Friday, June 28, 2013

Pics or it didn't happen?

You'll have to forgive me for not posting photos with my words - you see, oftentimes I'm updating from work and cannot access the images I've uploaded to Google from here.  I'll go back and fill in when I'm not overly busy with life.

This weekend, I'm going to try to get the sweet woodruff and bleeding hearts in, between thunderstorms.  The woodruff is going to get planted along the front walk by the new bee balm "Claire Grace" and the bleeding hearts will go in the new bed I'm creating on the north side of the shed, which incidentally is purely for the neighbors' delight, since I rarely go back there.

I went a little Polish on the kitchen last night, the uncleanliness was really bothering me.  Only a little though, since it was nearly bedtime.

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Evening gardening

Hmmm, wonder if I can get in a bit of garden time tonight?  I'm thinking of putting sweet woodruff at the base of the bee balm, and putting the rest of the bleeding hearts in the bed I'm working on behind the shed.  I hate to have to wait for the weekend. ;)

Maybe I'll make something for dinner that can cook unattended for an hour or so, or get something pre-made.  It all depends on how busy (and exhausted) I get at work, and how hot it is when I get home.

Otherwise, I'll be steaming my shirts, I suppose.

Monday, June 24, 2013

Broadfork to the rescue & Plant ID

Out with the old, in with the new.  G helped me dig out an overgrown/half dead ornamental grass (the broadfork continues to return on investement) and I put in a bee balm "Claire Grace" which has a lovely saturated magenta color.  I almost put in "Coral Reef" instead, which is hot pink, but saw Claire sitting there all lonely and wilted, and G likes more saturated colors anyway.

Finally figured out that the blue wildflowers are Chinese Forget-me-nots and came from the Velcro-like seeds that kept clinging to me last year.  They're taking over quite a bit (like everything Chinese, it seems), so I think I'm going to deadhead the seed pods once the flowers quit.  The bees love them, but I don't want them to out-compete everything else too much, including the three red poppies that came up this year.  Teach me not to use 100% native seed mixtures...



 



Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Opuntia humifusa

Opuntia humifusa - the Eastern prickly pear - will be joining other succulents in my garden thanks to my fiance's co-worker.  I do believe that I'll keep it contained in a pot, however, as it can be a nasty turf weed in NJ.


Monday, June 17, 2013

Gardening as therapy

Spent the weekend out in the garden for some much needed physical and mental therapy.  Being laid up the weekend before was really bugging me.

On Saturday I cut back a lot of roses, since they'd gotten damaged in the non-stop rains, as well as some problems with black spot.  I sprayed them with copper fungicide as well.  I then planted six snow-in-summer plants, three fiesta daisies, two purple beautyberry shrubs (no pear trees though).  Moved some iris, NJ tea shrub, & asters.  Mulched under the Japanese maple.

Sunday I mowed the back lawn, planted another pack of wildflower seeds to fill in a blank spot (the one you see to the right of the Earth Mother there), moved some echinacea & lily-of-the-valley, planted 2 of the bleeding hearts babies in those newly emptied spots, grabbed another balloon flower when we stopped at Home Depot (pseudohubby loves 'em).  Caged the lobelia because they were flopping over.


Tonight if I get home early enough, I'll move the other balloon flowers I've already got from the spot where they're getting crowded out over to where I have the new one, then douse them all with Deer Out to keep them from getting nibbled too badly.


Friday, June 14, 2013

Hobbies that bleed into each other

I suppose it was inevitable that my gardening passion would lead to hobbies such as birding and photography, though for some folks it goes the other way 'round.

Thursday, June 13, 2013

This weekend is going to be a lot more active than last weekend, because last weekend I sat in a chair indoors and did nothing but ice my injured knee.  It's starting to feel better now, but I'll not be able to kneel in the garden at all, and I have weeding to do and plants to put in.  Going to use some forced labor, and do what I can from a chair myself.