a little work around the house

I have't writtne much lately as not much has been going on other than constant watering trying to keep the yard alive. We got a few brief rain storms over the past few weeks, but not enough to really help the plants. I did get the water bill that included the day when the hose was left on all day and broke. It is maybe at most $10 higher than this time last year and I don't even think it is that much bigger, so that is a relief.

We bought two new lights, one for the porch and one for mom's room. I figured the light in mom's room would be easy to put up, until I got down the old fixture and found that there is no box up there. The strap had just been attached to the ceiling and now the drywall is flaking away at the edges, so attaching a new strap that way was out of the question. I've got a call in to Neil to come out and put in a box. The porch light is even worse. The base of the current fixture is underneath the vinyl. I cut it away a little bit and from what I can see, it looks like the base may be further covered with a piece of wood. So, changing that fixture will require removing at least one piece of vinyl and possibly some wood, then undoing the fixture and replacing it. This is beyond me, so I'm waiting for Neil on that as well. I bought 4 new light boxes the other day with the idea that when Neil does come I'll have him add a box to my mom's room, the porch if needed and while he is at it, maybe my room (guessing there is no box up there) and see if he will have the time to do anything about working on getting a light in the laundry room.

We were at Lowes yesterday looking at lights. I want to replace the bathroom light as when I was last changing the lightbulb, the fixture just seemed old and like it had been overheated at one point. I know it is just a cheap little fixture and I was hoping to find something else to just toss up there. So far, I haven't really found anything that is just what I want, so the old fixture stays up for now. While I was at Lowes, I did find an inexpensive oil rubbed bronze door knob that is perfect for the closet door in the dining room. It went on with no problems and looks much nicer. I also found ceramic lightswitch and outlet covers marked way down and bought those for the bathroom. They look nice as well. I looked briefly at knobs for the kitchen cabinets, but the cheapest thing I could find would cost me about $60 to change them out and I'd be left with a few extras, so that won't be done any time soon.

Today on my way home from yoga, I stopped at Home Depot to get some lighter paint for my mom's ceiling. She painted it the same color as two of the walls and I've always felt it just looked too dark. I ate lunch and was changing into painting clothes when I totally threw out my back. I currently can barely stand up and spent most of the afternoon asleep after taking a muscle relaxant. Painting the ceiling is on hold and I'm glad I got the doorknob switched out this AM as I can't do anything now.

new living room floor lamp

The lighting redo is continuing... We got a new floor lamp at Target today, which we put in the living room. This allowed us to move the one mica style floor lamp in the living room into the dining room. We then moved the halogen light in the dining room into my mom's room to replace the halogen lamp that she had that got broken. I think it all looks very nice, but now of course I want to get a second of the new living room lamps, a Tiffany style mission design lamp, to put at the other end of the couch.

I'm still looking around for lights for the bedrooms and I can't find anything that I really like for my room at all, so that is on hold as usual. I found a light long time ago that I liked for my mom's room and I'm currently bidding on it on ebay. I have also been very dissatisfied with the kitchen light for a while. The fixture itself is fine, but the glass was broken when we moved in and we replaced it with a really awful, cheap glass shade. I had wanted to get a new fixture until I found a really great glass shade on Rejuvenation. I think it will be perfect and the fixture they show it on looks a lot like our kitchen light. I am going to see if I can find anything similiar to it locally, as I'm not too excited about having a big glass shade shipped cross country.

I still did not get the kitchen floor cleaned, but I did finally get the front door cleaned. The steel door was new when we moved in and there was a sticker still attached to the door. I was able to peel most of it off, but never could get the residue off. I wanted to try some Goo Gone on it, but every time I thought about it, I couldn't find the Goo Gone and I only saw the Goo Gone when I was doing other things. So, finally got the residue off, I hope, and have the Goo Gone whree I can find it. The door was looking pretty dirty, so after reading on the internet, I cleaned it with Formula 409, which did a pretty good job. There are still a few dirty parts and I'm going to try a Mr Clean Magic Eraser on them and see if that helps.

It was way too hot to do anything out in the yard today other than give everything a good watering and hope for the best.

big roma harvest

I had my biggest ever roma harvest today, 3 1/2 pounds! I had planned to make a roasted vegetable tomato sauce tomorrow, but with the additional tomatoes, I went ahead and used my older romas to make a basic tomato sauce and will work on the roasted sauce tomorrow. I have also harvested 3 lemon cucumbers so far, gave one to Bobbie and the other two I have kept for my mom. There is a chance I may have a pretty good harvest of them and if so, I might try to pickle a few if I can find a recipe that will work with a small amount.

I have gotten nothing done around the house despite the fact that it is way too hot to work outside. We haven't had rain in 10 days now. The grass/weeds are still green but the plants are really suffering and I think I need to up the watering on the camellias. I had some really wilty plants I watered this evening. Tomorrow will be my big watering day and I'm going to try to really soak everything. I got eaten alive by the mosquitos this evening doing the watering and finally broke down and sprayed the yard with the Bug Free Backyard stuff, but only in the shady areas. I hate doing this as I have a really good population of bees this year, which I think is helping the cukes and all the other plants. I've also seen a few ladybugs. I don't want to hurt them, but the mosquito situation just gets worse and worse. Tonight there were CLOUDS of them around me when I bent down to water some of the shrubs. I'm hoping that this evening's spraying will help with the mosquitos and not hurt the bees.

I was playing around on the internet this evening looking at ourdoor lights, as I really want to replace our light. Bellacor was having a big sale and I got a light that looked great online at about 1/3 of its retail price. I hope it is as nice in person. I'm a tad worried about trying to install it, as the current light seems to come through the vinyl on the underside of the porch roof. I'm hoping there is a box under that, so we can easily hook in the new fixture. I do think it would look better if its base was on top of, not under, the vinyl.

more rain last night

I heard thunder all night while I was at work last night, but we never actually saw it rain, though our cars were wet when we went outside. All the way home, the road was damp, so my hopes were up when I got home. I was truly shocked to see 1" in my rain gauge! I didn't water yesterday morning because everything still felt damp. Obviously I didn't need to water this AM and this PM it seems like things are still okay. I'm hearing thunder again tonight, so I'm hoping we may still have a shot at more rain. The grass is actually starting to green up just a bit, or may it is just the weeds!

I'm not feeling well today, but I was able to go outside this evening and make a green bean harvest. We are having them in a stir fry for dinner. I also saw my second baby cucumber on my cucumber plants, so they are hanging in there. I do believe that my squash are done for though. Due to the bug issue this year, which I think killed them, I don't know if I will give them a shot next year.

first pesto of the year

I havested about 2 cups of basil on Saturday and today I finally got around to making my first batch of pesto for the season. I used some of it to make pesto pizza, enough for dinner tonight and a lunch later this week. I did not water at all today due to the rain this weekend, but I will need to water at least the container plants tomorrow morning.

second day of rain

Yesterday afternoon's rainstorm came to about 1/2", so it was about 1" overall for Saturday. This AM I woke up to the sound of a pounding rainstorm and had to sneak a peek at the tomatoes, who all seemed okay before curling back in bed. Today would have been my big watering day, but we got enough rain that I didn't need to. When I did get up, I checked the rain gauge and it showed about 3/4" from the overnight and AM rainstorms.

Again this evening we had a storm that hit just when we had gotten back from the store. This storm wasn't as long, and we got about 1/6". Still 1" yesterday and almost 1" today has been great. The weather report is still calling for rain for the next few days, so I really hope the storms keep coming.

really pouring now

I finally decided I needed to run out and get some more staking tape, as my dahlias and some of the tomatoes needed to be tied up some more and they were calling for rain. On the way home there was HUGE crack of thunder that made me jump. I got back home and started tying up 'Pink Accordion' to a taller stake. It had started to rain when I was pretty much done with that, then I ran over and tied up 'Lavender Perfection' dahlia, that was starting to lean some and got back inside before it started pouring. Looking out the window I'm already wishing I had gone out a bit earlier, so I could have staked my 'Black Pineapples'. They are all young, so none have stakes and they are really blowing in this hard rain. I don't like the staking tape I got at Home Depot. I don't know if there is something wrong with it or if it is always this way, but it is thick, oily and not very stretchy. I'll get it at Lowes from now on.

This is the first really hard rain I remember in it seems like months now.

rain at last!

We have gotten 1/2" of rain this afternoon. It isn't all that we need, but it is so much more than we have gotten, so I'm happy for that. I'm hoping that it won't be all for the day.

This AM I was out in the yard and there were bugs ALL OVER my squash. No wonder the plants have not been doing well. I think I may just pull the squash plants. I don't really need anything that attracts munchy bugs to my yard. I did reseed the squash today, but that was before I found all the bugs, so I'm going to think about it overnight.

I also discovered today that what I thought were new flower pods on my Stella d'Oro daylilies were actually SEED pods. Two had split open and only had a few seeds left in them. So, I collected the few seeds I saw and sowed them out in a little 4" pot. I'll have to look up growing daylilies from seed, as I think one of my others has set seed as well. I'm always looking for more daylilies for the ditch!

I also moved 2 of the 3 purple hydrangeas outside for at least part of the day. They are doing well, but the 3rd has a bad case of the wilts and is staying indoors were I can mist it regularly. If it starts to look worse, it may go back in the water.

I have decided that I really want to do something serious about replacing the porch light, which I have always hated. I'm going to have to look around online and see what I can find. I'm still not sure what size light would look the best, but I think at 8"- 12" would probably be the best as far as scale goes.

I hate fireworks

I have been a bit slack about keeping up with the blog lately, as not much has been going on other than the almost constant watering. I've been getting some nice tomato harvests lately, but I'm still waiting for enough ripe romas to try to make a tomato cream sauce. I don't want to sauce the big heirlooms, as they are supposed to be for fresh eating and saucing the cherries would be too much work. We had the roasted cherry tomato pasta dish again and it was very good again. We will probably have it next week as well. Last night fore dinner we ate two of the eggplants. I do want to try and make an eggplant and tomato dish that we had last year that I really liked. I found the recipe again, so maybe later this week.

Today I got a really late start on the day, but did give the yard a good watering. It was in the mid-90s today and I got hot and tired just from that little bit of outside work. I did repot the 'Blushing Bride' and 'Merritt's Surpreme' baby hydrangeas I'm growing into trade gallon pots. They can grow out in those until next spring. I am also working on getting the 'Double Pink' rooted cutting to start living outside. The last time I left it outside all day it almost died, so I'm trying a much slower approach this time. In other hydrangea news, I potted up the 3 cutting Mrs Phillips gave me from her purple hydrangea. They had been in water for 3 weeks and grew roots a ways up their stems. I actually had to cut leaves off one cutting, as the roots extended past the leaves. They will try a few hours outside tomorrow as well.


Hydrangea 'Penny Mac'

I'm tired and would like to go to bed, but there are constant fireworks. There have been fireworks for the last two nights and I'm sure it will continue for several more nights. These aren't even the pretty ones, just the ones that make a little explosion and the awful whistling ones. Times like this I wish they were illegal.

The really ugly house across the street from us had been on the market, but it never sold. Then they put up a for rent sign ($690/month- wow...) and it was rented in about a week. We saw the U-Haul for the new residents and have seen a van there, but we still haven't seen them.


Dahlia 'Lavender Perfection'

first attempt at tomato sauce

Today was once again hot and I watered twice. I also got a pretty good harvest, including a lot of the romas that were suffering from blossom end rot. I figured they would not keep too well once picked, so I would need to do something with them ASAP. I didn't have a ton, but I decided to try to make tomato sauce. I used a modification for a recipe in the book Mediteranean Harvest.



I sauteed 2 cloves of garlic in 2 T of olive oil, with about 1 t minced onion over medium heat. Then I added all the tomatoes, about 1/4 t minced red pepper, 1 sprig of thyme and some basil leaves. This was then simmered over medium-low heat for maybe 10-15 minutes (I didn't have that many tomatoes). I don't have a food mill, so I pulled out one big chunk that looked like the end of a tomato, then ran it all through the food processor. I think it tastes pretty good and is spicy! I'll have it over pasta for dinner on Monday night.

I was able to fix the part that had blown off the hose and gave the front yard a good watering today. Things in the back are looking okay. I got some new fiberglass planters at Sams Club Thursday night and have planted up the 2 'Black Pineapple' tomatoes I was never able to place out. I'm now growing FOUR plants of this tomato, so I hope it produces well and that we like it.

water bill may be the biggest problem

After coming inside and typing up a few things and worrying, I decided to go back out with a lantern and check out the situation literally on the ground. I think, other than my water bill, that I may have dodged the bullet. Our super-dry ground may have helped because the very areas that were squishy when I first turned off the water are only moist to the touch just about 10 minutes later and the two plants I was most worried about are surrounded by dry mulch. My forsythia seems like it got some water, but probably just a nice deep watering, as the top layer of soil doesn't even seem that moist.

Now, of course, I am still imagining a $500 water bill. I'm going to call the water company tomorrow (not that I think it will do any good).

disaster in the side yard

I went to wash my hands a few minutes ago, and the water pressure just didn't seem right. I thought... what if I somehow forgot to turn off the water this afternoon when I was done watering the front yard, so I went to check.

My worst fears were confirmed, I had left the water on. The spray nozzle on the water wand was turned off, but the ground underneath my feet squished where I walked. The hose that connects diretly to the hosemobile has been blown apart in some fashion, I'll have to investigate it in the morning.

Currently I am worried about two things: 1) my water bill- which is going to be huge as the water was running for 12 hours, though I don't know how long the hose held before it blew and 2) my plants in the area that was soaked for that long. I am most worried about the forsythia, as it is closest to the area where the hosemobile is and where the water would be coming out. The water would have poured on this area. I am also worried about my 'Gentian Dome' and 'Mini Penny' hydrangeas that are also in the general area and my creeping phlox. I am hoping that the fact that the ground is so dry will work in my favor and that some of the water will have run off, to be absorbed in other areas and that none of the areas will have become waterlogged. Obviously, I won't be watering in these areas any time soon.

It will be daylight before I can really access the damage and it may be a week or more before I can tell if the plants were damaged. I'm going to hope for the best.

finally- new hose

Not the most exciting thing to write about, but something I've been meaning to do for a long time... The "never kink" hose I bought last fall should have been an "always kink" and has been driving me nuts for months. Of course, I lost the receipt so I can't take it back, even though it has a 6 year warrenty and has started to leak.

So, the plan for a long time has been to get a new hose, but the ones that seem to work well cost about $25 and lets face it, I can get a 3 gallon hydrangea for that (or 6 gallons of gas). So, no hose for quite a while. Today I was at Wal-Mart and went in through the garden center. They had 50' "professional" hoses with a lifetime guarentee for $19, so I figured why. This time I'm stapling the receipt to the paper it came with with the guarentee, so if it fails I can take it back. I did some watering this evening with the new hose and it seems to work well. It is a bit heavier than the other hose, so I may hook it directly to the hosemobile and use the other hose and the one I drag around. That, and rolling up the old hose to shove it in the back of the yard (since I DOES still work, it just sucks), are tasks for Wednesday AM.

In other exciting news, I got my sun hat today! I was following a discussion on Myfolia about garden hats and someone linked to the Sungrubbies.com site and I couldn't resist this hat. Okay, so it is probably not the MOST practical garden hat, but it will give me lots of sun protection and look great!

not much other than watering

It is that time of year, there isn't much to be done in the garden other than watering, harvesting and weeding. I'm sure there are areas I could weed, but trying to kill of the poison ivy is enough for right now. On Friday AM, I cleared the area I plan to plant the fatsia in. I pulled out a bunch of honeysuckle and cut back all the privet that was growing in the area. Once it is a bit cooler, I think I'll need to dig out all the privet stumps and add some compost to the soil. The soil in this area gets really dry from all the tree roots. I still haven't decided if I am going to plant the fatsia this fall or let it grow on in the pot for another year.

Today I watered and harvested and photographed in the morning, then watered and photographed a bit in the afternoon. I did get some good shots.

Daylily 'Fairy Tale Pink'- first bloom for it this year


Tomato harvest- 4 Early Girl, 2 German Pink, 1 Cherokee Purple and cherries

Orange ditch lily


Tricolor sage


Veggie garden part 1- by the fence


Veggie garden part 2- in the yard

always more watering

Yesterday I was not feeling well, so I didn't go to yoga. Instead, I did a bit of work in the yard after work. I mixed up some aluminum sulfate water, using 2 tbsp this time and warm water as directed on one web site and watered all the Endless Summers in the back yard, Gentian Dome, the Penny Macs and the potted Together. I'm hoping if any of them put out a late bloom this will help them have a nice blue color.

Today and yesterday I did some more work on the endless task of tying up the tomatoes. It has been so hot and dry lately that I'm not getting much fruit set. I hope this trend doesn't continue, becuase while I'll get 5+ tomatoes off each plant if it does, I'm hoping for a bigger harvest.

Daylilies are blooming, but I think they are getting close to the end. I've noticed that particularly on the ones in the front yard, some of the buds are drying up without ever opening. I think this super hot, dry weather has been very hard on all the plants. I did get some good daylily pictures today.



Route 66


Pushmataha


Smokey Mountain Autumn


Unloosed Joy

got a little bit done today

The heat is really keeping me from doing much in the yard, but I got a bit of work done today. This morning I watered the entire back yard, but the front some how got forgotten so I have to try to catch that up tomorrow. I repotted my new Endless Summer into a 3 gallon container to live for the rest of the year while I figure out where to go with it. Cityline Venice went into a big pot I had gotten at Sams Club a while back figuring I'd find a use for it sooner or later. I think it is just perfect for Venice.



My other big project of the day was digging up Masja hydrangea. It was probably too small to really plant out last fall and it was killed to the ground over the winter. This spring it did come up, but seems to be struggling and not putting out much growth. I dug it up and it will live in a pot at least until next spring. I'm hoping that this will get it growing stronger before it goes back in the ground. I put my 2nd Together in the space where Masja has been. It is a much bigger plant, so hopefully it will be able to thrive there.



In the afternoon, I got some work done on the veggies. I pulled up the last of the lettuce. I currently have too many squash in the windowbox, so I dug up the smallest one and potted it up to give away. Then I dug up two that were really close together and moved one where the lettuce had been and put the other in an 8" (probably too small, but it was at hand at the time) pot. I'm hoping that I did not disturb the roots too much. If I don't get many squash, I'll figure it was because they did not have enough room.

Speaking of room, I had planned to try to thin the cucumbers, but their roots have totally taken over the whole pot. So, I built a trellis out of bamboo stakes and either attached or tied each of the plants on to its own stake. We will see if this works. Other people have successfully grown lemon cucumbers in pots, so it may not entirely be mission impossible.



I was trying to get rid of all the remaining pots of pansies and violas, so with two others that I had left I seeded one in with Genovese basil and planted 4 bush bean seeds in the other pot. My current group of bush beans are starting to flower.

My Jagged Edge daylily bloomed this weekend and it is really fugly. Not at all the expected color. I don't know if it was that particular bloom, heat and drought stress or what. I'm hoping some of the other blooms are a better color.



Endless Summer hydrangea- this is why I grow them!

massive hydrangea haul

I was on vacation all last week and since getting back pretty much all I've done is water. Today I was off work and wanted to try to get some work done in the yard before the heat really hit for the day. Bobbie had brought over some petunias she found on super mark down and I used some of them to make up a few pots, replacing the pansies that are now dead. Wednesday AM I also pulled out some dead pansies.

After potting up a few things, I ran out of potting soil and we went out to Lowes to run some errands. Monday night I had been at the Woodruff Rd Lowes and seen a lacecap hydrangea 'Claudie' that was really nice, but I didn't get it due to money and space issues. I was hoping that maybe they would still have it and I could get it. When we got there, the store was pretty much wiped out and there were not many hydrangeas left at all. It turned out that ALL there shrubs were on sale 75% off. At that point, I just decided to get ANY hdyrangea that looked good and sort it out back at the house. All told it came to $30. I got:

3 Forver and Ever 'Double Pink' - 1 gallon
2 Forever and Ever 'Red'- 3 gallon
1 'Madame Emilie Moulliere' - 3 gallon (originally marked $4.98 instead of $14.98)
1 'Glory Blue' - 3 gallon
1 'Merritt's Pink'- 1 gallon
1 'Endless Summer'- 1 gallon

After that, we went down to the Lowes in Simpsonville to see if they had the same sale and what they had. NO SALE in Simpsonville, but they DID have the 'Together' totally double hydrangeas I had wanted to get for Mrs Phillips, so I bought 3 of them, 1 each for me, Bobbie and Mrs Phillips. My mom fell in love with a huge beautiful 3 gallon 'Cityline Venice' so I got that as well. Those FOUR hydrangeas came to more than the big haul on Woodruff Rd, but it was worth it to get the 'Togethers' and 'Venice' is a real show stopper right now.


Massive haul of six Forever and Evers- 75% off


I told Bobbie and Mrs Phillips that the 'Togethers' were 75% off... I gave them each a 'Together' and a 'Double Pink' and gave the other 'Red' to Bobbie. That had found some of the original Fovever and Evers in 1 gallon pots marked down to $3 the other day, so now they have some of the special ones too. During our visit to Mrs Phillips, we saw the most INCREDIBLE hydrangea. It is just the color I've been wanting, a deep purplish blue. It was so beautiful! She gave us 3 cuttings, which I have put in water to root. I'm hoping they root well, but I doubt I'll get the same exact color, probably partially due to her soil in that particular area. A total showstopper! She also gave me some cleomes, which I planted at the back of the annual bed.


Cityline Venice- couldn't let this beauty slip away twice


Part of the haul staying with me

planting camellia and so much more

This AM I went out and did things with Bobbie, so no work in the yard beyond watering. After a quick lunch, we went out to plant the camellia. The digging went fairly quickly and I was able to get the camellia positioned in well. I also decided that I was going to plant the two Stella D'Oro daylilies I had bought on either side of the camellia. I think they help give the whole area a more finished off look.

While I was out working on the camellia, some boys from a house up the street came by to see if I needed my grass cut. After barginning with them just a bit, we settled on $15 (what I had paid the guy who cut my phlox) and they came and got it done in about 1/2 the time he had. I told them not to worry about trying to edge it, as I could do that myself. The whole yard looks so much better with short grass. Also, I had done some more weeding this morning and spread some of the seed soil, then seeded in some grass. The grass being cut almost but a little mulch over those areas, so hopefully that will help conserve water a bit. After the grass was cut, I could see a big section in the center of the yard that was just bare dirt. So, I spread some of the seed soil, trying to spread it a bit heavier than I did in the shade area as the underlying dirt in this area is awful, then seeded in some of the grass seed I bought that is for sun areas. This area is going to be much harder to keep moist, it will require at least 2x per day watering, but again it is a relatively small area and should be doable by hand watering.

After the grass work, we went over to Bobbie's to have supper and get some lirope. I am not good with a mattock and Bobbie ended up whacking it out for me. I also stopped by Lowes, where cyprus mulch was $1.69 instead of the usual $2.00, so I got 8 bags.

I got home about 7:15 PM and needed to get the lirope planted around the edge of the newly extended foundation bed and also around the Bradford Pear and then spread the mulch. The lirope planted went really quickly because the dirt had all been worked before. I had enough to finish out the foundation bed and then some small pieces that I used to start planting under the Bradford Pear. Spreading the mulch around the newly planted lirope was a bit time consuming to try to get it to look good, but the rest went quickly and 8 bags were just enough to do the job.

I am quite exhausted after a very busy but productive weekend. I didn't get to the poison ivy though...

preparing the area for the camellia

This morning was a watering morning and it took me about an hour to water the whole yard thoroughly. Once everything was watered, I got out and got some decent pictures taken, but of course first I had to come back in and delete some photos from my full memory card.

I worked a little bit on doing away with some of the pansy pots. I transplanted one bush bean seedling into its own small pot, moved the leatherleaf sedge into its own terra cotta pot and set it by the 'Limelight' hydrangea and finally potted up the one 'Ponderosa' tomato seedling in the big green plastic pot. I hope the seedling will make it out there in full sun. That variety has not been my strongest grower from seed. I also put my two now rooted hydrangea cuttings outside in pots for the first time today. As of this afternoon, they seemed to be doing well.

During the heat of the day, we went out and did errands, then ate dinner. After dinner, I went out to start to tackle the project of getting the camellia planted in the foundation bed. I used a garden hose to lay out how I wanted to extend the bed, then used the mattock that Bobbie gave me to try to cut the path of the bed into the grass. That was actually a bit harder that it seemed it would be. After that, it was one long project to dig out all the grass in the area. I finally finished just as the sun was setting. Now, I have a nice area of bare dirt to get started tomorrow morning digging the hole for the camellia and getting it planted. Then, I will really need more mulch!

planted limelight

I got off work early yesterday and my three day holiday weekend started today. I had not been feeling well earlier this week and I ended up sleeping in until 10 AM. This was not entirely in the plan. Before we could go anywhere, I had watering 911 as my front hanging basket was badly wilted and I wanted to get the veggies off to a good start for the day.

Yesterday we got a sasanqua camellia to put in the foundation bed and while looking at other things, I realized at Limelight hydrangea might be the perfect thing to go between the small beautyberry and the pieris. So, it was off to a few stores today, as well as Sams Club for 2 bags of potting soil.

When we got back home, I spent some more time on the neverending project of pulling plantain weeds. I was working near where I planned to plant Limelight, then weeded out the area between the two plants. I was pretty hot while I was digging and it really took a lot out of me today, but I got the hole dug and Limelight put in. I think it looks great! I may put something small on either side of it to sort of finish out the bed a bit more.



My dog did a number on my Double Pink hydrangea, knocking a whole branch off. I cut the end and am going to try to root it in watering. In rooted cutting news, I potted up the Blushing Bride and Merritt's Supreme cuttings and will start transitioning them to the outside world. My one biggish Ponderosa tomato seedling finally seems to be growing and it may make it after all. I am going to start moving it out to full sun with no roof overhead. The other tomato seedlings seem to be coming along very slowly.

I still need to do something about the poison ivy. When we were running errands today, I forgot that I wanted to get a big box to use as a screen in some of the areas I am going to have to spray.

rain this evening

The weather report was again calling for rain all day, so I made no garden plans. Bobbie and I went up to NC this morning to work with the dogs, then hit Cracker Barrel for brunch and went to Bloomfields to see if they had anything we wanted. No luck there, and we also made a fruitless chase out to the Ingles in Travelers Rest to see if they had the Forever and Ever hydrangeas (looking for a 'Together' for Mrs Phillips) like the site claimed, but no luck there.

After I got home, my mom and I went out and I got a new terra cotta pot for the rosemary on the front porch that has outgrown its pot and also got a ceramic pot for 'Blue Mouse Ears'. On the way home it finally started raining, but then stopped fairly quickly. I used the break in the rain to pot up 'Blue Mouse Ears' and finally water the potted hydrangeas with aluminum sulfate (2 tbsp per 2 gallons) and then water them well with plain water. I also pulled up some more plantain weeds.

hostas dug up- 2, hostas planted- 1

The forecast changed and we did not get any rain today. That was good as it allowed me to work in the yard, but due to the forecast for rain, I didn't really have any plans for the day.

My first task of the day was to finally dig up the one 'Julie Morss' hosta by the 'Generale' hydrangea that is looking pretty terrible. When I got it dug up, it was surrounded by other roots and some of its own roots were dead. This plant had been planted bare root straight into the ground, so I don't know if those roots were ever alive or if all the root competition killed them. I potted it up and will eventually give it to someone.

Despite thinking that I did not want to waste my day pulling plantain weeds, I got started on that again. This time I was working back closer to the camellias, trying to pull them in areas where there actually WAS grass, so that those would stay grassy areas, not get taken over. I probably spent over an hour doing that.

I called Bobbie just before noon to see if she wanted to get together. We went to lunch at Stax, then over to look at Mrs. Phillips' yard and have dessert. Bobbie was thrilled with the 'Ponderosa' tomato I gave her. I do hope it grows well for her. Mrs. Phillips' yard looks really nice. She also lost a lot of the old wood on her hydrangeas this year, she thinks the late freeze and the super cold night early in the year might have done it. So, its not just my plant, it was just a bad year for hydrangeas. She does have a HUGE hydrangea that is quite exposed and covered in buds, I might see if I can take a few cuttings off it later this year. She also gave me some tall irises, some are two shades of blue and others are two shades of brown. I have to figure out where to plant them now. I might plant a few along the house where I have the two daylilies now.

After I got home, I dug around in the area where I had dug up the hosta and got rid of as many roots as I could. I then planted the 'Abiqua Drinking Gourd' hosta there. I'm not sure if this will be a good place for that hosta, but for the time being, I'm giving it a try. I dug up the 'Elegens' that was crowding the carex. I'm going to give Bobbie and Mrs. Phillips each an 'Elegens'. I don't think either of them has a blue hosta. My final task of the day was to get the water sprouts cut off the bottom of the Bradford Pear. It no longer looks like it is wearing a skirt and now looks like a tree again.

planting under the pecan tree

Yesterday was my day to go in late to work, so I was out in the yard early trying to get some things done. I got the whole place watered first, then set to work on a little planting. I planted hosta 'Orange Marmalade' back under the pecan tree between the Teller Red hydrangea and the astilbe. Then I planted the golden spiderwort kind of between the hosta and the hydrangea, but set back a little. The hope is that the spiderwort will spread out and fill in that area, kind of making a (20" tall) ground cover in this area. It has little blue/purple blooms and is supposed to bloom all summer.


I cut back some of the junk privet near where the 'Orange Dream' Japanese Maple is so that it shows up a lot better. It is still a tad close to the hydrangea, but until I can get the shack repaired/torn down/whatever I want to leave the junk privet in place to block the view of the falling down shack. Speaking of privet, several of the largest privets are in bloom right now. While it is pretty, blooms mean seeds and seeds mean more of that garbage in my yard. It is never ending...

Once the planting tasks were complete, I felt compelled to tackle the grass a bit more. My yard is being taken over by plantain weeds. I picked an area in the shady part near the fence and pulled as many plantain weeds as I could for about 2 hours. My fingers are still red and sore from this. Then, I spread Black Cow (my bag is sort of waterlogged, so I need a new bag) over the newly seeded area, spread shade grass seed and watered well. I really wanted to get this done yesterday as the forcast was for several days of rain and I figured that would help get the grass seed off to a good start. My *latest* plan for the grass is to pick fairly small area each month and weed it and seed it in the same fashion. I'm hoping by sticking to a pretty small area, I can maybe get it watered well enough with the hose while I'm doing my other watering and will be able to get grass to grow. I'm going to get some of the sod and seed soil to spread over the bare areas before seeding, as that seemed to work well in the two area where I used it last year.

Today (Thursday) it was supposed to rain all day, but was just cloudy until late afternoon, when it finally did rain for a few hours.


Hydrangea 'Together'

hung up the rest of the porch baskets

I got up early this morning so that I could water and avoid the wilting tomatoes I came home to yesterday. I got the potted back yard plants watered and then swung around to the front. My big basket on the shepherd's crook was looking horrid, but seems to have perked up this evening.

After all the watering was done, I still had plenty of time, so I was able to pot up the other three hanging porch baskets and get them hung up. I also repotted, yet again, the one 'Ponderosa' tomato seedling that I'm trying to nurse along for myself. It had finally been doing well, then all the wind of the last two days really bent its stem. I'm hoping that this latest REALLY deep repotting into a trade gallon pot will do the trick.

I also had time to pot up the spider plant cutting that I had been rooting, so I was able to take that to work with me for one of my co-workers. Now that warmer weather is here, I need to ramp up my coleus production, so taking some cuttings will be on the to do list for tomorrow.

trip to Atlanta

I went down to Atlanta this weekend to see my friend act in a play, but of course I hit a few nurseries while I was there.

First up, my mom had wanted 'Blue Mouse Ears' hosta and found it on ebay, but I told her not to bid on it because we would just buy it locally. Sure... so, no luck finding it locally and of course it wasn't on ebay anymore. So, I decided that as Mother's Day present I'd get it for her. A quick web search turned up Bloomin Designs, a hosta and other plant nursery north of Atlanta, pretty much on my way down to my friend's house. I got in touch with them and though they would not be open on Saturday, we made arrangements for me to pay for the hostas, then pick them up while the nursery was closed. I was able to walk around for a little bit and all I can say is WOW, I really need to go back and bring my mom, because I pretty much wanted one of almost everything. I also was a bit scared when I saw how big 'Elegens' and 'Guacamole' can get. I think I may have a few too many 'Elegens' in my yard currently... They will make lovely gifts. While at Bloomin Desings, I also got 'Orange Marmalade' which we had both fallen in love with from its photos.

Since I was in the Atlanta area, I also stopped by the Pike Nursery out on Pleasant Hill Rd. Pike is unfortunately in bankrupcy currently, but they have been bought out or something. I did notice that there was a whole section that had been full of plants when I was there last fall that is now empty. Still, I did find some good things at reasonable prices. I initially got a mini hosta 'Sitting Pretty' and some black mondo grass (decent price and I needed at least one more for the area I've got planned). Then while I was walking around looking at things, I saw two Japanese Maples in the neatest octagonal boxes. I thought that I would like a box like that when my 'Tamukeyama' gets bigger, so I took a closer look. I was looking at 'Orange Dream', which just so happens to be the one other Japanese Maple I really want (after realizing I had a red dissectum, a regular red and a variegated one, the only thing really left was orange). Then I looked at the price. Wow... I will not repeat it here, but considering the tree was as tall as I was... However, due to the size of the tree, I was sure there would be no way I could get it home, so I left without it.

Once I got to my friend's house, I told her about my shopping trips and the tree and she said if it wouldn't fit in my car, we could get it in her van and figure out how to get it to my house later. We didn't go back on Saturday, because we had to meet friends for dinner, then the show, both of which were lots of fun. Sunday AM we headed out to Pike again to look at the tree. While there, I picked up a second mini hosta 'Golden Prayers' and also an Ostrich Fern that was marked $2.00 instead of $12.99 because it looked like someone was trying to kill it. I selected one that looked like it had some healthy but not yet unfurled fronds and will hope for the best. Of course, I got the tree, but not before triple-checking the price. I was even MORE amazed when we were actually able to fit it in my car. WOW!!



I got back home around 2 PM but was totally exhausted, so pretty much all I did was pot up the two mini hostas. I'm going to look for a really special pot for 'Blue Mouse Ears'.

Today I was still worn out and didn't do anything this morning. I regretted that decision when I came home to wilted tomato plants and had to hurry up and do a bunch of watering before my yoga class. Tomorrow I'm going to try to get up early and water the front porch plants.

several busy annual planting days

My work schedule has been different this week, so I had Thursday morning off. I decided it was time to get rid of some of the pansies in pots that really were not doing well and start seeding in some other things. But, before I could do anything, disaster had struck my cilantro. Apparently my dog managed to not only knock over the pot the cilantro was in, but also break the terra cotta pot. Impressive...

I did my best to salvage the little cilantro seedlings and repot them in a new pot. I then planted out some patty pan squash seeds in the windowbox where I have been growing lettuce. I dumped two pots of pansies and one pot was planted with Bush Blue Lake 274 beans. I'm hoping they will not require trellising. I didn't soak the bean seeds, so I hope they germinate alright. The package didn't say to germinate and this is my first attempt at growing beans.

I saved seed last year off my 'Peppermint Stick' zinnias and the seed seems to be okay, not moldy or anything. I spread this seed behind the two salvias along the front fence. If they do come up, the zinnias should be tall enough to peek out over the salvias, which should look pretty.

My final seeding for Thursday was to seed the basil in the herb barrel. This year I'm not growing as many different herbs in the herb barrel. I still have curly leaf parsley in there, as well as a few chives and apparently one dill. I divided the remaining area in two and planted one half with 'Purple Ruffles' basil and the other half with 'Lime' basil. I did leave room around the outside edge to plant nasturtuims, which I can never remember to soak overnight, so I tend to get them in quite late. I need to plant out more basil as I'm afraid 'Early Girl' tomato is pretty much shading out the basil I planted around her. I may start a few pots just of basil. In other herb news, I finally decided that it was time to dump the stevia and bronze fennel. Neither has shown any signs of coming back this year. When I dumped the fennel, I could see that the roots were totally rotting. Guess it got too cold for it in the pot last winter.

Seeded on Thursday:
- zinnias with seed saved from last year
- lime basil
- purple ruffles basil
- bush blue lake beans
- patty pan squash

Friday I had to work, but had a few hours of light after work, so with a quick stop for a few plants on the way home, I was ready to tackle more annuals.

First up was the hanging basket (still need to get over to storage to get the other frames) now that I have new liners. I got pretty orangey million bells and black sweet potato vine to make my far full sun corner basket. I got this one planted and hung today. I also found two pots of New Guinea impatiens that I really liked. One is small 4" pot that I'm planning on putting in a hanging basket and the other is a big quart plant that I planted in one of the bronze plastic pots.

Next up was one of the hardest things, pulling out the pansies. In the fall it is easy to get rid of the summer annuals because the frost kills them, but in the spring you have to pull out your living cool season annuals. The pansies in the annual bed were looking pretty rough, so it was definitely time. I pulled out all except the back row, which are in the most shade and therefore look the best. I added some Black Cow to the areas where I pulled out the pansies. The main area was replanted with 'Blue Puffs' Ageratum around the outside edge, then seeded in with 'Peppermint Twist' zinnias behind that. For now the pansies are in place along the back, but they will probably be replaced with coleus in a few weeks. I planted a 4-pack of pink vinca in front of 'Masja' hydrangea. I still have some more areas where pansies need to be replaced. I am thinking I'll use the Ageratum in front of the camellias, as it is a pretty color and will grow in part shade.

hydrangea 'Together'

hydrangea 'Together'
Originally uploaded by iechris

Hydrangea 'Together' is looking great. I am still wondering if it will rebloom as claimed and I am also wondering about how winter hardy it will really be. For the time being, it looks great!

Japanese Maple 'Butterfly'

Japanese Maple 'Butterfly'
Originally uploaded by iechris

Newly purchased 'Butterfly' Japanese Maple. This was also purchased from Mystic Farms at the Farmer's Market Spring Festival. I don't know much about Japanese Maples, but had never seen a variegated one before and just fell in love with this little baby. This is a small recently grafted plant and it is looking good. Since purchasing the maples, I've been doing some reading and it looks like I made some good choices. I've now seen more pictures of variegated Japanese Maples and I think 'Butterfly' is the prettiest.

Tamukeyama Japanese Maple

Tamukeyama Japanese Maple
Originally uploaded by iechris

My newly purchased 'Tamukeyama' Japanese Maple currently living in front of the water heater hut. It is sitting in its nursery pot, inside a fiberglass pot.

Spring Fest at the Farmer's Market

Went today on day 2 of the Spring flower and plant sale at the Farmer's Market. There was a lot of so-so, seen it everywhere stuff, but I did find some treasures!

I was looking for a new rosemary to put in the pot with the sage and thyme and after talking to the lady who was selling lots of neat herbs, she recommended I get an oregano for the pot, so I ended up getting a variegated oregano. While there, I thought about Golden Rain rosemary and a pineapple sage, but didn't get either at the time. I also got a phlox 'David' for the perennial bed, where I had planned to plant an 'Autumn Joy' sedum. I already have a sedum on that side of the bed and all the 'Autumn Joys' I've been finding have been in HUGE pots, so I went with the phlox instead. Later in the day, we went back to the Farmer's Market and I got the Golden Rain rosemary, but they were out of the pineapple sage. I can't believe she sold that many that quickly, but the place was a ZOO!!

On the return trip, I also picked up a 'Dolce Creme Brulee' huechera to complete one of the porch pots. Right now its color is on the green side, but I'm hoping once it is in the sun and starting growing out some its color will improve. After the first trip to the Farmer's Market, we went up to Country Boys, were I got a few other annuals to round out the porch plants. We also went to K-Mart where I got a really big hanging basket of purple double impatiens. We stoppped at Lowes to see if they had any cheap hanging baskets that I could repot for the front of the house and I found some annual dianthus. It looks nice and I hope it will keep blooming all summer.

While at Lowes, I found that they had finally gotten in the Forever and Ever 'Together' hydrangeas. All the plants they had were already blooming, but I was able to find one that looked like a decent plant and didn't have all its buds open already. This one is supposed to stay 2 X 2, so I'm planning on keeping it in a pot. I'll need to hit it with aluminum sulfate to keep the blue color though. I also took another look at their 'Peppermint' hydrangeas and I'm really starting to wonder if the tag was switched in the plant I bought and it was just a regular plant with the 'Peppermint' tag in it, as so far the blooms do not look right. ARGHHHH....

My big expense at the Farmer's Market was on Japanese Maples. I've been thinking about getting one for a while and a farm called Mystic Farm was there and had really nice maples at a good price. They had these giant Tamukeyamas that were just incredible and were $300. If they had taken credit cards and I knew where I wanted to put it... They also had it in a really nice $60 plant that I REALLY thought about, but I ended up getting a smaller $30 'Tamukeyama' that we all thought had a nice growth habit. While I was trying to decide, someone I know came by and he turns out to have a bunch of Japanese Maples and said that cultivator I was picking was a good one and that the plant I had picked out was nice too. I also saw this little tiny $15 plant called 'Butterfly'. 'Butterfly' has more maple shaped leaves and they are variegated.

While I was paying I happened to mention that I didn't have much room for maples as all my room is taken up with hydrangeas. Susan (one of the owners) said they had hydrangeas too but didn't bring them because they weren't blooming. I asked if they had '...Paul Doumer' and she said no but that they did have 'Nightengale'. I said I had cuttings, but they had died and that I was looking to replace mine and said I'd email them in a few weeks. Well, on our return trip to the Farmer's Market, I decided I just HAD to get one of the $10 'Bloodgood' seedlings they had. These are seed grown, not grafted, so they might not be exactly true, but he said they are super hardy and I could just toss this small plant in a hole tonight. I also made arrangements for them to bring a 'Nightengale' hydrangea to the show tomorrow and I can pick it up on the way to work.

Once I was home I had a ton of work to do! I planted the phlox 'David' and lambs ears in the perennial bed, added the oregano and a parsley to their respective containers, potted up the rosemary and potted up the Endless Summer hydrangea I had grown from a cutting last year. I also ended up repotting the 'Butterfly' Japanese Maple into a small ceramic pot, using pretty much solid composted pine bark with just a sprinkling of soil on the top like Chip said. It was semi-traumatic for me, as it was hard to get it out of the pot and then the potting soil part started to fall apart, but I'm hoping it was NOT traumatic for 'Butterfly'. The other two were placed inside pots on top of some mulch, still in their nursery pots. 'Bloodgood' is living behind the daylilies and 'Tamukeyama' is living over on the corner of the house where the water heater hut is.

grass finally mowed and carpets cleaned

Today was a busy day, as I'd scheduled steam cleaning for the carpets at 8:30 AM and a man to come cut the yard at 9:30 AM. Both were on the late side, but the carpet got done quickly and looks good, though it was still very wet when I left. The grass cutting started a lot later than planned and took quite a while, though it does look good. I've got to do something about trying to get REAL grass to grow in my yard, now that it has been cut, I can really see that large areas look to just be plantain weeds. I keep pulling and pulling...

I got my plant markers in the mail yesterday, but with all the stuff going on today didn't have any time to start writing on them. They look really nice and I can't wait to see how it will look when I label everything. I'm excited. They came from Eon Industries in Ohio, which I found through the Hosta Library.

This evening on my dinner break, I ran out to the bank and got some cash so I could go get a hanging basket at Fisher Orchard (at Dillard Farms). They had some HUGE beautiful baskets of pink million bells and verbena last week and that was what I wanted. Of course, those were all gone this week, but they did have some of the same combination, just not as grown out, so I got one of those and figure it will be fine. They also had really huge, really nice baskets of a peachy million bells combined with black sweet potato vine. I almost got one of those as well but finally decided against it for today, though I may go back later this week.

rain has arrived

I got woken up in the middle of the night by the sounds of a very violent rainstorm. The rain seems to have continued all night and into the morning. When I got home from work, we had over 1" of rain. Great news!

Irises I divided last year are blooming

iris bloom
Originally uploaded by iechris

Some of the irises I divided last fall and spread all around the yard are now blooming. Oddly, it is the ones that were stuck in some of the worst dirt, leftover clay that was full of lumps. These plants are in part shade but are currently blooming. I'm wondering if these may have been bigger pieces than the ones I planted other places, as this group seems to have always been ahead of the others.

where's my rain?

The forcast had been for rain Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, so I didn't really make plans for the yard this weekend as I figured it would be raining. Saturday came and no rain, so after running some errands in the morning, including a trip the Farmer's Market where I came away with two very cute little folk art tortoises made out of small clay pots and saucers, I had to hit the yard. I had also gotten 2 pots of purple fountain grass, some lilies and a pincushion flower.

I planted a 4 pack of vinca in front of the newly planted 'Double Pink' hydrangea. They are white with a red/pink eye and I hope they will do better in this area than the impatiens did last year. The pincushion flower went into the front corner of the left hand side of the perennial bed. A red lily went in front of the Joe Pye Weed, where I hope their far apart flowers schedules will allow each to hide the other in turn. An already podded up 'Stargazer' lily went in to the left hand side of the bed where the mallow had grown last year. One pot of fountain grass went in between the Tea Olive and Japanese Beautyberry. It looks good for now but may prove to be a little crowded and there might not be room there next year. I also repotted the Carolina Jessamine to a 3 gallon pot. I still haven't decided where I'm going to plant it, but it seems fine in a pot for now.

As there was no rain yet, but lots of thunder, and I had a bunch of freshly planted plants, I watered the back yard. Just as I was finishing, it started to rain. In all, we got about 1/2" yesterday (Saturday) then an additional 1/4" inch today (Sunday). Saturday night we went out to eat and I got very sick while at the restaurant and got extremely sick at the mall. I was still not feeling well today, so I didn't get much done or feel like doing much.

I pulled some more plantain weeds today, they are taking over huge sections of my yard. I really need to try to seed in some grass, but I just can't seem to stick with a watering schedule. Speaking of grass, it badly needs to be cut. The guy who cut it for me this year has a new job and hasn't been doing as much yard work. Today he called and gave me another name, the boyfriend of one of my mom's former co-workers and that guy will be out Wednesday AM. That is great, as it was almost to cutting it with the string trimmer time.

The tomatoes I am hardening off are doing well. I also finally have some sprouts of the 'Ananas Noir' tomoatoes. However, I am really running out of room under the lights. I have a few small potted tomatoes from the first round of seed starting and they may have to start hardening off soon. I currently have flowers on Tumbling Tom, Husky Cherry Red, Early Girl and Cherokee Purple. I may have seen the beginnings of flowers on German Pink as well.

so dry already, plus planted hydrangea and viburnum

For the last two days, when I've been outside in the evening, it has been SO dry. The tomatoes have all needed to be watered and today I saw 'Teller Red' hydrangea being wilty. I have watered portions of my yard both nights. The weather report had called for rain today, but it never showed up. Currently the forcast is for rain all weekend and right now that would be very welcome. I feel like I am back in last July already, with the heat and the drought and everything needing to be watered all the time.

The baby tomato plants continue their outside time and that seems to be going well. Right now they aren't putting out much in the way of new growth, but they also aren't getting a lot of sun. This weekend I'm going to try to leave them out in the sun longer, if we have any sun. Last night, I started another cup of the 'Ananas Noir' tomato seeds as I have yet to get a sprout. I'm not sure if they were quite ready to be started outside, so I brought those trays in a few days ago. I'm either going to have very few or a bumper crop as I've started almost 20 seeds.

Last night after yoga I came home and finally planted the viburnum. Last fall we set in in the spot where the yew had died and it has lived there ever since. I could never figure out where I was going with it and my mom said that it belonged on that corner and it does look good, so I've sacrificed matching for flowers on one side. I hope it will do well. The rootball was a little on the dry side when I planted it, so I tried to really soak the rootball while watering yesterday and today. The actual digging in was really easy as the yew had been there, so I didn't dig a very big hole, in part due to the lilies and heucheras planted around it. The soil seems to be great, so I'm hoping the roots will grow well. It was very root bound as well, so I was pretty aggressive about loosening up the roots. I'll keep my fingers crossed...


This evening, with no rain, I decided to finally plant the Forever and Ever Double Pink hydrangea I had bought at Lowes. The original ideas was to plant it in the front side yard where I ended up planting another Endless Summer. I decided against that plan, as I don't know how this plant will perform and I figured ES was a sure thing. After that decision was made, I waffled for a while on where to put the plant, then finally decided I would plant it between the 'Flying Dragon' and the Rose of Sharon, next to the annual bed. 'Masja' is in pretty much the same position on the other side of the annual bed and Rose of Sharon, so I figured this would balance well and my neighbor's chestnut tree should provide enough shade. The space I planted it in isn't big, but this plant is not supposed to get that big either, so I'm hoping it will work.

Another great ranunculus shot:


'Delta Fire' pansies still blooming:

more planting- ES and clematis

I worked tonight so I had some time to do some work in the yard this AM. I dug in an area under the tree on the front part of the side yard to plant the new 'Endless Summer'. After a few hours of work, I got ES planted and also got the Clematis I had bought planted. I hope that there will be enough room for the clematis' roots to grow and that I will be able to get it to grow up the tree.

'Christmas Tree' planted

I got up a bit earlier than usual this AM with the plan that I would get the new hostas planted before work. Since they were bare root, I let them soak overnight in a bowl of water, but I wasn't sure about leaving them that way for 2 nights, so that meant that I had to do something with them today.

I went out and dug up the area where I wanted to plant 'Christmas Tree', LOTS of roots, but I did my best to dig them out. My neighbor's trees are obviously the type that send out a lot of surface roots, as I always run into a ton when I am digging back there. I got 'Christmas Tree' planted out and watered in. I also put 'Holy Mole' in a 2 gallon pot and potted it up for the time being. I will have to figure out where to put it and its friends.

Today was the tomatoes first day outside. I put them on the porch right up against the house where they would get a few hours of morning sun but hopefully be protected from any strong winds. They seem to have done pretty well. I'll put them back out there tomorrow.

The reticulated irises that I got earlier this year from a woman who comes into work have just started to bloom.

eBay hostas arrive

The two hostas I bought on ebay, 'Holy Mole' and 'Christmas Tree' arrived today. 'Christmas Tree' has big leaves and nice roots. 'Holy Mole' is just beginning to wake up but has a HUGE root system. So big, I'm trying to figure out what to do with it, as I'm not ready to plant it yet. My tentative plan is to try to plant 'Christmas Tree' tomorrow AM before work, but that depends on how early I can get up and get ready for the day.

I also potted all the 'Pink Accodion' tomato seedlings in their own pots and plan to start moving them outside tomorrow.

finally got to the Lily Lady

We finally made it out to the Lily Lady this afternoon, but when we got there I found out that mom had left the list of the ones we liked at home. She had thought that we could just pick out the ones we liked best in person, forgetting that they are not blooming yet!

We started out with the hostas and I got a 'June' to put by the Generale in place of one of the 'Elegens' and also got 'Great Expectations' which kept catching my eye. From there, it was off to the daylily photo albums to choose some daylilies. We ended up getting 2 'Jagged Edge', a lavender one to go on either end of the 'Mattie Max Maxwells'; 2 'Chicago Knobby' to go along the side of the house and 1 'Pushamataha', which was supposed to be for the side of the house, but I forgot what color it was, then decided to plant it in the perennial bed.

When we got home, I got the 'Jagged Edges' and 'Chicago Knobbys' planted in the front yard and dug up the 'Purple Emperor' sedum that I can't believe is still alive. I tried to get all the peat off the sedum that I could, then had mom run it under some water, then planted it out in the perennial bed, where I hope it will do better. I also planted 'Pushamataha' out in the perennial bed.

From there, it was hosta time. First up, I moved the far right 'Elegens' by the Generale over between 'Coral Bells' and 'Pink Ruffles' azaleas. Then I planted 'June' where it had been. After that, I took 'Great Expectations' and planted it beside 'Fuji Waterfall' hydrangea.

Once all the planting was done I did a few other odd jobs. I removed the chicken wire cage I had built around 'Gentian Dome' hydrangea and ran chicken wire along the rest of the inside of the fence. I put a tomato cage around 'Gentian Dome' so hopefully that will protect it. I also planted the two little yellow begonias that I got, they are on either side of 'Ami Pasquer' hydrangea. I was very surprised to see that my millions bells hanging basket that had overwintered from last year is now blooming. I really need to fertilize it. It is not all that leafed out, so the blooms were a real surprise. It also looks like the hanging basket of verbena from last year has overwintered as well. It is just starting to put out new growth. Not sure where I will end up putting either basket.

I think I may have gotten the tiara hosta mess straightened up and that I now have them correctly identified. My current master plan is to slightly enlarge the bed that 'Ayesha' hydrangea is in and then put all the tiara hostas around 'Ayesha'. I will need to move another 'Elegens' to do this, but I will leave the 'Fire and Ice' hosta where it is, as it seems happy there.

Autumn Belle azalea bloom:

only 1/2" of rain today

The weather report intially called for rain all day today and tomorrow, but we got the rain today in the AM, only about 1/2". I think I will hold off on watering on Sunday, but with no rain forcast for the next week, I'll need to water on Wednesday probably.

I had to work today, so all I did this evening was pull a few weeds. Mom harvested some lettuce and the 'Galactica' lettuce that had been in the windowbox got uprooted somehow, so I'll move one of the ones in the nursery bed to the windowbox. I also put out another box with some more 'Ananas Noir' tomato seeds this morning. In other tomato news... more flowers on 'Husky Cherry Red' and the first open flower on 'Early Girl'.

planting and transplanting for 4/18

Planted out today in the perennial border:
Euphorbia
Wallflower
Blue Hill salvia
alyssum Easter Bonnet
lantana Bandana Cherry
Stargazer lily bulbs
Bearded Iris rhizomes
dahlia Lavender Perfection
hollyhock

Planted out:
Teller Red hydrangea
Night Before Christmas hosta
perilla
marigolds

Transplanted to the perennial border:
ginger lilies
Joe Pye weed moved from one side to the other
coneflowers moved from one side to the other


licorice plant icicles moved from the pot to the border

perennial bed and so much more

Today was one of those super productive days that you can only think of when it is cold or rainy. We are expecting rain over the weekend, so I'm glad I had today off to get a lot done.

I started at 8:30 AM by raking the mulch and pine needles from the left half of the perennial bed. I also moved all the plants that had been plopped down in and on the bed except the variegated iris, that has come up so well. Once I had all the mulch off, I realized I wanted to put the mulch somewhere, so that led to a brief time out while I weeded and pulled all the grass from around the daylilies and spread the mulch/pine needles there. Then it was back to digging in the bed. It actually went better than expected and I only ran into the rocks really in one area near where the viburnum is. I added almost a whole bag of Clay Buster and raked it into the loose dirt.



Then it was time to start planting the bed. First order of business was to dig up the ginger lilies, which I think planted on the outside back corner of the left and right side of the bed. In order to plant on the right hand side, I first had to dig up the 1 Joe Pye Weed, which I then moved the the left side. While I was digging in the bed, I discovered that the two dahlias that had bloomed last year appeared to have overwintered, plus I had a glad coming up, so I decided to leave them as the back row planting and get another bag of dahlias. Once I had the ginger lilies and joe pye weed in, I put the blue sage back in and dug two clumps of coneflower from the right side. I think dug the wallflower out of the herb barrel and planted it on the left side. The wood spurge (euphorbia) went on the right side where a coneflower had been and the licorice plant finally got out of a pot and into the right side of the perennial bed.

With all that done, it was time to tackle the next project... planting the 'Teller Red' hydrangea. Since there was already a hole in place it wasn't that bad. I also decided that I will plant a hosta near it between it and the astilbe. After that it was on the the next task, fertilizing the camellias. I raked back all the old mulch, then fertilized them and watered them in. I also fertilized my azaleas, which apparently was a mistake, as it will stimulate growth and cause the flowers to fall off. So, maybe the azalea show will be brief this year. I also fertilized the yew and the loropetulam.

It was about 2 PM at that point and I went off to Country Boys to pick up a few things. I got a flat of alyssum, a perilla, a hollyhock and a pack of coleus. I stopped off at Home Depot and got 2 packs of marigolds and a new water wand that I hope will be more gentle. I planted the alyssum along the entire front of the perennial bed, the hollyhock in the inner back corner of the right side of the perennial bed and the perilla in the center of the camellia bed. Hosta 'Night Before Christmas' finally got a home between the far left 'Miss Biloxi' and 'Debutante'. I'm going to put the new 'Christmas Tree' hosta on the other side of 'Debutante' when it comes. I planted up three small pots of marigolds and planted one marigold in each corner of the big pot the roma tomato is in.

At that point, after the watering, it was time to call it a day. I am still debating where I'm going to plant the double pink hydrangea.

Euphorbia in bloom: