Ahh, fresh air, summer sunshine, and digging in the dirt. The last couple of days have been ideal for finishing up the annual planting. This morning there was a freshening to the air, the wind came up a bit through our open bedroom window. It was 6:30 AM. It wasn’t the sweet sound of chirping birds that woke us, it was our next door neighbor, mowing their grass. 6:30 on Sunday morning seriously, who does that!!! Well in their defense I’m sure they were trying to beat the approaching thunderstorm but, that was worse than waking up to those loud buzzing alarm clocks of old.

I have been hip deep in dirt trying to get all my containers planted and the garden beds cleaned out. Do you go to just one nursery and buy all your plants or do you hit several? I go to several favorites and have found over the years that I look for certain things at each nursery. Dragon Wing Begonias I go to Canoyers for red (they grow their own), pink and white are at Lanoha. Geraniums come from Indian Creek, Viaduct Gardens in Waterloo always gets some of my money too. This year it is Hellebores, which are new to me, and a sedum similar to Autumn Joy but this one is black. Loved it! All the fillers come from Ace Hardware, and of course Mulhalls will get some of my $$$ this season as well. My garden is my happy place.

We have already mulched the front and sides of the house which required 32 bags of mulch and yesterday we went to Home Depot and picked up 30 more bags. It will easily be 80 bags before we are done. I was hoping to get out there today but, off and on thunderstorms all day put a damper on that!

After the baskets, after the pots, after everything is raked and tidied I step back and analyze. The last few years I have really been focusing on perennials, and I think the gardens are beginning to look like something. I am not a formal garden person. My gardens are definitely more haphazard and relaxed. I try to take a more meandering approach to gardening. Sometimes this works and sometimes not so much. Yesterday I was moving some Ligularia to a new spot and splitting Day Lillies. Last summer I planted an Oak Leaf Hydrangea in the back 40. I moved the Lilly to give the Oakleaf more room and hopefully allow a bit more sun to reach it. There are areas of the back forty that I am quite happy with now. Things that are finally beginning to fill out, with interesting textures and flowers set to go off at different times during the summer. My first iris came out to play yesterday and the peonies are fantastic.

I guess I approach my garden like I do my interior design. Lots of texture, and I am certainly learning the plants I love and the ones that are my nemesis. I have plenty of those. Snow on the Mountain being one of those invasive plants that you cannot get rid of. My dad gifted us with a few sprigs from his garden about 40 years ago and let me tell you, you do not want this in your garden! The retaining wall is just covered. I’m about ready to try the cardboard box system to try to eradicate this stuff. A lot of people swear by using a layer of cardboard over the weeds and topping it with mulch. The cardboard will break down over time and smothers the bad stuff. The only problem is that I have some plants in the retaining wall that I don’t want to lose. We shall see.

Last year it was voles, (well we had to treat for them again) this year in the eyebrow where the voles did so much damage last year, I discovered a weird something that I did not plant. All of a sudden I have this monster growing there. It has tiny little white flowers but, it had taken over the whole bed and was moving up. I Google lensed it and it turned out it was chickweed. This was a massive plant. The good news is they say the root system is shallow so once you pull it, it doesn’t come back. How did it get there in the first place? I don’t have a clue.

Until next time happy gardening.

Thanks for stopping

Shelley