Front porch garden

The climbing Carefree Sunshine rose and May Night Salvia are a wonderful combination!

William Baffin climbing rose

I tried to grow a wisteria vine on this arbor, but the wind kept blowing it over.  So I replaced it with a William Baffin climbing rose.  Climbing roses need to be tied to a trellis or arbor.  This one will likely be over the top of this arbor in a couple of years.  It is a recurrent rose, which means that it will be covered in blooms now and once more later in the summer.  

Field daisies, peonies and roses

Things are really starting to pop in the garden!  The field daisies move around from year to year and tend to self-seed, but they are one of my favorite flowers.  I pull some of the baby plants out when I am weeding to keep them under control.

Speaking of weeding, I have been wondering why my front garden has been so weedy this year.  I forgot to put down my corn gluten!!  I have to be sure to get that done soon!

East side

This bed has been mulched and I added a couple of Japanese Fleece flowers - they are the varigated plants in the center of the bed.  They continue the green and white combination that is found throughout the hosta bed.  This is part of the same bed - it wraps around the corner.

Salvias and dianthus

Ok, this is another one of those examples of things  that need to be fixed.  The group of three salvias look like one plant, so it looks like we have a grouping of four plants - not pleasing to the eye.  And it looks lopsided with two of the pink dianthus (Firewitch variety) on one side and only one on the other.  The one furthest to the left when looking at the picture needs to be moved to a new home....

Schubertii Allium

This little allium looks like fireworks!! 

Tiny dianthus

These little dianthus plants under my cherry tree are called Artic Fire.  The catmint (nepeta) is Little Titch. 

Mulching the Hosta Garden



Last weekend, I started mulching the hosta garden. The mulch pile has gone down, but there is still plenty more mulch to move! Some gardeners advise against using mulch around hostas because it provides needed moisture for their worst enemy - slugs. But there is no way I could keep this big area looking good without doing something to keep some of the weed seeds from sprouting. I'll keep a close eye on the hostas and use some Sluggo at the first sign of slug damage.



Garden accent

I confess - I pulled this little wicker chair out of someone's trash!! It is a cute accent in a shady spot.

Backyard plans

I am trying to focus on finishing up some of my projects - the path next to the retaining wall on the east side of the garage and finishing the front path on the west side of the house.  I came up with a wonderful plan for that space - instead of putting in a round patio, I am just going to edge a circle of grass with bricks.  The grass there is nice, so why dig it up?  Then I will extend the front border so that it provides a private space (well, when the shrubs grow up, that is.)  It will be my "secret garden."  And my front path will have the destination it needs. 

The big thing on my mind is the back yard.  It is just such a large area and I really need a good plan.  I have some ideas of what I want, but am struggling with how to integrate them.  I am reading P. Allen Smith's book on garden rooms - they are lovely, but all those hedges would require so much maintenance - and they are very formal.   But some separation of the space is definitely needed!

So I keep pondering.......

Turkey visitor!

This turkey (I have named her Clotilda and call her Cloe) comes to visit our bird feeder at least once a day - sometimes morning, other times evening and today at lunch time.  She is quite nervous.  Usually you see a tom and a number of hens, but Cloe is all alone.  I hope she finds some other turkeys soon!

Veggie Garden

This is just one section of the veggie garden - the onions are coming along nicely and the sugar snap peas are sprouting.  Look how big my rhubarb has gotten - I was able to pick some and make a dessert for our Memorial Day barbeque.

We had a very cool and rainy spring - so the garden was planted late this year - I think I got it in on May 25th.  The tomatoes got planted about a week later.

New Grasses

I had planted some cottoneaster shrubs in this area and our heavy snowfall last winter just crushed them!  So I decided to replace them with a tall grass - Molinia Skyracer. (Circled in orange.) It can get 8 to 9 feet tall, which will be a great vertical accent in this area, and it will help to bring the scale of the garage down. (It is a tall garage!)


The shrubs will get a new home  - one where they won't get such heavy snow piled on them!

Baptista - New and Old

This is a new variety of baptista - I think it is Twilight Prairieblues.  It has a ton of blooms and is a vase-shaped plant.

This is the common variety of baptista - it doesn't have as many blooms.  They are a darker purple than the new variety.  Baptistas get to be quite large - plan to have about 6 feet of space in the garden for them.  They don't like to be moved!  After they are done blooming, the foliage stays in a nice mounded shape. 

 

Blooming Irises

Wow!  This two-toned iris is beautiful!  This area has a bit of a mix of different colors (which you can't see in this picture).  I am going to mark the other colored ones so that I can move them out.  I have some green garden tape that I'll write on with a sharpie and tie around the leaves - hope that works!!

Blue spruce

I just love the soft blue of blue globe spruce in the spring!  They contrast so well with all of the fresh green foliage around them.