Perfume

Boing!

What is spring without flowers!!??

In Your Face!

Spring is here and not nearly as gentle and quiet as I thought she would be and certainly not in her normal pastels.  I think she stopped off at St. Tropez on the way here and after a rum drink or two she brought some new colors and some rather revealing silks that drift in the cool spring breeze.  I feel just a little under dressed in my gardening sweats.  Maybe I should get out the fine china for some tea?  Or maybe she is expecting spiced rum?

Whoops...here comes some more wind!

Purple Midgets

These jolly spring-colored elves arrived in my herb bed on March 1 in a semi-circle at the bottom of our tiny cherry tree.  I had to get down in the mud to take these photos...but I didn't care.  It was after a long day of weeding and mulching and I was already dirty, so this was my reward.

Visiting the Trees

The National Arboretum is not far from where I live. Not close but certainly something I could, and should, enjoy more often as it is a reasonable day trip and I can still get back home by late afternoon...which I recently did.  I am taking that Master Gardener class and we recently had a field trip to this USDA facility.  I had been there before a long time ago. The 22 Corinthian columns in the background of the photo above were part of the White House East Portico before a re-modeling.  This, I guess, is our little homage to Ancient Greece and Rome.  


Touring of the arboretum is free and research and maintenance are paid for by the American taxpayer.


There are over 446 acres of trees, various Asian gardens, a knot garden, an herb garden, a bio-tech fuel walk and a tremendous bonsai garden among many other features of interest.  The bonsai museum houses a tree that was started in the 1600's.  I did not get a photo of that, but maybe next time.  The arboretum is packed with visitors in the spring, but the fall is a also a good time to visit and not so crowded.  This is the place to get ideas for fall and winter color and structure in the landscape.


Just a few lovely views below:

Knot Garden

Chinese Valley

Fall in the arboretum

Deer Me

I think this is what is called the stand off or the show down or better yet, the stare down. I stare and they stare until one of us backs down and ambles off. I won this time. I took this picture from my front door a few days ago early in the morning. Looking carefully you can see the shine of the eye of the other deer to the lower right peeking through the leaves. If you also look carefully you can see the deer fence which is keeping them from eating the roses, sunflowers, etc. that are the gourmet salad I have set just out of their reach. Right now I am working on spraying hot pepper mix over the young sunflower seedlings to discourage a frequent rabbit visitor. I feel so very much like Mr. McGregor!

Seeing Red

It is not Valentine's Day but it seems that there is red all about me these days as I walk in my gardens. (Or for a more detailed description the following taken from Thesaurus.com: bittersweet, bloodshot, blooming, blush, brick, burgundy, cardinal, carmine, cerise, cherry, chestnut, claret, copper, coral, crimson, dahlia, flaming, fuchsia, garnet, geranium, glowing, inflamed, infrared, magenta, maroon, pink, puce, rose, roseate, rosy, rubicund, ruby, ruddy, rufescent, russet, rust, salmon, sanguine, scarlet, titian, vermilion, wine.)




























Happy Red Day!

Spring News

(I cannot for the life of me understand why blogger loads this strawberry plant photo sideways...maybe too much blog beer today?)


Some gardeners are proud of their green thumbs. You will recall last spring I put up a small boat-load of strawberries in the freezer (I think there are still a few pints left to thaw and use), and it looks like once again this year I will be wearing a red thumb during the month of May. These two beds of strawberry plants will eventually be moved outside under the blackberry bushes, but this year we put them in the raised bed as a holding area and they really, really,... I mean really liked it.

The dogwood purchased by hubby last spring is in all its pink glory and loves its location in one of the flower beds as well.

Yet the wild white dogwoods around the yard are just as lovely and we have managed to save several from the wild roses and climbing vines and they have rewarded our efforts with more blossoms. Doesn't this tree photo make you want to grab a book and sit on the grass in the shade and read?

Hubby also had to purchase a cherry tree this spring. We will probably not see one single red orb from this little tree. My guess is that the birds will divest us of any cherries just the day or two before they are completely ripe.


My final note is on the families of birds that share our yard. The blue bird house now has five eggs inside. She may lay more, be we cannot chance opening the wall again to look inside. The chickadee house above is still being leased although I do question her neatness! ( I am sure it says somewhere in the lease that you cannot hang things from the front door!)

I am so Glad

These lovely white fairies are now blooming in one of my flower beds. Their fragrance is the breath of a tropical night on a distant island, quite exotic for mid-October!

The Perennial Plant Dance

I have had my garden beds in place less than a year. Large parts of them are bare and still await more population this spring. I am moving somewhat slowly in anticipation of deer grooming the beds this winter. We are trying to get some money saved for a deer fence, but cannot afford something that would look nice in the front yard and do not like those fences that are practical in appearance.

Still and yet my perennial plant dance begins this week. I am moving the guara to the end of a bed that is across the lawn. It's beautiful dancing branches were too close to the sidewalk turn and the lovely pink petals were continually being knocked to the ground. I am moving the purple rhododendron to the bed beneath the bay window. It was becoming hidden by the knock-out rose bush---those babies are really healthy! The rhodo has to stay close to the house because some animal just loves to eat the blossoms! I had to move one daylily to another end of one bed so that I could plant a caryopteris (Sunshine Blue) with lime green leaves that I fell in love with at the garden center---photo above. It was filled with flower buds just ready to open and after this weeks heavy rain it should be beautiful.

That is all the moving for now, but I have a brand new area cleared for another long bed...my head is exploding with anticipation.

This next week once the rains stop and the earth dries I have over 100 bulbs to naturalize. (What possesses me I will never know.)