Never Trust the Weatherman

He said it was going to rain, even thunderstorm for the past two days.

I believed him, so I didn't water my new coneflowers.

Big Mistake.
I took the hose out there last night and gave the area a good watering. It probably sprang right back to life overnight.

The new path area is filling in nicely with my red wave petunias and purple Angelonia. I also planted pink petunias, but you can't really see them in this picture.

I like the Shasta daisies with the red petunias. The daisies are very short in this area. Probably because they were moved and stunted with all the digging. I wish they would stay short here because they are the perfect height right now.

They are much taller on the side deck garden where they are mixed with yellow Margarite daisies. I am thinking of moving some of the yellow daisies to the arbor gardens this weekend.
The lychnis coronaria just started blooming, too. Everything is about a week or two late this year due to the cold weather.


This lychnis is on the other side of the house.

Way in the back you an see a lot of orange daylilies. They usually start blooming by July 4.
I do hope we get some rain soon. The grass is beginning to turn brown and all the flowers are crying out for a good drink of water.

Who Electrocuted my Allium sphaerocephalon?

(AL-lee-um sfay-roe-SEF-ah-lon)

I did a double take when I walked by the rockwall garden and this caught my eye.

It's my new hair allium, which seems to have opened overnight.
I love it!

It reminds me of a drumstick allium that stuck it's stem in an electrical socket.
This is drumstick allium.

(Allium sphaerocephalon (AL-lee-um sfay-roe-SEF-ah-lon))

I was out of town for the last four days. When I returned the arbor gardens were much more colorful than when I left last Thursday morning. I need to buy more of these red carpet lilies. I have a few orange carpet lilies on the other side of this garden--maybe they should be mixed together.


I have never been afraid to move any plant. Whenever I need a certain color someplace, I dig up the appropriate plant and move it. Just a few days ago I moved a yellow daylily in full bud. I dug a big hole, filled it with water and stuck the entire plant in when the water had gone down.


As you can see here, there was no harm to the plant. It did not even sulk. Daylilies are a cinch to move. Not all plants are as easy to relocate. It's always a tad risky to do so. I think I lost a new poppy when I moved it last week.

That said, I still plan to dig up those hair alliums and move them to one of the arbor paths where I can see and appreciate them more. I think I planted 8 of them and I only see five blooms. I hope they multiply quickly as the drumsticks do.

I must get ready for work now. I will have a busy day since I've been gone since last Tuesday.

I Planted a Few New Plants Today and Brought out some Garden Junk

To many of you it may seem like junk, but I am quite attached to all of these little treasures.

Take this shovel for instance.

Yes, the one that is only half there.

It broke years ago when we were digging out the rockwall garden.

Every time I see it sitting in the shed it reminds me of the three summers I spent digging out roots, rocks and poison ivy with that very shovel.

Now I can admire it every time I walk this path.

I bought a red caladium yesterday and planted it near the shovels.

I also planted that small coneflower. I keep planting coneflowers and they keep disappearing

On Sunday at our BBQ party, we were talking about invasive plants and my SIL mentioned that coneflowers were one of hers. What? I can't even get one plant to stay alive for two years! I find black-eyed Susans invasive. She can't them to grow well in her garden. Isn't that odd? I guess it all depends on the soil content.

Here is the frontal view of this side.


Since I decided not to plant annuals on the deck this year, I had a bunch of watering cans as well as the milk cans you've been seeing, that were still in the storage shed. I decided to haul them all out and scatter them in different places in the gardens.




To complete my objets d'art I leaned my old wheelbarrow against a tree among some taller perennials.


I am now off to see my hunky dentist. I have a 7:00 a.m. appointment. I am an early riser so I love that he takes such early appointments. I had a root canal a few weeks back and today I get the tooth crowned.

More Garden Work

I was outside early this morning trimming all the shrubs in the front of the house. I probably spent two hours trimming yews, burning bushes and a crab apple tree.
I still need to do all the shrubs on the side of the house, but I'll do that another day. I did a lot of other garden chores today.

I worked on this area which is directly across from the burning bush above.

If you walk down to where the path turns to the left, I had a big bare area where I had removed some orange daylilies.
I added another milk can (seems to be this year's theme) and moved a yellow daylily to fill in the empty spot next to the can.
I also moved a potted ligularia that I have been nursing along since last fall. It was nearly dead last year and now it's looking pretty healthy. I hope to get some nice tall yellow spikes on it soon.

I spent all morning outside. I finally had to come in at 2:00 p.m. to get ready for a 4th of July party we had to attend at 4:00 p.m. I was pretty well exhausted by then anyway.

After a refreshing shower, I made a spinach salad with strawberries, blueberries, red onion and toasted almonds to take to the event.

Spinach works so well with summer fruits and I have been eating a lot of it. I really enjoyed the addition of blueberries in this salad.

I used a very light vinegar/oil dressing and I am inserting the recipe here so I remember it.

Spinach Salad Dressing

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 cup Rice Wine Vinegar

1/4 tsp. Paprika

Just shake it all up in a lidded jar (or use a whisk) and gently toss over the salad. You can add poppy seeds or sesame seeds if you like them. I didn't have any or I would have used both.

Overnight Trip and a Great Bargain--or Two

We took an overnight trip Friday to see my son and his girlfriend. We decided to meet and stay at a hotel in Birch Run, MI.....a three hour drive for us and the home of a large outlet mall.

The first store I went in was Pottery Barn. In my small hometown we have nothing like Pottery Barn. I must say I was a bit surprised to see the prices in this outlet store. I found them to be quite high. But I kept an open mind and I did end up finding something to purchase:
These wild purple salad plates were marked down from $6/plate to $3 a plate. They also had a 10% off special due to the holiday weekend. So I bought six of them. I think they will work nicely for a Safari-themed dinner table.

Long time readers know that this is my favorite clothing store.

I have pretty much given up all the local clothing stores and I order online almost weekly from CC. I was excited to get to go in and see and touch the clothing I have seen online. I saw a sweater/jacket that I ordered last Thursday and was happy to see that it was quite cute in real life. I saw quite a few jackets and necklaces that I already own.

I must say that the online prices I get in the outlet store are way better than the prices in this store (the sweather was 50% less online). I did not buy anything here, but I felt really good about the prices I have been paying online. I made sure to drag Dear Husband over to many of the items I own and point out how much less I have been paying!

My best purchase was this pan.

It's a Calphalon One Infused Anodized 4-1/2-Quart Saucepan. There are different grades of Calphalon. I have some pieces of Simply Calphalon, which is not as nice as Calphalon One. I looked up this pan on Amazon. The price is $179.99. This pan was marked down to $49.99 because it had no lid. Because it was the 4th of July, they had it marked down again --to $19.99 on the sidewalk sale!!!
I was pretty sure I had a Calphalon lid at home that would fit. Sure enough I did. Wow--what a good deal I got on that one!

We even found a P. Farm store with items priced half or less of retail.


It's been years since I have been to this outlet mall. I don't really like to shop, but I shopped until I wore the skin off my toes from my flip flops (which was nearly closing time). The we took the kids out to dinner, and went back to the hotel, where DH and son were thrilled to find an old Ms. Pacman machine. After getting a pocketful of quarters they launched an attempt to exceed the high point person indicated on the machine. After just a few tries sonny boy topped the high score.

After a great night sleeping on some very comfy beds, we had breakfast and left early this morning for home. It took us all day to get home because we stopped at a number of difference places--everything from a casino to a Walmart store. To top off the whole trip, I won enough at the casino to pay for the whole trip--including all of my purchases. So all those bargains, 2 hotel rooms, dinner for four--it really didn't cost us a cent!

Ah, Life is good today.

July 1, 2009 The Green, Green Grass of Home

Green! Green! Green!
We have had a lot of rain which has prevented the dreaded brown grass that is usually beginning by July 1. I went out between the rain showers and took a lot of pictures.

I can't fit the entire side gardens in one picture. This shows a bit more than half the space.

There is a lone red lily in bloom along this path. By the weekend there will be about a dozen more.
Back in the rockwall garden below the tulip foliage is almost ready to be cut down.

Once the colorful spring bloom of tulips and purple phlox, and orange poppies is over, this garden remains mostly green. I have been removing all the flowers and planting different hostas and shrubs for the past two years. My goal is easy maintenance in shades of lemon green to dark green with a few purple accents like this smoke bush.
I planted two of these smoke bushes three years ago. So far they have not taken up the smoking habit...maybe this year if that big flower bud stem does not shrivel up.
This area has a lot of big boulders. A few are full of this gorgeous moss, which I love.
Three years ago I also planted two cherry trees. So far I have not gotten any of the cherries.
I don't necessarily care about eating them. I planted the tree mostly to cover an ugly view. I think I would have to cover the trees with netting to keep the birds from eating all the cherries and that defeats my purpose of having a prettier view.

The side garden has huge peonies this year.

Unfortunately the rain is beating them down.

A bit further out, I have some Artemesia (also known as wormwood). I love the silver foliage and it's great for flower bouquets. It gets a bunch of small yellowish flowers (ugly) later in the season. I try to cut it down before then.



So that's pretty much where my garden is at on the first day of July in 2009.

Moving plants again

I spent about four hours Saturday morning working on last year's new path area. This is the front of the path, which is filling in nicely. Last year I planted the yellow Allium Molly bulbs in a number of spots along the front of the path.

That bright spot of fuchsia in the front is spiderwort.

I decided that I needed to work on the back area of this path, right after you make the turn to the right behind the wheel. I dug up some Allium Molly from the rockwall garden and moved three clumps here. I also removed a lot of daylilies and put some hosta here because it's in a wooded area with little sunlight.

I went to the rockwall garden again and dug out clumps of yellow sedum which I scattered all along this path. By the time I got to this path, it was high noon and not the best picture taking time (please try to overlook the glare).

I know these paths are confusing. This is the one we just made last weekend. As you go around to the left of that driftwood, you are back in the wooded area again where few things will grow.
I spent a lot of time playing around with milk cans and small boulders in this spot. I am trying to make little garden vignettes that you can barely see until you stumble upon them as you walk the path. If you look behind the driftwood above, you can hardly even see the milk cans. As soon as you turn the corner, they are in full view.
I threw some grapevine around one can and dug up a few hens/chicks to toss among the vines. I like that...very simple, easy and it will take no care.

Another spiderwort (this time with blue flowers) appears to spill out of this can.
I am not totally happy with this area, but I think I am on the right track. I need a large plant behind the spiderwort can to hide some of the metal.

I also made a peony bouquet using my recent garage sale vase purchase.

So I am very happy with the amount of work I completed this weekend considering that shortly after noon on Saturday we left for another overnight trip. I got a new special order book on Friday from the Michigan Electronic library. The return date is June 30 -- Tuesday. What's with that? Less than a week and the book has over 400 pages! I asked if they thought I was a speed reader.

The six hours of being in a car provided a lot of good reading time. When I got home Sunday afternoon, I spent the remainder of the afternoon and early evening reading and I finished it...Whew!
I have not spent that much time reading in quite some time.

All in all it was a great weekend.

Friday Night in the Garden

I forgot that I planted one pot of annuals. Weeks ago I bought this Gerbera daisy. I liked it's edges which look like someone took a pair of shears and made them all raggedy.

I bought one dracaena spike in a brown color to coordinate with it. I chose this container that a friend gave me. It used to be part of a small water feature. Dear Husband drilled a few holes in the bottom and now it's a unique flower pot.

My big spirea bush is blooming at its peak right now. It's so pretty, but only for a few days.
Here is the opposite side of the above arbor looking toward the road. As you can see there is a lot of green, but not many blooms. That will change in the next week or so when these white lilies in the front and many others will burst into bloom.
Looking through this arbor from the other side you can see a large patch of Oriental poppies in the back.
Here is a close up of the poppies. It's a big plant and part of it fell over last week during a rain storm. I really need to remember to put a wire cage around it next year.
This morning before I left for work I cut a few of these poppies and some peonies and combined them in my first garden bouquet.
By the time I got home this afternoon, the poppies had already wilted. They don't last long in a vase or in the ground. I think that is why I never tire of them. I only get to enjoy them for about two weeks each year.