These are peonies that Dad always had and I dug and divided them 5 years ago and now I have them to enjoy and remember. I remember that he always cut them for us to take to our teachers. And some years if they bloomed at the right time, we would go with Dad to see Grandma and Grandpa and take some of these to help them decorate graves over Memorial Day weekend.While mowing the lawn earlier today, I was thinking about passalong plants, family heirloom plants, and family tradional plants.Passalong … [Read more...] about Family Plants

This is one of the deutzia shrubs that I have growing in the same bed as English ivy. It is Deutzia gracilis 'Nikko', one of the dwarf varieties. The left picture is the shrub, the right picture is a close up of the bloom. Neither picture is all that great, and mine are still a little ratty from spending several years trying to grow with all that ivy choking them out, so you might check out this website for a better look at this great shrubRemember I posted about how I pulled bags and bags of … [Read more...] about Deu you plant Deutzia?

I think one thing every gardener needs to learn is basic plant propagation. With a little bit of plant propagation knowledge and some courage, you can quickly double, triple, really multiply your plant collection and have some plants left over to share.Some plants do the propagation for you! They self sow themselves all over the place. You can just dig up the seedlings and move them all around to other parts of your garden as you wish. Or share them with friends, with the appropriate caution … [Read more...] about More, more, more!

They say you should create an entrance to the garden that draws people in so they want to enter to see what's around the corner. I've tried to do that with this entrance to the back yard.I hope that as people come through the gate, they want to turn right and head toward the patio. I haven't done that on the other side, but plan to soon. (If we hadn't had seven days in a row with measurable rainfall I would have done it last week!)Once in the garden, I want people to feel drawn to other sections … [Read more...] about Garden Entrance

Such a perfect day for planting containers. With cool and cloudy conditions you don't have to worry about personally getting overheated and the plants have a chance to settle in to their new homes without the hot sun beating down on them. I could not have asked for a better day for finishing up the containers.But am I finished? Not quite. I made a quick trip to the garden center this evening to get some more peat moss and vermiculite and another flat of impatiens landed in my cart, along with … [Read more...] about Cool and Cloudy = Perfect

There was finally a break in the weather earlier today, with enough dry time to make more progress outdoors. The above is my window box replanted for summer. This window box is actually a wire basket, lined with green moss. I went with a yellow theme. It doesn't look like much now but in a few weeks it should fill in nicely. If it doesn't, I'll add a few more plants.I didn't have the heart to just toss out the pansies that were growing in this window box. They actually enjoy cooler temperatures … [Read more...] about Finally, Some Dry Time!