Tag Archives: Gardens

Yellow Things Blooming In The Garden and Inner Peace

Gardens, Thoughts On Life, ,
Lilies
Lilies

Dahlia

Mandevilla

These are the yellow flowers currently blooming in our garden. I am not generally a big fan of the color yellow but I must admit, these flowers are spectacular.

I spent several hours working on various things and then the rest of the afternoon relaxing on the patio. Everyone needs a place of refuge to recharge. Even if it’s sitting on your bed with a good book or listening to music.

All the more so in these trying times. It’s important to take time for yourself. Be kind to yourself, regain your calm and inner peace. This will help you be kind to others. And the world needs all the kindness it can get.

Peace In the Garden

Gardens, , ,

June is peak rose month. I went to the patio garden to read for a bit before dinner this evening. This was my view.

Bliss!

Patience

Gardens, , ,

This is a hollyhock that I have grown from seed. I started six of them indoors last spring. This is the lone survivor. When they reached a few inches in height, I transplanted them to my flowerbeds. This one in the rose bed will bloom soon.

Hollyhocks are biennials. They don’t bloom until their second year. So I am eagerly waiting to find out what color it is since I planted a packet of mixed colors. I check every day now for any hint of color.

I started several more hollyhocks from seed this year. Although they do reseed themselves, you have to plant them for two successive years to have blooms every year. I am keeping this year’s seedlings in pots until they are bigger in the hope of having a higher survival rate.

The anticipation is real!

Still Mulching

Country Life, Gardens, ,

I spent several hours today weeding and mulching my peony and iris bed. Hubby tried to weedeat it for me, but the plants are just too close together. It caused too much destruction. So I am weeding by hand.

I will finish tomorrow. I was driven inside mid-afternoon by the large amount of fly bites I was getting, along with the biting gnats and bees, it was too much for me. Even though I had to take an antihistamine to deal with the various bug bites, I must say the flowerbed is looking good.

The bed also contains false indigo, hardy amaryllis, and a young red maple. I don’t know how I ever had time to work. Retirement is exhausting!

The peonies in this bed should bloom soon and I will post pictures when they do. I want to start posting more pictures on my Sanctuary Acres Facebook page, so you may want to follow that as well. I promise there will be no political posts on that page. Maybe an occasional spay/neuter comment. Mostly it will be photos of our flowers, gardens and animals.

A Day In My Gardening Life (Mulch!)

Country Life, Gardens, ,

My plan this morning was to spend it mulching flowerbeds. I went outside and found my husband sorting wood left from past carpentry projects. I took off my gardening gloves and stopped to help him, so it would get finished before the rain came. I didn’t want to get the mulch smell on the wood. We finished some of the work in the rain. Looked for my gardening gloves but couldn’t find them.

Since it was raining I went inside until things dried out. I decided to work on some financial records for our dog rescue for the rest of the morning. Next thing I knew, it was lunch time. Looked for my gardening gloves again. I have another pair but didn’t want both pairs to smell like mulch. Couldn’t find them. Ate lunch. Looked for my gardening gloves. No luck.

Got out new gardening gloves and helped husband mulch the rest of the flowerbeds in the patio area. Still no gardening gloves, but the beds are looking great.

Then, we checked on the vegetable garden. This resulted in hubby and me weeding the row of beets, radishes, and turnips. A gardener’s work is never done, especially in the spring time.

Weed free plants with blooms do not come easy or free. It is, however, a labor of love for us.

Never did find those gloves.

A Typical Day

Country Life, Dogs & Other Animals, Gardens, ,

This morning, I took time to enjoy a cup of coffee and some patio time with the dogs. I soaked in the beauty of the flowers and greenery. The dogs enjoyed it too. Zekie found the plastic whale from the top of the old pool thermometer and thought it made a fine toy. He followed me around and put the whale at my feet, then snatched it away, saying “see what I have!”

After a lunch of homemade pizza, I put the dogs out in the fenced pasture to play and enjoy the sunshine. Then it was work time for me. I pruned the old fashioned lilac that grows beside the kitchen window. The original lilac died. The one that is there now was moved here as a young rootling. It came from grandma’s house in town. It is old enough to have some dead branches so I gave it a good trim.

I also pruned the ancient scarlett azalea outside the living room window. It has a beautiful color. I have not seen another in this shade of red-orange-peach. The base of the bush is enormous and gnarly giving it an ancient feel. The house was built in 1830 so I have no idea how old the azalea is. I didn’t trim the bush back nearly as far as I felt it should be. Parts of it are not in the best of health and I didn’t think it would survive a drastic trimming. I hope this makes it stronger next year, then I can prune it again.

Then I moved on to more mundane chores. I pulled the dried out vines from last year’s morning glories off the fence, picked up grass clumps from the weed eater, and weeded around newly sprouted plants in the vegetable garden.

All the prunings and weeds, I took to the pile at the back of our woods where we dump such things. Eventually we get some nice compost at the bottom of the pile. The walk through the woods is always interesting. Halfway back on the left is our pet cemetery. It elicits memories each time I pass. The neighbor’s yellow marsh irises are visible around her pond. There are always plants of interest to notice along the way. Jack-in-the-pulpits. Solomon’s seal. It is a pleasant walk if your load is not too heavy.

After the work was done, I took three of the dogs for a walk to the township park and back. Zekie was a good boy. He only barked at one car, even though 7 or 8 cars passed us. We crossed to the other side of the road when we passed a house with two dogs behind a slat fence. Zekie looked at them but didn’t bark! I was so proud.

This is a typical day for me as a retired person living in the country.

Comfrey and Hummingbird Moths

Dogs & Other Animals, Gardens, ,

I split my comfrey plant in two this year. This is the split that I move to a new location. Aside, from not being quite as tall as the half left in place, it is doing great.

This is a plant that I grow not for it’s great beauty, but for the variety of pollinators that it draws. It does draw assorted types of bees. Even better, the hummingbirds love it.

But the main reason I grow comfrey is because it draws hummingbird moths like nothing I’ve ever seen!

I can’t get enough of watching them. They are a moth that moves like a hummingbird and they have antennae. I find them fascinating. The one above was in my garden last year, feeding on one of our butterfly bushes, of which they are also quite fond. Keep an eye out for them. They are worth the effort.

Vegetable Garden Planting

Country Life, Gardens, ,
Icicle Radishes

We spent most of the day yesterday putting in our vegetable garden. We tilled one row and planted it with seeds for icicle radishes, turnips, and beets, less than a week ago. All of them are up already.

Yesterday morning hubby gave the rest of the garden it’s final tilling. I made hills and planted the cucumber, yellow crookneck squash, and zucchini seeds, while hubby planted green bean and Romano bean seeds.

We worked together planting four types of tomatoes that we purchased as plants. We chose lemon boy, Romas, pineapple, and Mr. Stripey varieties. Mr. Stripey is my all time favorite tomato. I search it out every year. It has the perfect, slightly sweet tomato flavor. Since it is a combination yellow and red tomato, it is lower in acid, but still has great flavor.

At this point, hubby had to go mow the yard before the rain set in. So, I finished up planting sugar snap pea, a mixture of lettuce, and spinach seeds. I watered all the vegetable plants after that. Hubby watered them again before dark.

I watered all again this morning, and mulched the tomatoes with grass clippings. Garden 2020 is off to a good start.

And then before coming in for the evening, the smell of the lilacs and lily-of-the-valley was so sweet, I had to bring a few sprigs inside so I could continue to enjoy them!

Lilac and Lily-of-the-Valley

Spring Planting

Cooking, Country Life, Gardens, , ,
Super bells

This was a busy day. This morning I baked bread since we were nearly out. Then I made an oatmeal cake with chocolate frosting.

The afternoon was devoted to planting many of the flowers we purchased yesterday on our trip out into public for the first time in over two months. I planted the usual six hanging baskets for our porch.

Black Cherry Petunias

From there I planted some urns and pots for the patio garden.

Mandevilla

Dahlias and mounding vinca

Dahlia and Petunia

Dianthus

I bought a new dianthus to add to one of the flowerbeds. We already have some, but they have been coming back for many years and I thought we could use some new stock. This one is a nice, bright pink.

Bleeding hearts, Dicentra

I didn’t plant these bleeding hearts. They are a perennial that was here long before I bought this property. The blooms are peaking right now, so I wanted to share them with you.

Gardening season has begun in earnest. We will plant the rest of the vegetable garden this week. Our radishes and turnips are up already in less than a week!

Gardening and Pie

Cooking, Country Life, Gardens, , , , ,

This is the time of year for all things garden related.

Yesterday, I de-thistled our asparagus bed. Once the spears are up, you can’t rototill the bed. And it was full of thistles. So, I dug them up with my hand trowel so they won’t go to seed and infest the rest of the garden. They aren’t very difficult as weeding goes, but there were a lot of them. Resulting in a blister on my palm, even whilst wearing gardening gloves. Oh well. I harvested a batch of asparagus this afternoon that we ate with dinner.

Today hubby ran the rototiller in the rest of the vegetable garden in preparation for spring planting. Our seeds finally arrived in the mail today! There was a backlog at all the seed suppliers. Everyone is wanting to plant a garden while they are home avoiding the coronavirus. We put in our first row for the year, containing turnips, icicle radishes, and a variety mix of beets. We will plant more vegetables over the next few days.

I also harvested some of our rhubarb today. It wasn’t enough for a pie, so I added some blueberries from the freezer and made a blueberry-rhubarb custard pie. I always use a butter pie crust. No Crisco for this girl. Blueberries were what I had available so I altered a recipe I found for rhubarb custard pie. It turned out just fine. In fact, it as downright tasty. I look at baking as an art form, so I always feel free to make whatever adjustments suit my fancy.