Spring Day Garden Tour

HAPPY SPRING!

Whoa....Spring is here finally...YAY!    Yup...I am sick of winter and this winter wasn't even that bad here.  I am so excited I had to go grab the camera.  Come on, lets go see what is happenin' in my garden!  Oh and bring a cup of coffee...its chilly out and this might take a few minutes.

Licorice flavored very pretty leaves

Yumminess is happening in the back yard...and some flowers too but I'm hungry so where is that kale?

This buds for you...yummy!

Hey this isn't cheating, they are doing the sowing not me

I am not an addict...I am not an addict

Garden shame...we all have it...here's mine.  That bunch of pots...all the stuff I bought and never got planted and some that I dug up...and never got replanted. 

Last year's Pansies thriving and blooming again

Lets see what the Prims are doing....(moving a chair)...LOOK!

A plant from my past as a propagator

Wanda never disappoints and is so easy to grow

Let me show you a weed over here that you don't want going to seed...Galium, or Cleavers as a lot of folks call it.  The seeds are like velcro and it sticks to everything...especially sock, cat's tails and curly haired dogs.  It is a useful plant but just don't let it get out of control.  I call it Velcro weed because the leaves and stems have little hooks on them.

Oh and one more...yup...Labrador Violet...it goes everywhere...pretty and pretty invasive, at least in my garden.

Oh look...LETTUCE SEEDLINGS!  Nope...they are from last year's seed.  They wintered over so now I will have fresh lettuce without sowing a thing this year.  (I am right on task with my no seed sowing aren't you proud of me?)

Lets to out to the front...here we go down the side yard...oh look at that...red violets...I love violets.

I like getting up close and personal with my plants

If I ever am without this next plant I will be sad...David Ward is a man from my past...er a plant from my past.  I adore this plant.  Those leaves lighten up the shade and the flowers are such a sweet salmon pink.  Be still my beating heart!

Another plant from my past

Historically favorites in the garden

Oh no...more garden shame...actually it's not really shame its just the garden being itself.  That's what happens when you can no longer whip it into submission. (lol)  Sword Fern, Carex, Scilla and Orris root all fighting for land rights.  I wonder who will win?  Oh and yes I made the hyper tuffa planter.  Nice moss huh?

"Out of my way." "NO out of MY way!" (You mean you can't hear that?)

You gotta see this Hellabore...its just the sweetest little thing....here she is.

The sweetest seedling in the garden.

Well here we are at the front porch...yeah the Ribes is pretty isn't it.  The humming birds just go nuts over those ruby red flowers.  I like it because it blooms over my birthday...oh and we really needed something against this white wall and this worked great.

Thank you for taking the time to humor me and take a look at my garden.  It's funny writing this post because I am really doing nothing in the garden but letting it do it's own thing...proof that there is still beauty to be had when things are taken out of your control and that different doesn't necessarily mean bad...it's just different.

~Happy Spring and Happy Gardening ~

Spring is Springin'

Lord help me, I think I’m gonna have to squeal like a schoolgirl I’m so happy!  Spring is springin’ finally!!!  I can tell because the seeds say it all and I am never more excited about any garden chore results than with the emergence of my little baby plants.  Spring is springin’….

In our sunny kitchen window

Hope springs forth quickly with cucumber

In my vegetable garden

Stirring up hope with carrot babies

 

At the front porch

Lettuce be hopeful

Out front on the walkway

Ain't nothin in the world like homegrown tomatoes

So if you need to beat the doldrums of lingering cold weather try sowing some seeds of your own and maybe, just maybe, Spring will spring up at your home too.

Oooh! Look what I found!

Sigh....its finally spring!

What better way to spend a couple of hours than to cruise the local plant nursery.  It was the perfect day for it so I grabbed the ol’ camera and shot out of the house as soon as I could get my shoes on.  The draw of the nurseries is tough to resist after all the snowy, rainy, frozen, gray days of winter.  Let me warn you though, those nurseries, they know we’re for spring days and color and pull out all the stops to bring us to our knees.

Starting in late February my car shifts into auto pilot and if I’m not paying attention will turn right into every nursery in route to where I should be going.  Okay, so I can’t resist, but the way I figure, why fight it.  I deserve a little beauty in my life after all that winter weather.  Don’t you agree?

Today as I walked in the front door and turned to say hello to the cashier when my eye caught a glimpse of these totally cute glasses.

So cute weeding glasses.

They have little flowers painted on the top corners of the frames.  I want a pair but darn if they won’t work for me.  I’m so near sighted I have to take my glasses off to read!  Oh well…that’s a craft project for another day if I want them in my prescription.

As I headed on out to cruise for plants I saw these and was sent into a state of giddy delight…they come in colors now!

Look Ma!  They come in more than pink now!

And I said that out loud…really loud.  Amazing how things that delight us make us loose all measure of decorum.  Now which color…hmmm.

To be honest a few years ago my dear husband threw out a pair of plastic pink flamingoes an elderly friend had gifted me with before she died and I have been bereft ever since.  He’s still in the doghouse over that one and if he wants out he is going to have to cough up a new pair of birds for me.  I’ll take a pair in bright blue please.  Maybe I should charge him for pain and suffering too.  What do you think?

Milk Jug Update and Other Garden Observations

For those of you who have been keeping up with my milk jug science project I have some updated photos to share.  These were taken a couple days after our freezing temperatures last week.

They should make it just fine.

Different varieties have different cold tolerances...this is a good thing to know

I got lazy and didn't bother to pull them up close to the house and figured...live or die.  I am happy to report they did just fine and are now sitting out in one of the raised beds.  Though their tops don't look like they are doing much, those roots are growing and I can't wait until I can finally plant them.

The flower stems of brussel sprouts are very yummy and tender.

While I was poking around out back I discovered blooms erupting on my left over brussel sprout plants.  (Oh yummy!)  They were tender and sweet and juicy...I love garden grazing.

Volunteer potato showing up in the garlic bed means there is garlic smashed potatoes in our future.

Across the isle from my grazing spot a bonus potato plant poked its head up in the middle of the this years garlic bed.  There seems to always be one I miss.

New growth on Lavender in early April

Across the yard new growth on my Lavenders which gave me a lovely flutter of hope.  I have Lavender plans.

My favorite Rhubarb

Then I saw the rhubarb. I have two types of rhubarb in my garden. One I spent good money on that turned out to be the puniest green stemmed variety known to man and which sports more blooms than I ever knew possible for a rhubarb and the other, a fat stemmed luscious ruby red version that I am still waiting to see some produce from.  Why do the things we really want seem to take so long to get established?  Oh well, all good things are worth waiting for.

That "other" rhubarb plant in bloom

Oh and before I forget...I had pulled up a start of the favorite rhubarb that I thought had died last year and ITS ALIVE!  Maybe there is hope for my rhubarb patch yet.  WOO HOO!

Slugs have begun to munch at Patty's Garden Buffet

In a corner stock pile of containers I saw this.  I had tossed these variegated Iris in a pot last fall hoping to get them in the ground but here they are...growing in spite of my neglect and have now become the main course on the slug's garden buffet line.  I best be getting the slugs baited or these babies will be ribbons in a few days.

Golden Bay shines this time of year.

On the way out to the garden the golden Sweet Bay, always shining, called to me like a siren song with its glowing gold foliage.  I have the plain green variety too but when I saw a photo of this plant in a cobalt container...it was just too much.  It has been my siren ever since.

Wanda Wanda beautiful Wanda

As I was leaving the back yard I spotted my little 'Wanda' Primula blooms sparkling in the shade of our fence.  (Oh my heart be still.)  I love these little beauties and it seems they like my garden too.

Happy Gardening!


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Impending Bloom and Hope

We have all had more than our fill of disaster news of late,  I know I have.  It is such a grief to me to feel so utterly helpless when there is such great need as there is in the world and though I know our minds go straight to Japan, it is not just there but everywhere.  My heart cannot bear to look at it constantly.  If I did I would fall into despair without remedy.

First buds of warm sunny yellow peeking out on Primula veris

I was thankful to be out working in my garden today, to even have a garden, to be able to clean up things and see the new growth at my feet.  As I picked up the last of the garden duff I looked around and was overwhelmed by how even a flower bud is a messenger of hope, that life will go on, that there is yet beauty to be seen.

Pulmonaria longifolia, hope in breathtaking blue

I love that God saw fit to give us seasons to remind us that life does go on, that nothing lasts forever and that things only truly last just for a season and that he gave us impending blooms, a small thing with a big message.

Pure white Andromeda and bright ruby buds Ribes ranguineum a hope-filled contrast of colors

Rosemary, the herb of remembrance, bears her blooms of hope in soft pail blue

It doesn't matter if one is in a disaster zone or not there are still signs of hope when spring arrives.  If we can tear our eyes away from the dispairing scenes before us long enough and look around we will find them...small messages of hope sometimes surprising us from the crevice of a rock, as they lay on branches of a tree or on the ground at our feet.

I pray these little glimpses will be that sweet reminder of the mercy of the seasons and especially this season of hope.