Today I had a little time before work to work out in the yard. I had hoped to get some more lillies of the valley and hostas planted, but as it worked out, I only got some more lillies of the valley planted. I did however get to take a look at how some of my plants are doing as we are starting to head on into spring.
Lillies of the Valley: not doing so well so far, except one (who knows it might be a wild onion) that seems to have greened up and is growing. The others are all whitish. I did plant two more bunches today.
Elegens Hostas: not sure on these either, one has had its leaves green up a bit. Several others have lost the weird white leaves they had due mainly to dogs running over them and on two others the white leaves are kind of pulpy now. I did make sure I pulled the mulch back from the crowns and now that it is warmer, I removed the pine needles from on top of the hostas.
Other hostas: Stilletto is coming up, so I pushed back the pine needle mulch. Guacamole is also looking like its two ends that are above ground are starting to look a very little bit green so I pushed back the mulch there as well. As for the nameless hosta, I rooted around under the mulch in the area it should be, so who knows if it made it or not, time will tell.
Forsythia: Spotted a bloom on it today.
Camellias: Debutante still has no buds and one of the dogs broke one stem off, hope she survives, if not I'll get a bigger pink camellia next year. One Tom looks like it is getting ready to bloom again. I have decided against trying to plant Margaret Davis until after she is done blooming. Should still have enough time to get her in the ground before hot weather.
The other shrubs seem to just be doing their thing.
Backyard potted plants: one stem of the Rosemary seems to be dying and the vinca also looks bad and needs to be replaced with something else.
Annual Garden: Thanks to the dogs running, the pansies have pretty much had it. I also have two snapdragons that seem to be dying, one still in a 4 pack and the other in the ground. My goal for this weekend is to get those other snaps planted.
Front porch plants: Most are doing well, except the bowl. Two of the English Daisies in the bowl are blooming, one looks okay and two are definately goners and will be replaced this weekend. I also have one artemesia that is pretty much dead.
Bulbs:
- paperwhites- seem to be done for the year
- crocus- don't really seem to be coming up at all
- iris- starting to come up on both sides of the walkway
- hyacinths- starting to come up, but the dogs also have run over them quite a bit, so don't know how they will do
- tulips- saw the very beginnings of them coming up in the big white pot
- scilla- a total surprise when I went to plant lillies of the valley today, but the scilla seem to be coming up alongside the house. Hope there is enough sun for them to bloom.
Haven't seen any signs of my other bulbs, except an area that *might* be renunculus, either that or weeds...
I also need to weed my foundation beds again, especially the bed around the tree.
The plan for this weekend is to:
- remove dead plants from the bowl and replace them with new plants
- plant remaining snapdragons
- remove all damaged pansies still in the ground
- plant firewitch dianthus around edge of annual garden
- plant 2 Autumn Ferns behind the one garbage can
- continue planting bareroot hostas
- continue planting bareroot lillies of the valley
- plant clematis
- try to decide on location and plant bleeding hearts
To buy:
5 firewitch dianthus
1 white primrose for the bowl
something else for the bowl
2 Autumn ferns
1 bareroot Nico Blue hydrangea at Wal-Mart
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Sunday, February 25, 2007
I attempt to start seeds
Today we had rain all day as predicted, so no yard work.
I did replace the doorknob on mom's room, organize the purses and shoes in my closets and go through 3 large bags of shoes that had been on the floor. I tossed some shoes and decided to give a few other pairs to Goodwill. Now, what I really need are some plastic shoe boxes to store these shoes in my long closet, as there is room for shoe boxes. This will also work well for off season shoes.
I also finally got around to putting all my CDs on the CD racks and hooking up my CD player. My room is looking pretty good right now, no boxes or bags on the floor except a few bags of computer related things under the computer desk. Now I just need a computer that works in my room...
This evening I decided it was finally time to attempt to start the Chinese Lantern seeds. Of course, the seeds are tiny (relatively, a little smaller than sesame seeds). Actually getting the little pots set up was not a problem, but trying first to add the tiny seeds to the little pots and then get them covered with peat was a bit more challenging. Right now the little "greenhouse" is on top of the microwave, as they just need to be warm in this phase, not have light. Unfortunately, the greenhouse directions did not include any information about watering. I can figure that I should not allow the little pots to dry out. I'll have to check books for more info on seed starting.
If all goes well, the seeds should germinate in 20-25 days. Our frost free date is around April 15th, so by then my seedlings should be a month old if I get anything to grow. I figure one will be great, two will be exciting, three will be unbelievable and any more than that will actually probably be more than I need and would be great to share with friends.
I did replace the doorknob on mom's room, organize the purses and shoes in my closets and go through 3 large bags of shoes that had been on the floor. I tossed some shoes and decided to give a few other pairs to Goodwill. Now, what I really need are some plastic shoe boxes to store these shoes in my long closet, as there is room for shoe boxes. This will also work well for off season shoes.
I also finally got around to putting all my CDs on the CD racks and hooking up my CD player. My room is looking pretty good right now, no boxes or bags on the floor except a few bags of computer related things under the computer desk. Now I just need a computer that works in my room...
This evening I decided it was finally time to attempt to start the Chinese Lantern seeds. Of course, the seeds are tiny (relatively, a little smaller than sesame seeds). Actually getting the little pots set up was not a problem, but trying first to add the tiny seeds to the little pots and then get them covered with peat was a bit more challenging. Right now the little "greenhouse" is on top of the microwave, as they just need to be warm in this phase, not have light. Unfortunately, the greenhouse directions did not include any information about watering. I can figure that I should not allow the little pots to dry out. I'll have to check books for more info on seed starting.
If all goes well, the seeds should germinate in 20-25 days. Our frost free date is around April 15th, so by then my seedlings should be a month old if I get anything to grow. I figure one will be great, two will be exciting, three will be unbelievable and any more than that will actually probably be more than I need and would be great to share with friends.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
fixed the fence
I have had to take a few weeks off due to being sick will gallbladder attacks and then having gallbladder surgery. Surgery was now three weeks ago and I am feeling a lot better. I had the entire weekend off this weekend, but they are calling for rain tomorrow (Sunday) so I decided that today was the day to finally fix the fence.
I spent from 9 AM until noon cutting out the old falling down field fencing along the one fenceline with my neighbor. I spent the rest of the day putting up new field fencing in the holes. I finished up around 4:30 PM and am hoping my right hand will soon function normally again. I am also hoping the scrap metal dealers come through my neighborhood soon as I have a huge pile of old fencing in my front yard.
The dogs now have a slightly larger yard and now that the fence is fixed and I'm not running fencing to the shack, I can have the shack torn down when I can find someone to do it for a good price and have money for it too.
I ended up buying 5' field fencing from my neighbor across the street (he had a roll he'd never used) so most of my one fenceline is now 5' inside of just 4' like the chain link is in other places.
Unfortunately they are calling for rain tomorrow as I still have a bunch of bare root perennials that I got at Sams that need to be planted.
I also need to replace the doorknob on my mother's room, as the old one accidentally locked when we had guests visiting and we had to remove the knob. The holes in the door that the lock screws into are pretty much stripped, so we are going to have to fill them in with wood putty before trying to install the new lock.
I also bought two seed starting trays and I am planning on trying to start some chinese lanterns. I would like to get a few small pots and try to start a few caladiums as well. I have NO idea if I have enough light in my kitchen, but I figured I would try after I saw that Bill had started seedlings on the table in his grooming shop where there is NO natural light at all.
I spent from 9 AM until noon cutting out the old falling down field fencing along the one fenceline with my neighbor. I spent the rest of the day putting up new field fencing in the holes. I finished up around 4:30 PM and am hoping my right hand will soon function normally again. I am also hoping the scrap metal dealers come through my neighborhood soon as I have a huge pile of old fencing in my front yard.
The dogs now have a slightly larger yard and now that the fence is fixed and I'm not running fencing to the shack, I can have the shack torn down when I can find someone to do it for a good price and have money for it too.
I ended up buying 5' field fencing from my neighbor across the street (he had a roll he'd never used) so most of my one fenceline is now 5' inside of just 4' like the chain link is in other places.
Unfortunately they are calling for rain tomorrow as I still have a bunch of bare root perennials that I got at Sams that need to be planted.
I also need to replace the doorknob on my mother's room, as the old one accidentally locked when we had guests visiting and we had to remove the knob. The holes in the door that the lock screws into are pretty much stripped, so we are going to have to fill them in with wood putty before trying to install the new lock.
I also bought two seed starting trays and I am planning on trying to start some chinese lanterns. I would like to get a few small pots and try to start a few caladiums as well. I have NO idea if I have enough light in my kitchen, but I figured I would try after I saw that Bill had started seedlings on the table in his grooming shop where there is NO natural light at all.
Friday, February 02, 2007
snow!
Yesterday we had snow, but luckily not the ice they had been calling for. Today the sun came out and it got up to 49, so the snow is basically all gone.
Due to gallbladder problems (I had surgery to remove it today) I have not done much of anything around the house or yard lately. I did make two new container plantings last week now that the nurseries are starting to have something other than pansies for sale.
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