthy?):

 

But it doesn't really count because I bought the plant this spring.  I was elated to spot flowers in this pot:

Because that's an over-wintered thyme blooming (not calendar-worthy, but still pretty):

 

Only one lonely moonflower in this container that keeps getting attacked by digging birds.  My mom sent me malabar seeds (also known as basella or Japanese spinach) which I'll plant along the trellis and some of the basil seedlings will go in front.  Again, when I have the stamina: 

 

The Japanese maple has a new set of leaves:

 

When VPH weeded the wildflower hillside I asked him to leave a few just about to bloom plants so I could see what they were.  One turned out to be Bladder Campion:

 

Pretty:

 

There are a few lupine plants in the wildflower patch:

I can't believe how many flowers there are going to be on the Endless Summer hydrangea:

And this heuchera is blooming so much

 

I've only been waiting 2 years to see this astilbe bloom: 

 

Whereas all the ones in containers are blooming nicely for me after only a year.  Should be a spectacular show soon: 

   

I'm one week post-op today, but I'd say I'm only 65% at the moment.  I've asked my friends who've had this surgery (a surprisingly high number) and most say 2-3 weeks until they were 100%.  Having limits is absolutely driving me crazy!

I'm Back!

Well, not really, but I did manage to get into the garden for about an hour today.  I don't have complete mobility -- I'm avoiding squatting 'cause I'm afraid -- but I did manage to water, weed, and deadhead.  I didn't take many photos because I was pretty tired after my hour outside, but maybe more tomorrow.  I pulled the remainder of the radishes and with VPH's help most of the peas:

 

We split the watering duties and then I tied the swiftly growing clematises (yeah!) up higher and cut the lupine flowers that were going to seed:

 

It's stupid hot and humid here today, so I really needed a shower after my hour outside.  Then in the afternoon I ate all the peas with some dill dip (yum!) and we used some of the radish leaves to bulk out a store-bought lettuce mix as a side to our barbecue chicken and leftover potato salad dinner.  Supposedly there is rain in the forecast for tomorrow, but we've had a week of fore-casted rain not actually arriving, so I'll believe it when I see it.  Conan O'Brien at the Mohegan Sun tomorrow night, which I've been looking forward to for months, and now I'm reasonably certain I'll be able to walk around the casino a little and sit up for the whole show. 

A Little Bit Of This...

Since we finished the garden ages ago I find myself wandering around weeding, watering, and taking photos.  There's no rhyme or reason to what catches my eye.  I liked the way the light was hitting the fertile frond of the Cinnamon fern (yes, I had to look up what the brown spiky thing on the Cinnamon fern was called):

 

I was struck by how you can show the good in the garden:

But simply turn the camera to landscape orientation and you get the bad (not our ladder, blanket or old bird's nest):

And turn 90 degrees to your right and you get the downright ugly (the wildflowers haven't progressed beyond seedlings and the weeds have taken over):

There are some really lovely things on this side of the house though...like this perennial shade container:

Which looks like a completely different container from the other side.  I think I may plant one of the "free" lamium plants I have over on the shelves in the driveway in that empty spot.  I'm just a little bit afraid it may take over the container, but creeping jenny wouldn't look quite right I don't think.  I do have those white impatiens still, but I think whatever I put here needs to spill over at least a little:

Okay, I thought about it for 24 hours and then went ahead and planted the lamium:

 

I just asked VPH what he thought we should do about the 8 million maple seedlings growing out of the stump.  "I'll cut them down," he said.  I said, "You'd better hurry because I can't see the baskets of impatiens on top of the stump anymore."  Which I can't:

Over in front of the house the containers on the huge stump are doing really well.  I think the creeping phlox is going to survive, the golden sage is growing like mad, and the astilbe are prettily blooming.  VPH says he's going to climb up the hill to cut back the brush around the stump so the containers stand out more, but he's been saying that for weeks now:

This is my view when I walk out the front door.  I'm quite enjoying it even if it does appear a bit drab in this photo.  I'm considering putting a hook on that post now that I chopped down the huge bush and hanging something from it:

Another of my very favorite spots in the garden right now.  You can't see it, but one lonely moonflower has sprouted in the container beneath the trellis:

The flowers on the heuchera make me think of Japanese watercolors:

One more shot from the driveway along the house.  I'm not sure why this creeping phlox is giving me a second bloom, but I'm enjoying it:

I really can't stop going to the nursery.  Lord help me, it's not even Memorial Day yet!  But I needed a replacement tomato plant for the Green Zebra which swiftly died on me.  I walked out with stevia (why not add another perennial herb to the mix?), lemon basil (my seedlings didn't do so well), June-bearing strawberries (because they already had berries on them), and the tomato seedling I actually went to pick up:

 

A Brandywine tomato seedling, to be specific, all planted and happy:

 

And those strawberries?  Two went in withe the eggplant, and the third in one of the strawberry pots that needed another.  It's been a few days and the berries are starting to ripen:

 

We finally have peas!  I had fun playing with this image in Picasa: 

 

And all the plants now have flowers.  This front petals of this blossom are the prettiest shade of pale pink:

 

I went around earlier in the week hilling the potatoes.  Here's a before:

 

And an after taken today, 4 days after hilling.  Clearly they're ready for more:

 

Same with the Red potatoes in the veggie garden.  Please note all the beans sprouting behind them.  Beans have popped up all over the garden:

 

The Yukon Gold are really loving the garbage cans:

I gave the raised veggie bed some attention too by weeding and picking two rows of radishes:

I had quite the little harvest:

Does anyone else start tasting fresh mozz, basil, and tomato when they look at all these Black Russian tomato blossoms?  I'm salivating:

 

The whole veggie garden late on Friday afternoon:

 

Our next stop on this garden odyssey is the patio garden.  I was deadheading the Siberian iris on Thursday when all of a sudden I noticed that the clematis was blooming!  See, it's not all that obvious:

 

But when you get close -- wow!  The Blue Mist clematis that SS2 gave me for Mother's Day:

 

And one last photo from late Friday afternoon.  Now that I've trimmed back those branches along the left you can see the shady side of the house, which isn't so shady anymore that late in the day now that the big maple tree is gone:

 

I'm so pleased with it all this year.  Now let's just hope this nice warm sunny weather lasts with rain every fourth or fifth day all summer.  

Scenes From A Lazy Weekend

No gardening going on here, just enjoying the fruits of our labors.  In fact, on Saturday VPH wanted to go by Barnes & Noble to buy a book he wanted.  I agreed to the trip, but said if I didn't walk outside and see zucchini seedlings popping up in the patio garden we'd be making a trip by Vaiuso on the way home.  I walked out the side door with my camera in hand and came around the corner to:

Oh yes, that's a bird in the bird-bath and he didn't even fly away.  I snapped the photo above without zoom so you could see just how close I was.  And then I used the zoom to get a closer photo and I'm pretty sure it's a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher:

I snapped about 20 photos before VPH came barreling around the corner chatting loudly and despite my subtle shush, he startled the bird into flight.  But then I was able to focus and see that I had not one, but two zucchini seedlings so no trip to the nursery for me:

Another photo of the patio garden because why not:

 

Something was really digging into the raised veggie bed and even uprooted some of the carrot seedlings:

 

Yukon Gold potatoes -- I can't tell you how excited I am about these:

 

So off we went to B&N and we stopped in to the grocery store on the way home because I saw there were a lot of radishes ready to be harvested in the raised veggie bed.  I read on-line that a wonderful way to eat them was on good crusty bread with butter and then thinly sliced radishes on top.  We came home with two different kinds of butter: 

 

And:

 

And a fresh out of the oven loaf of French bread ($.79 on sale): 

 

How cute are these?  And they were delicious.  The bread and butter made the radishes less spicy, but still tasty:

 

With all the birds stopping by the feeder, I've looked a little on-line to try and identify them, but with little success.  At B&N I bought the National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Birds (Eastern Region) that my friend Meg had at her house -- very easy to use and lots of good information.  Now I know that this is a Black-capped Chickadee (with a big seed in his mouth):

Another view helped to verify the identification:

 

Also identified on Saturday, the Common Grackle (which I already knew) and House Sparrow (which I was pretty sure about).  I think this book is going to get a lot of use.  Sunday dawned cloudy, but around noon the sun came out in force.  It didn't look like we were actually going to get any rain, so I watered the garden and weeded a little as I went.  I left this rather large seedling in with this habanero pepper because I want to see what it is.  Looks like it could be a cucumber to me, but time will tell: 

Then I sat down with VPH, a Coke Zero on ice, and a book.  Within moments I noticed I had little bits of pollen all over me:

 

I was wearing a black sleeveless shirt which showed the pollen very clearly, like this bit on the button:

 

VPH is so much better that we actually went for a walk on Friday afternoon.  A slow, short walk (only 8/10ths of a mile), but since it was his first one in 5 weeks we were both really happy about it.  Today we took another walk, a little quicker and a little longer -- just over a mile.  This route brought us past Kathy's house, do you remember her garden from a few years ago: 

 

I can't imagine how much time and energy she puts into this magnificent garden.  She wasn't outside as we walked past, but since it was 3pm, she had probably already called it a day.  I certainly didn't see a flower that needed dead-heading or a leaf out of place:

 

We enjoyed our lazy days and the Lost finale tonight with SS1 will be the perfect end to a wonderful weekend.  I hope you had as nice a weekend whether yours involved working hard in your garden or relaxing in it like we did!

Is This Like Watching A Pot Boil?

All of a sudden it's like summer outside and I want to be eating fresh produce from my garden.  But alas, it's not even Memorial Day yet.  There are a few signs of summer though.  The first dragonfly:

And really, what could be more summer than a sun-drenched tomato plant (this Hillbilly actually has flower buds on it):

 

But the Husky cherry tomatoes are not looking so good:

 

Another not so attractive portion of the garden right now is the hillside that's supposed to be wildflowers.  Lots of weeds and the wildflowers are still teeny tiny seedlings.  Not happy with this area at all.  Thinking it would be nicer to cover it all in mulch:

 

But close by the perennial shade containers look just lovely:

 

The dahlias are popping up all over the place: 

Including 4 out of 5 of the containers by the cellar doors:

 

And the Hootenanny dahlia in the heuchera is getting big:

There is the promise of peas shortly:

 

And a full on flower on a Black Russian tomato plant:

 

The radishes are getting to an eating size.  In fact I ate this one (Beauty Mix) after I took this photo -- yum!  I never knew I liked radishes:

The red potatoes are doing great in the big grey containers and I will probably be adding more soil this weekend:

 

See what I don't have in the front of the patio garden?  Zucchini!  No sign of the seeds planted on May 7th, but they take 10-14 days to germinate depending on soil temperature and we've had some cold days since the 7th.  I'll give them another few days before I panic:

  

But I'm sure you saw what I do have in the patio garden...lots of flowers -- irises, Siberian irises, and lupine:

 

I think I'm having the most fun with the lupine: 

  

This is so almost a great photo:

  

The afternoon light hits the blooms so nicely it's tough to stop taking photos:

  

I've found that I cannot sit still in the garden anymore.  I brought a book and a beverage outside on Friday afternoon (along with my phone and Blackberry since I was technically still working), but I immediately started watering and weeding.  And then I had to grab my gloves and trusty Felcos because the overhanging limbs were driving me nuts over here (and pardon the horrible photos I'm about to share): 

  

Ah, much better:

  

You can actually see the hosta/rhododendron bed now:

  

VPH came home and immediately asked me what I did:

 

We'll be sending those limbs to the transfer station to be chipped there.  Some of them are almost 2 inches in diameter.  I had to do some fancy bending and slicing to get them down.  I think I finished the garden too soon.  It's all I can do to keep from going to a nursery and buying more things to plant!

It Just Doesn't Seem Possible, But I'm Done

I don't think I've mentioned it here, but I must have my gallbladder removed.  I have two gallstones that are each 2 cm. in circumference and one is sitting in the neck of the gallbladder.  I had some diagnostic testing done at the end of April and I finally got to see a surgeon on Monday for a consult.  I didn't know if I would leave her office with an appointment the following day to have it removed or if I'd have a few weeks reprieve so I was a bit of a slave driver in getting the garden in shape this year.  But the good news is that the garden is done and the surgery is scheduled for June 1st.  I don't remember ever finishing the garden so early in past years (all three of them!), though the warm weather/threat of surgery certainly drove me to a whole new level of efficiency -- and that's with VPH out of commission for a few weeks in the midst of it!  The marigolds and beans went in on Monday, May 17th and this is the final veggie garden: 

I had to look back at photos from the same time last year to see the difference and not only is the veggie garden quite a bit larger and more diverse this year, but the grass is much farther along (all of the old photos are from 5/17/09 and 5/18/09):

Can you see the marigolds in the photo at the top?  I really don't know why planting 36 marigolds was so difficult for me to get started.  I also put two rows of Royal Purple bush beans in the planter table this year:

And a photo of the gravel patio last May, boy it's come a long way in a year:

You can see the irises blooming and the Siberian irises just about to pop open behind the ginormous hydrangea, not to mention the peas to the right attaining height, but no flowers yet:

 

And the difference in the size of the hydrangea is much more than just two more weeks of warm weather.  We didn't do anything differently in this, its fourth year in the garden, so we don't know why it's more than four times the size it was last year:

I'm going to switch it up a little with this next photo.  It's from last May...a view of back garden from about where the stepping stones from the patio to the raised garden bed are located, or right smack dab in the middle of the whole garden:

The old shed is just so crappy looking.  I also like that the new shed is still in the box on the gravel patio under a tarp in the photo above, but nicely assembled in this photo from today:

Speaking of stones, the rain has sort of uncovered the huge stone in front of the raised veggie bed.  We think it was a piece of curb or something because of the yellow paint stripe on the edge:

 

And one more photo of the whole garden from the hill at the very back of the garden.  I like to stand up here occasionally and survey my domain:

 

I can't tell you how excited I was to look into the big black trash can and find the first Yukon gold potato foliage poking up through the soil: 

 

As I worked in the garden on Monday birds and butterflies were all over the garden.  VPH came to keep me company for a little while and even decided which type of marigold would be planted in each container.  As I toiled away he spotted a bird in the birdbath and it was all I could not to squeal in delight!  I didn't reach for the camera then, but I did get these two guys by the feeder a little later:

 

Get ready for some of the most boring photos you'll see on this blog, but I was feeling lazy and instead of making plant tags, I'm documenting what is in each container here.  French filet bush beans in both pots: 

 

Burpee's Stringless Green Pod bush beans in both pots:

 

The red potatoes are coming up very nicely (especially the ones on the right), but this photo is about the Kentucky Wonder beans planted in the two wooden troughs along the fence in back: 

I paused frequently to taken in the wildlife as I planted...the female cardinal is snacking on the ground beneath the feeder:

 

Both of the white plastic pots on the black plant stands are Gold Rush Yellow bush beans:

 

And both of the brown plastic pots on the wooden plant stands are Burpee's Tenderpod bush beans:

 

When the peas finish (still only flowers on that one variety -- hurry up already, peas!) I will plant Royal Burgundy bush beans and Maxibel bush beans along the side of the house in their place.  I'm pretty excited to see the Hootenanny dahlia coming up from beneath the huechera leaves:

 

I will probably leave the greenhouse shelves up for a while, but VPH put those bulbs from the bottom shelf in a paper bag in the basement after I took this photo:

 

So in addition to the herbs I showed you the other day, I have the Japanese maple seedling and a bunch of petunia seedlings:

 

One 6-pack of white impatiens and "found" lamium and creeping jenny still to add to the shady side of the house if need be:

 

I started digging this hole by the stump at the end of the veggie garden for the lovage.  We'll add compost to it and let the lovage develop some more roots before I transplant it.  I think I will also will keep the spearmint in that spot permanently:

The surgery is going to be done laparoscopically and I should only be in pain for about 48 hours and back to normal within a week's time.  I'm not exactly looking forward to it, nor am I opting for the surgery without thought and research, but it does need to be done because I don't think I can go without ice cream for the rest of my life.  I look forward to recovering in my garden.

I'm Too Tired To Take a Shower

Day 2 of the marathon to finish the garden was another perfect day to garden--sunny, but right around 70.  I admit I slept until 10am.  Have I mentioned here that I'm a night person?  Unfortunately gardening at night requires too much equipment.  VPH suprised me by putting on gardening clothes right after we all had some bagels and heading right outside.  And SS2 shocked me by following him out the door even though I told him he didn't have to -- what a great guy!  He and VPH had the hosta/rhododendron bed weeded and mulched before I even came outside:

 

And the Mother's Day Garden too (though VPH still needs to fix those rocks on the upper right): 

 

When I came outside they asked me what to do next.  I suggested digging and screening some more compost and as we headed back that way I got distracted by the pile of tarps sitting on the gravel patio.  So we all moved our cars out of the driveway and laid out the tarps.  SS2 rinsed them off with the hose and we left them there to dry.  I just wanted to tell you this because it illustrates how easily I'm distracted in the garden and because I love that VPH insists on keeping this tarp that used to live under the big pop-up shed.  It stuck out a little on each side and he was forever catching the corners with the lawnmower: 

 

On to the compost...since I wasn't doing the heavy labor today I snagged a photo of the menfolk at work.  VPH is calling himself a dirt farmer now:

 

I added some of the finished compost to the top of the patio tomato plant since the soil level was rather low.  But now I'm a little concerned because the water just sat on top of it and it looks kind of clayey.  I hope it won't be a problem, but I'm going to have to keep an eye on it:

VPH and SS2 filled another 2 trash cans with finished compost and then came over asking for another task.  I set VPH to placing the big rock that used to be in front of the little pop-up shed in front of the shed.  He used some of the finished compost to build up because we wanted the rock to serve as a little ramp to make it easier to get the mower in and out of the shed.  I like this photo because you can just see SS2 laughing at his father right before he was excused with thanks for his hard work (and he even went inside and did the dishes -- love that kid!):

 

I think he did a great job getting it pretty close to level and building up the left side (the yard really slopes here and although we did our best, we didn't get the shed 100% level, but it's pretty squared up).  He even put down some grass seed.  Can you see the two patio boxes are in place on either side of the shed now?  So much better:

It's still not as neat and organized as I would like back here, but it's getting there:

VPH was then excused as well and I did fun stuff!  Four fingerling potatoes in the large pot and the basil perpetuo in the little container 'cause it's right near the front door: 

Four fingerling potatoes in the large pot and two more in the smaller one.  This is my little experiment to see if they grow better with the hilling method or a full container (just like I did for the red potatoes): 

 

Speaking of the red potatoes...they're coming up all over the place in the wooden box:

 

And the black plastic container:

At this point I really should have planted the marigolds in the veggie garden, but for some reason I just wasn't feeling that job.  I think it was planting the pesto perpetuo that got me thinking about herbs.  Before I knew it I was transplanting like crazy.  First I tucked some Red Rubin basil into this pot (everything else had successfully overwintered in it):

And some Large-leaf Italian basil into this one (you'll remember that the others were here already):

Then I went nuts with this year's configuration of the herbs in pots by the patio:

The golden oregano overwintered in the large container above and this is some that was spreading there (it creeps on top of the soil and roots as it goes), so I just ripped it up and planted it in a little potting soil -- free plant!  The rosemary came home with us from Florida in December and lived on the kitchen table for a few months then moved outside in March. The tarragon successfully overwintered in a pot outside (and started growing in March). The Bee Balm (a gift from Layanee when I visited her garden 2 summers ago) also overwintered. I grew the dill from seed started inside in March. I bought the lavender in March and planted it in April.  The parsley and basil are starts purchased a few days ago and planted today.  The cilantro was also grown from seed started inside in March.  I had a lemon thyme that overwintered, but I am going to use it elsewhere because it's growing too slowly and I want one here that's good-sized already:

I think this is now my favorite part of the garden with the herb pots, clematis from the boys, and lupine starting to bloom:

So now I have this left in addition to the lovage and basil seedlings (some of which are growing great, but others aren't doing so well):

And only the herb barrel to play around with:

I had just enough energy left to get one more job done.  The dead branches and leaves of the ivy have now been removed, its rapid new growth pointed in a good direction, and stapled in place until it affixes itself properly:

 

When I finished that I noticed that I finally have flowers on some of the peas.  This is the Snowbird variety and the package says 58 days to harvest.  They were planted on March 18th, but they didn't show up until the beginning of April, so I'd say they're right on schedule if I count from when the seedlings emerged:

 

I really was too tired to shower, but we got so much accomplished.  The to do list now reads:  

·     Plant marigolds and potatoes

·     Plant beans

·     Mulch: Mother’s Day garden, hosta/rhododendron bed, veggie garden,  perennial shade garden

·     Finish herb pots/barrel

·     Build compost cages

I should get the marigolds and beans in tomorrow evening, but I'm not entirely sure that the perennial shade garden needs any mulch and the compost cages may not get built this year (I've only had the materials for 2 years now, so there's not exactly a rush).  I will definitely get the herb barrel done, however I'm not too sure where the lovage is going (though now I'm thinking somewhere down near the potato cans at the end of the veggie garden rather than the herb barrel) and there has to be a significant redesign of the barrel planting.  I can't believe we're this close to done.  I don't know what I will do with myself after we finish.

I Don't Think I Enjoyed A Minute Of The 3 Hours I Spent In The Garden Today

It was all work and none of it fun.  VPH, SS2, and I got started outside at the crack of noon.  First the three of us worked together to move the massive stone from behind the shed to in front of the raised veggie bed.  It was so heavy and the moving of it so scary that I didn't take any photos of the process.  Then I set SS2 to moving bags of mulch out of my car to their destinations and VPH to digging a hole for the big ass stone.  I headed into the veggie garden to plant.  But it turned out VPH needed help with the big stone, so the only thing I planted today was the Black Prince tomato plant to replace the Hillybilly one I broke the other day:

Then I helped VPH flip the stone in and out of its hole, got it leveled and flush with the ground and then evened out the leftover soil and spread grass seed.  The stone is still covered by some soil and probably will be until the grass starts to come in, but it's nice to have it all leveled out and a dry clean spot to stand while I play in the bed:

Then while SS2 watered the veggies and I started planting the fingerling potatoes (also not completed because I was called away to help with something), VPH started the brick project.  I know, Mom, that you are dying to see what we were using the bricks for, but I'm not sure the end result will be worth all your excitment.  I present our brick and mulch platform for the double-lounger.  Bricks because we had them on hand, mulch because it's cheap and the soil here is very thin, so as the mulch breaks down it will enrich and add to the soil vs. another inexpensive option: pea gravel which would just add more rocks and you know we don't need those:

You can see in the photo above that VPH and SS2 set to work mulching the veggie garden.  Doesn't it look great:

We excused SS2 after 2 hours because we're nice like that.  And VPH and I went back to the bastard garden (otherwise know as all the shit behind the shed).  He's been throwing branches, leaves, and whatnot back there for years, even Christmas trees before we started gardening.  I figured there's a few feet of great compost back there and I'm sick of buying potting mix.  He wasn't so into the idea, but he loves me, so he grabbed a shovel.  I bought a few feet of 1/2 inch hardware cloth ages ago to build a compost screen to place over our wheelbarrow, but I haven't gotten around to building the frame for it yet.  I can tell you it worked just fine laid over the top of the wheelbarrow.  VPH shoveled onto it as I lightly pushed the compost through, saved the big fat worms, and removed all sorts of debris ranging from large sticks to rocks to broken glass -- you bet I was wearing heavy rubber gloves as I did.  Here's the hole we made today:

 

And the trash can full of finished and sifted compost.  We would have filled it all the way to the top, but we could barely carry the can at this level:

 

We did manage to get it over to the end of the veggie garden by the potatoes with the top safely on.  I'll try to remember to open it up and wet it a little every once in a while so the worms don't die, but hopefully the potatoes will grow so quickly that I'll need it before too much longer:

 

There's still some more mulching to do, and in fact I think we will need another bag or two before we're done.  Clearly we could spend a lot of time digging and sifting compost.  But I want to get some fun stuff done tomorrow too or I might not be able to motivate myself to go out to the garden.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day - May 2010

Carol's been hosting GBBD for years over at May Dreams Garden, and now I'm a monthly participant after years of observing.  And there's a lot blooming in my garden this month.  I'll give you a tour of the garden starting from the front door.  The Purple Gem rhododendrons in the two containers flanking the front steps are done blooming (well only one actually bloomed) and they're still leafing out, but the impatiens add color and along with the creeping jenny fill out the interior of the container:

English Daisy, a purple calibrachoa, and the few straggling flowers on the pink creeping phlox (the big black container is red potatoes and a Husky cherry tomato is tucked in the right):

 

I love how the shadow of the blooming white salvia was in such sharp relief on the fence:

A lavender creeping phlox at left and white calibrachoa in the near hanging basket: 

 

And on the table a gerbera daisy in a galvanized pail that was the centerpiece at a benefit dinner that I attended last week.  I wouldn't have purchased it, but I'm glad that my tablemates send it home with me because I'm enjoying it a lot:

A bunch of marigolds that will be planted with the tomatoes today:

Leftover impatiens on the greenhouse shelves, a purple calibrachoa in the hanging basket, and a few blooms left on a purple creeping phlox down on the right:

 

Hot pink calibrachoa in the hanging basket on the left, white salvia in the green container, strawberries in the little blue pots, and chives in the far blue pot:

 

A funky double-blossom dark pink calibrachoa in the center and chives in the brown hanging basket on the right:

 

The azalea in the Mother's Day garden is still blooming away:

 

And I totally cheated on this one by buying a "patio" tomato plant with blooms and actual fruit on it already at Walmart, but it was only $13 and we'll be eating tomatoes in June:

Moving over to the patio garden where a lot is happening: 

You may have noticed the iris blooming above.  Here's a close-up of the bearded beauty:

We planted the passalong rhizomes back in the fall of 2008 and this is the first time they've bloomed, so indulge me and look at another photo:

Another plant that I've waited two years to see blooming -- lupin -- and it looks like it will match the iris:

The Blue Mist clematis that the boys got me for Mother's Day is almost blooming...maybe it will be the same color too:

 

And the Siberian iris is very nearly there, but I know it's a darker purple:

The bleeding hearts (dicentra) are fading to a light pink, but they're still pretty:

Impatiens in the hanging baskets along the walk on the shady side of the house:

Another two on top of the huge stump (it's full of carpenter ants so I can't put anything heavy up there):

Just about to bloom is one of the astilbe that I bought bare-root from Home Depot last year.  I'm so excited to see it flower:

A few flowers on the white creeping phlox (I'm not feeling too good about the survival of this plant, it's not looking good), and the astilbe is blooming though it's tough to see with all the background chaos:

 

And that brings us full circle back to the front of the house.  I hope you enjoyed your tour...I know I enjoyed leading it.

How $.68 Cost Me $57

I did take the afternoon off today and I'm glad I did.  I stopped by an organic farm stand that I visit from time to time.  And what do I find?  Fricking fingerling seed potatoes!  I searched high and low for them weeks ago and gave up.  Well I couldn't leave without buying some.  5 red fingerling seed potatoes set me back a whole $.68:

 

Then I stopped by my favorite local nursery, Vaiuso Farms, searching for a replacement tomato plant for the Hillbilly I killed yesterday.  You know I couldn't just buy one $.75 tomato plant.  But I did manage to limit myself to just under $25 (not counted towards the aforementioned $57).  From the bottom left up -- large leaf Italian basil, Red Rubin basil, parsley, a Black Prince tomato, Pesto Perpetuo basil, lemon thyme, and a buttload of marigolds:

I want to highlight the Pesto Perpetuo basil because I haven't seen it before.  I love the variegated leaves and from what I read it's a non-flowering basil.  I've never heard of such a thing:

From the moment I bought the $.68 worth of seed potatoes I brain-stormed non-stop about where I could plant them.  I didn't have a single empty large container sitting at home, so it was either wait until I harvest the radishes and beets and plant them in the raised veggie bed (not ideal for a bunch of reasons, but mainly because it's only about 10 inches deep), forgo the Black Prince tomato I just bought and plant in its intended container (kind of small and not likely to yield as many fingerling potatoes as I would want), plant in the ground somewhere (but then have to dig them up--ugh), or buy some new containers.  Guess which option I went with?  I headed home, dropped off my plants, picked up VPH (now home from school), and off we went to my favorite place to buy containers, Ocean State Job Jot.  $57 later I have four new pots that blend nicely with two already in the driveway area:

 

But the two blue ones on the left were shaded by the bush to the left of them, so I grabbed my trusty Felco pruners and down it came.  I'm sure it will grow back if we don't dig the stump out (it has once before), but VPH is happy because now it won't be attacking him when he gets in and out of his car: 

 

This is what it looked like yesterday with the huge unknown bush intact and single pots:

I'm thinking the red fingerling potatoes will be spread out between at least three of the new containers, one is just too small, but oh so cute.  Just in case you don't know how to make your seed potatoes stretch a little further, here's a little info session for ya.  You can cut them into smaller pieces, but each has to have at least 2 eyes.  There are at least five eyes visible in this photo: 

 

The same potato sliced in two with plenty of eyes on each piece:

 

All five potatoes sliced in half and drying out to be planted tomorrow:

 

Some people say it's not necessary to let the sliced potatoes "cure," but I decided to error on the side of caution.  So that's how my $.68 purchase cost me $57.  I promise I will not go buy any more containers this year.  Really.  Well, probably.

Tomatoes And Peppers Oh My

With rain in the forecast for Friday, I was really glad I was able to get into the garden late this afternoon to plant the tomatoes and peppers.  Though they're rather difficult to see in this photo:

 

I'll give you some close-ups from left to right.  The raised veggie bed and one Black tomato I grew from seed (thanks Jennah!):

 

I still have beans to plant, but I want to wait until the forecast calls for a few warm days in a row before I do so.  The white container will hold bush beans of some sort.  The hanging baskets have habanero peppers, the wooden lattice planter Soldacki tomatoes, and the grey container is the other Black tomato grown from seed:

 

The big green planters have Brandywine Pink tomatoes and the other three will have beans (and more potting mix in those brown ones):

 

Ivory Bell peppers in the brown containers, red potatoes in the big grey ones, another habanero pepper hanging above, and tucked in back where you can't see them are two wooden trough containers for Kentucky Wonder beans:

 

My favorite tomatoes last year--Black Russian--in the trellis planter, empty brown pots for beans, and Lilac Bell peppers in the large green containers:

 

Roma tomatoes and habanero peppers in the big wooden planter, a habanero pepper hanging above and that's a container of spearmint on the plant stand:

 

And on the gravel patio Cherokee Purple tomatoes in the blue square planters, Hillbilly in the grey square planters (though I broke the stem on the one on the left, so I'll have to find a replacement for it, because I don't think it's going to magically heal itself despite me mounding soil onto it), and Green Zebra in the round blue containers.  The patio box will be moved this weekend and beans will go in the planter table:

 

And of course Yukon Gold potatoes in the black trash cans at the end of the garden, which I really hope are doing okay in that clay soil down there.  Maybe I'll dig down to one tomorrow to check on them:

 

The peas are doing well, but not a sign of a single blossom yet and I planted them on April 18th.  I'm getting impatient:

 

The Sweet basil is doing great:

But some of the other basils aren't looking as good:

But luckily the dill and cilantro are thriving:

I scheduled Friday afternoon off to garden, but the weather forecast isn't looking very good.  I might hit a few garden centers instead.  I still need marigolds to plant with my tomatoes and you know I'll find some other things I want!

UPDATE: Mom, just for you...that Hillbilly tomato is not coming back from this:

 

It was a rather sickly seedling anyway, which is why I think it snapped as I firmed the potting mix in around it.  Just gives me an excuse to go buy a different variety! 

Patio Garden -- Check

With overnight temperatures back at the norm, meaning no looming potential frost, I spent about 10 minutes this morning emptying the kitchen table of all plant material.  When I got home from work it was still rather cold, but with the next 24 hours forecast to be rain-filled, I really felt motivated to get my new clematises in the ground.  After a good 15 minutes spent unraveling the stems from their mini-trellises, I got them both planted.  The Blue Mist clematis on the left was pretty easily wound around the trellis and tied to it with green string:

 

The Mme. Baron Veillard clematis on the right was more problematic.  The 2 really long stems of it broke off when I tried to wrap them around the trellis leaving 3 short tendrils, but I wrapped them around the trellis (one on the center post with the Blue Mist) without further event.  I took the 2 broken off pieces and stuck them in the pots from the clematises filled with the soil we took out of the patio garden.  Maybe I'll end up with 2 extra clematises and if I don't, oh well:

Here's the bare-root clematis I got from Home Depot last year.  It's now tied to its trellis too.  You can see that 3 of the 4 climbing nasturtiums have now sprouted.  I think this trellis will be very pretty this year:

 

Then I spread 2 bags of mulch in the patio garden.  The light spots are approximately where I planted the zucchini seeds and I didn't want to add more mulch for them to fight through as they emerge.  I love how the garden looks when the mulch is still a little damp and so dark:

 

I walked the rest of the garden and found the first potato leaves emerging from one of the containers of red potatoes in the veggie garden:

And this was an impulse buy on Monday at Walmart.  For just $13 I bought this 'patio' tomato plant with fruit already formed and tons of blossoms on it.  I think I might have bought it just for the neat trellis on the container.  I plan to add another few inches of soil to the container because it's rather low:

I got some terrible shots of the cardinal sitting on the fence this afternoon.  I think he's becoming more accustomed to us being in the garden:

Some day I want a camera that will take good shots from 50 feet away:

 

Unfortunately I don't see a lot of planting getting done until the weekend between the weather forecast and my work schedule, so this little bit of gardening and posting will have to tide me (and you) over.

What A Wonderful Mother's Day Weekend

When you have to split Mother's Day with the woman who actually gave birth to your step-kids it can make for a short celebration (last year SS2 had to get up early, drive an hour to spend the entire day with her and her mother, and then got home just before dark in time to eat dinner).  So I kind of get to celebrate the entire weekend.  When the sun finally came out on Saturday around 3:00pm, I really wanted to go out and work in the garden and VPH really wanted to veg on the couch.  But since it's Mother's Day weekend I was able to drag him into the garden without too much kicking and screaming.  SS2 even joined us when he got home from an outing with his girlfriend.  By the end of Saturday we had the veggie garden containers full of fertilized potting mix and ready to plant up: 

 

They're not in exactly the spots where they'll live and some of those pot stands need to be leveled and pounded in further, but I'm liking the mix of colors, textures, and heights.  The containers on the gravel patio are ready for tomatoes too, but the patio box is driving me nuts sitting there:

 

As you can see we still haven't gotten the shed area organized:

This is the to do list relating to the shed:

·     Clean up around the shed, position patio boxes, compost

·     Build compost cages

·     Put big rock in front of raised bed

·     Put rock in front of shed

·     Seed around shed and raised bed

It will get done, it's just frustrating to not be able to do it by myself.  That rock is behind the shed and I can barely budge it, let alone pick it up to put in the wheelbarrow and move across the garden.  And there's other stuff on the list like weeding and mulching the Mother's Day garden, but it's still lovely even though it hasn't been tidied up yet:

The irises are going to give us a show when they do finally bloom:

 

You can see how much more light reaches the shady side of the house now that the huge tree is gone:

 

Over the last few weeks I dropped some subtle hints that a clematis for the empty trellis in the patio garden would be a nice Mother's Day gift.  On Sunday morning SS2 presented me with a Blue Mist clematis:

Details for anyone who's interested:

And then, much to my surprise, another clematis, which is a gift from his brother (not present due to work obligations).  Since they got me two, I asked that the second clematis (a white spring/summer bloomer), be exchanged for a fall bloomer.  Introducing Mme. Baron Veillard:

Again, for anyone who cares:

After a lovely brunch with VPH and SS2 at our favorite little breakfast place, SS2 went back to the garden center to get me a fall blooming clematis and VPH and I headed off to Home Depot to get mulch:

 

10 bags probably would have fit in the trunk, but with the addition of a big bag of potting mix, we flipped down the back seats and now my car smells awesomely of mulch:

 

But that's where it stayed because it was way too cold for me to work in the garden today -- about 50 in our shady garden.  In fact, it's so cold that I heeded the frost warnings and brought in my seedlings and starts this evening.  The kitchen table is quite the greenhouse tonight:

 

It's supposed to be a little bit warmer tomorrow, so maybe I'll be able to get at least the tomatoes and peppers planted.  If it's still chilly I'll be spreading mulch instead.

Firsts

First flower on the strawberries:

 

First photo of the raised veggie bed that actually looks like a garden:

 

First iris bud that gives me a hint at color:

 

First time I've noticed that the Siberian irises are starting to send up flower stalks:

 

First bud on the Husky Cherry tomatoes -- might I be eating tomatoes in June?  I dare to dream:

 

I didn't get a darn thing on my list done yesterday and won't be able to spend any time in the garden today, but it's going to be a fabulous weekend of gardening! 

Little By Little

Get used to seeing photo after photo of this container, I have a feeling it's going to be a favorite subject:

 

As will the raised veggie bed.  Six out of seven cucumbers seeds have joined the party:

 

The Purple Gem rhododendrons are putting out new leaves, the creeping jenny is growing quickly, and the freshly planted impatiens will fill out the container nicely:

Since the steps aren't straight I'm not really concerned about getting the lights straight:

 

I also planted up four hanging baskets of impatiens and put two on these hooks on the shady side of the house:

And the other two on top of the huge stump because it was so bare.  And honestly I really didn't feel like getting out the drill and putting the plant hangers up again (every time I attach them to a tree the landlord has it cut down):

I was a really lazy gardener too, I just threw the whole 6-pack in the center of the basket.  I usually break them up and plant them spaced further apart:

I split the two containers of Husky Cherry tomatoes into four separate plants as planned.  Two went in hanging baskets on the large shepard hooks on the gravel patio, one in a pot on the metal bar on the patio, and the last one in a black plastic pot which made me think to place it in the blue/black grouping in the driveway.  Since things always look better in odd numbered groups, I threw the decorative frog thing holding a purple calibrachoa into the mix, but staring at this photo I think I may switch it with the phlox container for better balance:

 

Then I started pulling/cutting down the bulb border and will finish the other half tomorrow:

 

Now that the lupine is standing tall front and center, I could see that it has flower stalks!  I'm beyond excited since I've been waiting two years to see this flower in my garden:

  

I wanted to see how the new containers looked from the grill area...nice:

My mom requested a "before" picture of the hillside where the wildflowers are slowly growing.  We've tried getting those weeds out of there, but we're not having much luck.  However this shot also shows just how high that stump is on the hill and that the guy who's been doing work upstairs took out some of my little wildflower seedlings and left some nice big tire tracks for us:

The herb seedlings are doing really well and I'm starting to think of what will go where.  You saw that I saved some space in the hanging herb basket, the herb barrel practically has acreage available, and I have six empty pots here: 

  

My to do list for tomorrow:

·     Cut down rest of patio bulb border

·     Plant moonflowers

·     Plant zinnia

·     Plant zucchini

·     Plant more nasturtium by trellis

What's on yours?  

A Good Start

Before I get to all the planting I did this weekend (and there's a lot), a quick check in on the patio garden.  The bulb border is just about done and I've decided that as soon as these last few tulips finish blooming I'm going to cut it all down to the ground.  We'll plant new bulbs in the fall.  I just didn't get enough bloom this year to make suffering through the leaves dying back to the ground for another month or so worth it: 

I'll miss beauties like this though:

 

First up on the to do list was getting the dahlias in.  Check:

The other 6 tubers went into containers with perennials, like with this phlox.  When it stops flowering I think the green foliage will still be pretty with the brightly colored pot:

And this nice purple combo for as long as it lasts.  Hopefully the dahlias actually grow:

And both of these blue/black containers have dahlia tubers in them.  I think they elevate the plain black plastic planter of red potatoes, of course I may just be fooling myself:

I think this is going to my favorite grouping once again.  The blue fescue is coming back nicely, the coral bells is glorious in that pot (there's a Hootenanny dahlia tucked in the back of it too), and the large pot with a white salvia, that funky coleus, purple fountain grass, and dichondra is a great combo.  I am going to try again to grown moonflowers up the trellis, which didn't work out too well last year, but I'm going to blame that on the terrible weather we had:

I did basically the same planting in this pot, but with a slightly less funky coleus.  I'm especially proud of myself for buying a container that had 2 dichondra seedlings in it and carefully separately them using one in each pot:

I decided that the big pot on the new huge stump on the hill would be home to the astilbe, heuchera, white phlox, and the golden sage that I dug out of the wooden box on Saturday:

 

However, I was not looking forward to climbing up to the stump to plant.  This really doesn't show how steep the hill is or how perilous one's footing is balancing on those roots.  Which is why I planted all perennials that don't need pampering.  And in fact, you can't really see the plants very much from this angle or distance:

But if you climb up there...well I'm sure the phlox will perk up after some time and tomorrow's forecasted showers.  The golden sage will get pretty big and give some brightness to the container.  VPH says he may go up and cut back some of that brush around it:

This chaotic photo shows you the calibrachoa are on the three hooks in the driveway.  I found a container at the nursery with 2 purple calibrachoa seedlings in it, so I carefully split it (2 plants for the price of one again!) and put one in a black plastic pot in the frog planter on the table:

The hanging basket in front of the ivy has a double bloom calibrachoa, which may be my favorite this summer:

 

And the hook by the raised veggie bed has the hanging herb basket with the purple sage rescued from the wooden box and the chives and creeping thyme that overwintered in this container.  The empty space is reserved for some basil when my seedlings get big enough to transplant:

 

The only veggie I got in this weekend was the eggplant, mostly because I had already filled the container.  I did carefully pull the two seedlings apart (more bargain goodness with two plants in the same container) and planted them about 8 inches apart.  The windchime was a freecycle pick-up and I've already written about the container of herbs and all the strawberry pots a million times:

Did you see the huge pile of bricks in the photo above?  Of course you did, you'd have to be blind to miss it.  After nearly a year we are finally getting around to using them.  VPH needs to mow the grass and then I'll hop on this project.  Feel free to leave any guesses on what we'll be doing in a comment:

 

A sign of summer...the nasturtiums are popping up in the raised veggie bed.  Even better two of the cucumbers broke through the soil today.  I love this photo for some reason:

The first butterfly of the summer, a painted lady which let me get really close:

I have so much left to plant: the impatiens; all the tomatoes, peppers; and seeds -- beans (crazy amounts), zucchini, marigolds, zinnia, moonflowers, and more nasturtium.  I hope to get it all done by Mother's Day, but I have a pretty full week of work and other obligations which will prevent me from spending too much time in the garden.  If I can just get 2 hours in a day I should be in pretty decent shape.  How's your spring planting going?

Wondering Where April Went

There's a few days left in April according to the calendar, and the low temps and freeze warning the local newscast is giving me right now certainly make it feel like April, but my garden does not look like April.  Though I do think this little cold snap and 3 days of rain have helped the tulips last a little longer:

Because this does not look like an April garden:

 

This is the same garden on April 30, 2009.  Now some of the difference can be attributed to a year's worth of maturity for the day-lilies, irises, and grasses, but once again, we're clearly running a few weeks ahead of schedule:

I especially like how much the ivy on the fence has grown and that the hydrangea is clearly visible at the corner of the house now.  I posted this photo of the Ichiban eggplant on Twitter earlier today with a note saying perhaps I should have brought it in last night.  Don't worry, it perked back up during the day:

 

The other item of concern when I walked outside this morning...apparently the high winds and wet ground dislodged my paper-clip stakes and the pea netting was all over the place:

 

I figured there was no point trying to stake it down again while the wind was still going crazy and the ground was soaked, so that's item one for Thursday's to do list.  There's so much I want to get done over the next 4 days in the garden.  Expect many photos and updates.

Proof Positive

Anyone out there doubting that spring is running way ahead of schedule this year?  The tulips are already fading and the lilacs are blooming.  After a 90-minute drive home today I had to run outside despite the rain and check on my garden.  I'm astonished by the size of the heuchera in this pot:

 

I had to look back at last year's photos to see when it hit this size -- May 12, 2009 -- and it's not quite the size in last year's photo that it is now.  That's a full 15 days ahead of the norm and proof positive that this has been a crazy early spring:

The seedlings are looking good (as is our lawn): 

  

And I'm adoring my little rows of radishes (though I'm not sure about those onions):

 

I hope it dries up enough tomorrow for me to clean up last year's veggie garden mess.  And if it doesn't I'll be visiting a nursery because I have a sickness.

A New Look

I don't even remember when I created my former header, but it was definitely time for a new look.  I snapped this shot of basil seedlings today and not only is it calendar-worthy, I decided to use part of it for my new header:

The whole tray: 

A few highlights...I really have to get the cilantro and dill out of the tray before they take over completely:

I'm so excited for the lovage:

 

And with 3 Black tomato seedlings I can't believe I actually have a chance of harvesting tomatoes from a plant I grew from seed:

In other seedling news -- the first radish has popped up in the raised bed (and by the end of the day almost 2 full rows of seedlings had joined it): 

Three of my favorite things in the garden right now: the hydrangea, peas, and patio garden together:

It looks like my crappy fall clean-up may have unexpected benefits.  These appear to be lots of petunia seedlings...I'll have to try and save some and see, they'll probably be nice for replenishing containers mid-season:

 

It's almost azalea time:

It's covered in buds, unlike the rhododendron (I still like the rhododendron though):

 

No blooms on the bush on the other side of the steps where it sees far less sun.  Note the dried up creeping jenny by the solar light in the foreground:

 

As I grabbed it to tidy up before taking the photo I realized that it had rooted in the driveway sometime since I dropped it there about a month ago.  And I found a piece on the other side (you can see it in the photo above of the flowering rhododendron bush in the shadow of the container).  So I potted them up:

I hope there's an orange photo contest theme sometime soon:

I'm not sure the tulips will last much longer, so I like to spend some time every day staring at them:

 

From all angles:

 

VPH is doing much better, so he's actually going to join me in the garden on Friday doing some light duty tasks like weed-whacking and leaf-blowing.  I've got a long list of items that need to be planted or transplanted and I've told my boss I'm essentially taking a vacation day other than one scheduled conference call.  I can't wait!

I MIGHT HAVE PULLED THE TRIGGER TOO SOON

The little rhododendron bush by the front steps is blooming.  There are fewer than 10 blooms, but they're such a cute light purple.  It's a Purple Gem rhododendron -- $3 each on clearance at Home Depot if I recall correctly -- planted in September 2008:

 

Chives grown from seed that my mom sent me a few years ago.  I'm supposed to gather some seed from these when they bloom and send it back down to my mom, but I think that they're just plain old regular chives not garlic chives as they were labeled, so I'm not sure it's worth gathering seed for you, mom: 

 

And more for you, mom, those pretty purplish hosta shoots have just plain old green leaves:

 

The Cinnamon fern fiddle-heads are so alien-like bunched up together like this:

 

I might have used this as my green world photo entry to GGW's Picture This contest if I hadn't already submitted my entry: the fiddle-head photo from last year.  The late afternoon sun on this astilbe leaf stopped me in my tracks:

But I can't decide if I like it better put through Picasa:

 

I just can't stop staring at this pot:

 

Another big box purchase, this time from Wal-mart, an Ichiban eggplant that has two plants in one container for $3, I couldn't pass that by without purchasing:

I'm not sure yet if I'll plant them together as is, or try and separate them and plant them a little bit apart in one large container, or 2 completely separate containers. 

Oh, and in case you couldn't figure it out, the title refers to the photo contest entry, it was a little random.  And do tell me which version of the photo you like better, it's definitely a candidate for next year's calendar.
  

PLEASE HELP MY POOR LITTLE TOMATO PLANTS

Elizabeth over at Garden Rant is offering a chance to ask "What's Wrong With My Plant?" and get an answer from experts, the authors of What’s Wrong With My Plant, David Deardorff and Kathryn Wadsworth.  Well I've been staring at my brand new Husky Cherry tomato plants and wondering if I should toss them in the garbage or plant them in my garden.  Picked up at Home Depot just over a week ago the seedlings looked fantastic:

But then I started noticing white areas on some of the leaves:

 

And they got bigger:

 

Until they looked like this:

 

Since last year's late blight arriving early in the Northeast was attributed to tomato plants sold at big box stores, I'm more than a little nervous about what this could be and am strongly considering just tossing the plants in the garbage (not the compost pile obviously).  Do I need to be worried or should I strip off the affected leaves and focus on the healthy new growth on top and just plant deep?

WORKING AGAINST A DEADLINE

Remember the spot where we took down the old pop-up shed?  In August '06, when we had the concrete patio put in, the installer kindly used some decomposed granite to give us a fairly level 5' x 5' area to serve as the shed's base.  At least I'm pretty sure that it was decomposed granite.  So we had a basically level spot with several inches of material that wouldn't be conducive to growth next to the vegetable garden.  Have you guessed where we're heading yet?  A raised bed:

 

On Sunday I went to Home Depot and bought a 2x12x16 piece of pressure treated lumber.  First tip -- bring a friend with you to buy large pieces of lumber.  I left VPH at home prepping the site and regretted it almost immediately.  I found an employee to help me try to find a straight piece of lumber that wasn't too beat up and he quickly tired of my pickiness, or I just felt guilty making him help me lift down and examine piece after piece.  Then I had the nice man cut it into four 4' long pieces for me.  Some exterior screws and an impulse buy of 2 Husky Cherry tomato plants later (but look at the 2 plants/container -- I can divide them into 4, so it was like buying them half-priced) I headed home:

 

I'm not going to bore you with how to build the box, there's any number of videos out there instructing you in different methods, and I'm not going to debate pressure-treated lumber and what terrible chemicals might seep into your veggies and kill you.  I think the risk is pretty low, but I did line the box with landscape fabric to be on the safe side:

You can see above that I took the rubber edging that used to demarcate the end of the veggie garden and turned it to incorporate the new raised bed.  We had one bag of mulch (very wet mulch) on hand, which didn't quite reach all the way behind the raised bed, and the rubber edging didn't quite reach from the back of the bed to the fence, but I think that when I buy more mulch I'll be able to cover that up pretty well:

 

We spent the rest of our daylight hours moving soil from last year's tomato containers into the new bed (no tomatoes or potatoes will be planted here) and ran out of daylight with only about 1/4 - 1/3 of the bed filled.  VPH was on spring break this week so I had a list of chores a mile long for him and first up on Monday was to dig out soil from the large cedar tomato planters and other spots and finish filling the new bed.  I stepped outside that morning to show him exactly which containers needed to be emptied and that's where things went off schedule.  Long incredibly scary story short, he managed to partially tear his calf muscle and is completely out of commission for weeks...well when it comes to garden chores he's out of commission.  He can limp around and hopefully will be able to work when school starts back up on Monday. 

So now it was Tuesday and I had onion sets sitting on my kitchen table that really needed to get in the ground along with cooler season seeds that really needed to be planted.  But I also had an injured husband who was having trouble getting around the house, a job they kind of like me to show up to, and rain in the forecast for Friday.  Obviously I wasn't going to be able to spend as much time moving soil around the garden as VPH would have, so I was going to have to buy some potting soil.   I was finally able to take some time late on Wednesday afternoon to stop in at my favorite local nursery and charmed the proprietor into selling me three 3.8 cubic foot bags of soil-less mix at cost, which just fit into my trunk (and probably saved me about $50 versus buying 8 or 9 of the largest size bags of potting soil available at your various box stores, not to mention my back loading them into the car all alone):

At first I planned to break up the compressed soil -- I know it's not really soil, but I'm going to call it soil from this point forward -- onto the tarp, but then I thought, uh wouldn't it save time to do it right in the raised bed?  One package should yield about 8 cubic feet, so I hoped I would be able to get by with one and 2 partially used large bags of potting soil I had near the potting table.  This is when I had the block about 1/3 broken up:   

 

And this is as far as I got on Wednesday -- onions in and watered, but no seeds planted: 

 

And here it is late Thursday completely planted!  From right to left are one row each of Detroit Dark Red beets, Beauty Mix radishes, Salad Rose radishes, Early Scarlet Globe radishes, Burpee A#1 Hybrid carrots, one and half rows of Danvers Half Long carrots, and half a row of Tonda di Parisi carrots.  Along the base of the trellis I planted Spacemaster cucumbers and I plan to grow them up the trellis.  And I planted Jewel Mix nasturium around the perimeter of the bed (I removed the seed packets once I documented what I had planted where):

 

So I met my self-imposed deadline of beating the rain and getting the cooler weather crops in by April 15th.  I did get the peas in way back on March 18th and now they're big enough that I had to get the netting hung, so I went out in 45 degree weather on Friday to take care of it: 

This is the one other thing I wanted to get done before the rain arrived -- dividing the yellow hakone grass and using part of it in one of the new containers on the big stump.  After I stole some (maybe VPH will be able to sit here and weed soon):

 

I also put a hosta that I had hanging around into the other small container on the stump and could not for the life of me get the containers level again, so I gave up:

 

The wildflower seed that VPH scattered on April 1st is beginning to sprout:

 

And finally, the ferns in the containers are putting up fiddle-heads -- this one is potentially calendar-worthy:

 

A Japanese Painted fern (I think):

 

And the Cinnamon fern makes an appearance:

 

I can't wait to see how the raised bed does.  And I'm so pleased that I was to meet the deadline since about 30 minutes after I finished it started to pour and is forecast to continue to do so all weekend.

FORGOT HOW PUNISHING THIS GARDEN WORK IS

My boss and I both had a terrible case of spring fever on Friday, so we both called it a day around 3:00pm.  It was way too warm and sunny and I had way too much to do in the garden to spend all day inside on the computer!  First I had to get the new containers into place on the fresh stump.  We used rocks and sticks to level the pots, then we filled them 2/3 of the way with soil from last year's tomato containers so no one finds pretty new pots by the road and drives off with them.  My last comment is that these are going to be a bitch to plant up and I still don't know what will go in them, but it won't be high maintenance because I won't be climbing up there too often: 

Our kitchen table was a little overwhelmed with the rosemary, lavender, seedling tray, onion sets, and hyacinths so I decided it was warm enough outside for the herbs and into pots they went.  I also transplanted the tarragon into the new blue container on the left because the water running off the house (no gutters) really did a number on it:

 

I also transplanted those cute little strawberries that grew from runners in the fall into another new container and pulled the brown leaves off the others...they need a little new soil on top still, but overall, looking good:

 

VPH was a crucial part of the next work, I really don't think I could have done it without him and a tarp.  Remember the containers of perennials that needed more soil?  Well no one gave me any ideas for making it simpler than tipping over the pot, putting additional soil in the bottom and replacing the plants, so that's what I had to do.  We decided to start with the smallest one thinking it would be the easiest.  You can't really see it here, but there are a few fern fiddle-heads coming up, so I had to do this carefully:

Unfortunately, what you can't see is that the lip of the pot is slightly tapered in, so no matter what I did, the freaking contents would not flip out.  I finally had to sort of reach in and scoop it out.  It was messy, it was sloppy, but I think it will all survive.  I also added some soil to the top because the crowns of the ferns were a little exposed:

A slightly larger pot and I needed VPH to lift it up and turn it over carefully into my waiting hands.  See the hosta and astilbe coming up?  I was worried I'd snap them:

 

He then added soil to the bottom of the empty container and I flipped the plants back in safely, phew!  I added a little soil on top too:

No fiddle-heads from the Cinnamon fern yet, but the hosta was just poking up.  The heuchera's in awesome shape:

 

After a careful examination I decided this one only needed some soil on top.  Honestly, I just don't know how we could have turned it over without crushing that heuchera, though it could probably have taken the abuse:

I didn't grab a before shot of this container, but it has lamium, hosta, and astilbe coming up and it was in pretty good shape.  I just topped it off with some soil and tidied up the lamium: 

And we kept the biggest pain in the ass of the afternoon for last.  This large square container (at least 2 feet high and full of soil).  That's lamium trying to take over the entire container, but some creeping jenny's fighting for space, and beneath all of that I found a hosta and an astilbe:

VPH and I lifted it down together and carefully turned it upside down.  Nothing.  It must be tapered on top too because I could see through the finger-sized hole on the bottom of the pot that it had shifted down, but the container would not lift up off the contents.  I shook, I hit, I rocked, nothing worked.  In desperation I finally decided to shove soil into the overturned container through the drainage hole and used a metal plant stake to distribute it around.  It took a while, but it worked.  I also threw a bit on top:

 

I love my containers and I can't wait to see if wildflowers will grow around them: 

 

Saturday's big project is finally getting a floor into the shed.  Then we can move the shelves from the old pop-up shed to the real shed.  For some reason I'm the only one looking forward to this project.  I can't imagine why.

RAIN, RAIN GO AWAY, DON'T COME BACK FOR A WHILE, PLEASE

I really shouldn't complain, we didn't get nearly as much as other portions of the Northeast.  My garden's a little bit wet, but not flooded thanks to the slight hill we're on.  We drove by a house today less than a mile from ours with a swamp for a front lawn and could only wonder what their basement looked like.  Before the massive rain I took a page out of Layanee's book and burned my grass.  I may also cut it back since it didn't burn all that evenly:

 

But the rains brought some good things...peas!  There are still a few that haven't come up, but the ground is cracked above where I planted them, so I can tell they're pushing their way out.  I have a row of little pea sprouts:

I thought about cutting the Endless Summer hydrangea back hard (people around here do that for some reason), but opted not to (yes, I clearly need to fix that circle of stones, but am resisting running out in the dark with a flashlight to do it right now):

The crocuses are pretty much done flowering and the daffodils are not blooming as much as I would like, but maybe I'll get more soon.  I have high hopes for the tulips:

I'm still not quite at the point of dealing with the containers of herbs yet, but only one container seems to have cracked over the winter.  It will be sealed with liquid nails because it's one of my favorites:

But I still went to Ocean State Job Lots and bought more containers because really, people, I have a problem. But at these prices I couldn't resist and in fact, may have to go back for more:

 

Remember the fun slope that now will have at least partial sun because that huge tree was removed:

 

While I worked away on the most boring work-related stuff you could possibly imagine, VPH spent the morning raking it and cutting down last year's brush:

Then I filled a bowl with enough wildflower seed to cover 600 sq. ft. -- this area was 440 sq. ft., but I'm a fan of over seeding (that's VPH's hand):

Then since he did all the hard work, I let him have the fun of scattering the seed:

I had a few random old moonflower seeds from last year, so I planted them around the stump where I could see them out the living room window (that's my hand):

 

We have big developments inside too, almost 100% germination in the seed tray:

Even the tomatoes:

I think one of these might be calendar-worthy, but I'm not sure which is better: 

Leave me a comment and let me know which you think is stronger:

 

And I'll leave you with my other current obsession...hydrangeas:

 

This is the second of four pots of hydrangea bulbs that I've purchased over the last four weeks.  One will go with us to Easter dinner on Sunday as a hostess gift (not this one, another that's not quite blooming yet, but hopefully will just be on Sunday).  This one is behind me as I type and I'm loving the scent.  Please ignore our ugly blue carpet, remember it's a rental.  Those are all my seeds by the remotes on the couch.  Much time has been spent dreaming about what will go where.

Don't forget to tell me which of those seedling photos is calendar-worthy.

SEEDS!

I've been a bit of a lazy blogger.  I so want to get out there and garden like mad, but it's still a little bit early.  I could do more to clean up the garden, but that's more VPH's territory, and quite frankly, it's still a little bit cold (especially today 35 and windy).  I can't help but wander outside daily and rooting my plants on (no pun intended).  The bleeding heart is doing great:

I can't believe how early I have daffodils blooming (only 2 so far):

I'm enjoying the stepping stones that I bought last summer.  They'll be covered by the irises and day-lilies soon (as will the ugly foundation of the house).  I should go outside after dark and see if they're still glowing: 

Layanee says she thinks the mystery flowers are scilla siberica.  Uh, of course they are.  I even said to VPH as we walked up to look at the Mother's Day garden bed, "I hope we're not walking on those cute blue flowers that come up every spring, whatever they were called."  I guess we're not the first people to think a garden bed belongs in this spot.  But in my defense I never saw these flowers at this stage of their development before:

I love having garden blogging friends.  Jennah sent me a package of leftover seeds which arrived earlier this week.  I was prepped and ready with a new seed starting tray, seeds of my own and a fun new way to label.  So Wednesday night I combined TV watching with seed planting:

I planted tomato - black (From Jennah), lemongrass (FJ), sweet basil, lime basil (FJ), Mrs. Burn's Lemon basil (FJ), cinnamon basil, opal basil (FJ), Purple Ruffles basil, true lavender, fernleaf dill, lovage (FJ), watermelon coleus, and rainbow mix coleus.  I used sticky flags and toothpicks to make the labels.  By using a piece of scotch tape on each side over the marked flag it's waterproof and securely affixed to the toothpick.  It certainly makes for a colorful seed tray:

 

The kitchen has other signs of spring in it (like the pink crocs above near the sidedoor for a quick garden walkthrough).  As soon as the weather warms up a little I'll be planting these onion starts, if I can only decide where:

The rosemary really wants to be outside:

And I just couldn't resist this adorable provence lavender:

A new crop for the veggie garden this summer -- red potatoes!  Stay tuned for how and where they'll be planted:

 

So, as you can see, I'm chomping at the bit to get planting.  The tease of warm temps and sunny weather so early in the spring has really thrown me off.  How are you coping in your area?

SPRING CLEANING

Let's be honest.  We in the Northeast wish that the beginning of spring really came with the springing ahead of the clocks.  But in reality we know that there's at least one more cold snap lurking just around the corner and it often comes with a March or April snow storm.  I can't tell you how many of our Easter Sunday photos were taken in our pretty little Easter dresses and bonnets as we shivered with teeth chattering. But Mother Nature is giving us a few spectacular days this week to really get our hopes up that spring is actually here to stay! 

There have been a few garden days this week and there are little signs of spring all around the garden.  I tried to get a photo to submit to the GGW's March photo contest -- the theme is awakening -- but didn't find anything I love so far.  An emerging strawberry plant :

 

A blurry shot of my bleeding heart...containers do warm up faster:

 

I was very excited to see the tarragon growing though it didn't make for much of a photo:

Nor did the creeping jenny:

I think this may be my entry.  The lupine is so small it's dwarfed by the crocus, but I think it almost looks like palm trees at first glance:

 

I found a few things that made me laugh.  One container of carrots that we left in the soil looked like this (that's a rotting carrot):

But the other yielded intact carrots!  I don't think we're going to try and eat them, but it was fun to pull them out:

 

Then it was time to actually plant!  The CT oldtimers tell you to plant your peas on St. Patrick's Day.  However, it's never been even close to warm enough for me to want to be outside on St. Patrick's Day before.  I had to go to the office on Wednesday, so I was a day late planting, but I think within 24 hours still counts.  I opted for 3 different types:

I wondered how long a row of peas I was planting so VPH (who was keeping me company) paced out the row.  He said 15 feet, so about 5 feet of each of the 3 pea varieties went into the 2 inch deep trench 2 inches apart.  (I don't follow most spacing recommendations on seed packages.)  After taking this photo I carefully filled in the trench, but I didn't water because the soil was sort of damp already, the overnight temp was supposed to get close to freezing, rain is in the forecast in a few days, and most importantly, I haven't replaced the broken hose nozzle yet:

 

Moving inside, I like this shot of the forced forsythia branches in the living room, but I'm going to keep trying, and maybe even break out the tripod:

 

The full effect really brightens up the room:

 

This time of year I get the urge to clean and redecorate.  Usually it's because it's not warm enough yet to go outside to clean and redecorate the garden!   I got a lot done this past weekend during the non-stop rain.  First up was hanging some photos in the kitchen.  Do you know how to hang a grouping of frames one on top of the other?  Pick where you want your first frame and hammer in your nail.  Then you're supposed use a string level, but I don't have one, so I grabbed an extra dental floss from the medicine cabinet, popped out the spool/cutting device and slid off the spool of floss.  Then I tied a loop in the floss and slipped it on the nail (important that you don't tie the floss to the nail because it will be a bitch to remove without pulling the nail).  The wax floss will not unroll on its own despite the weight and gravity, so you can just unroll it to the length you need.  Then I used a tape measure to mark 2 more nail holes on the wall behind the string 15 inches apart (your distance will vary depending on the size of your frames and how far apart you want to space them):

And voila -- perfectly straight evenly spaced photos (that dresser doesn't belong there, but we haven't figured out where it's going yet):

And then of course I had to find a home for my honorable mention-winning photo, which actually printed very nicely on my home inkjet printer and gave a lot of color to the living room despite being a winter photo:

To the left side of the above photo you can see an open box on the table.  I have a small problem with bed linens.  I just love nice sheets and a pretty duvet.  So I splurged a little and bought a queen-sized 500 thread count set of sheets, a new duvet, and a 8 towel set (because we really need brown in the new bathroom instead of our old pink towels that matched the pink bathroom).  But I got it all for less than $90, so I'm hardly counting that as shopping at all!

What are your spring cleaning rituals -- inside or out?

MOM'S GARDEN: A VISIT SOUTH

It's cold, wet, and grey in CT, so I'm going on a mental visit to my mom's Florida garden by going through my photos from our November/December visit and some that mom has sent me this week.  Mom lives and gardens in the Ft. Myers area and like many of the gated communities in southwestern Florida, hers has strict rules about what you can grow on your own property and where.  Not only are they required to meet a standard for the look of the community (you have to grow grass), but there are safety based bans in addition to the aesthetic guidelines.  No vegetable gardens are allowed so as to discourage the wild animals from visiting (panthers are the scariest of them).  Consequently she has striking landscaping (photographed here at night...for some reason I didn't take any photos during the day), but not much else around the house:

 

And a pretty little pond by her front door (decorated for the holidays):

 

But edibles must be kept in containers "inside."  But inside at mom's house is the lanai:

With the temps dropping down below freezing overnight in Florida recently, mom had to tuck her veggies in tight (photo by mom):

But other than a few dead branches that had to be pruned off (and the watermelon on the right that isn't looking so good) mom's garden made it through just fine (photo by mom):

She harvested her tomatoes before the cold weather and put them in a paper bag to ripen -- success 10 days later (photo by mom):

But she's already got another ripening on the plant (photo by mom):

And a cute little pepper (photo by mom):

This would be my favorite part of the lanai except it's not heated and we've only been down to visit during the cooler weather (not to mention that the pool at the condo is heated and 45 miles further south):

Mom has plants all around pool.  Can you see the plant stand on the far left above?  And that's a chiminea covered up on the far right.  I think these are all orchids:

Mom had a phalaenopsis orchid sitting in this container with her camellia and it was just starting to flower at the beginning of December:

She said the "phalenopsis is an offshoot (play on words) of the dendrobian family. They are the toughest, longest-lasting bloomed of all the various orchid families.  They make corsages out of them that can last for weeks, blooms on a plant can last for months."  But you have to have the right level of humidity and light for it and apparently mom does, wish I did...she stuck it in a smaller clay pot and photographed it alone just for us (photo by mom):

Cacti do quite well in her garden too:

I can't count how many avocados mom started from pits on toothpicks in a glass during my childhood and she's still up to her old tricks.  I would absolutely love this photo without the crap at the top.  Why, oh why, did I not move the container?

I'm not sure exactly how mom started this meyer lemon, but I love the container she's growing it in:

 

Mom was having an aphid issue on some of her garden veggies so she bought a container of ladybugs and insisted that I photograph them in the garage fridge: 

 

I hope you enjoyed my tour of my mom's garden.  VPH and I can't wait to get back down there at the end of February!

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 grow 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?