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Cleomes and phlox in the garden

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Cleomes are strange looking flowers. They grow on long stocks and bloom as they grow. They have long spidery things that stick out all around the blooms giving them their strange look.

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I plant these flowers along the back edge of my garden. They grow to approximately 4 feet tall so they help screen me from my neighbors once they’ve grown enough. I always try to grow some white ones as well as pink and purple.

Another flower that I grow is Phlox David. I have four clumps of it in my backyard garden and it’s just lovely when it’s in full bloom.

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I like having some white flowers scattered throughout the garden. They seem to highlight certain areas of the garden, and of course at night these flowers are still visible so they add a nice touch if we’re sitting out on the patio.

Sorry my post was a little late today. We seem to have the flu or something like it running through the house and it appears to be my turn to fight the bug. Ugh.

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information. GTS participants remember to check in at As the Garden Grows each week so that we’ll know you made a new post!






Spring garden maintenance complete and front boulevard planted

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I’d like to thank everyone who stopped by to express their condolences on the loss of Chris’ cousin who was a very good friend of ours. I was supposed to be in another city and attending the visitations today, but I got really sick yesterday and our car broke down. So I’m home tonight … Chris can’t even drive back to pick me up as our car hasn’t been repaired yet. You can read a more detailed explanation of what happened on my main blog if you’d like.

So on to garden related stuff …

Last week, in preparation for Green Thumb Sunday, I went out into my yard and took pictures of most of the plants that were either coming up or that were blooming.

The garden looks very nice this year. Chris and I spent two days last weekend cleaning up the garden – trimming plants, getting rid of dead foliage, pruning roses and putting some compost that we picked up at a local park on Saturday thanks to Toronto’s Earth days’. (That’s a green recycling program where the city gives back the compost from the green garbage and other yard related wastes it’s picked up the year prior).

Needless to say my back took a beating and ached for a few days after I over did it in the garden. The effort payed off though as we had cooler temperatures and some rain last week and that really perked up the garden. Since the beds were tidier I could really see how my plants were progressing.

IMG_3325 Now you might remember a post I made about a month ago. It was the one where I showed photos of our front yard still covered in snow and photos of our planted boulevard that I had spent the day cleaning up.

Well the front boulevard looks even nicer now! I planted some peonies that I’d purchased in early April as well as some Dahlias, Gay Feather and a few other plants to go along with the plants that have been growing there for a few years (iris, daylilies, malva, salvia, tulips) and we placed our short bamboo fence in front of it to finish off the look and protect the garden from the teens that like to stand outside my house talking before they go their separate ways after school.

This is what it looks like now:

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and from another angle:

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Just to give you a complete picture of how the front garden looks I’ll throw in a photo of the front flower beds too:

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Now most of my plants are in the backyard. In a day or two I’ll post some photos of how the backyard garden looks right now and maybe a few photos of what’s blooming.

I hope your gardens are doing well right now!

Everything in the garden is growing as it should!

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It’s a beautiful day here in Toronto and I’m hoping to go outside shortly and get some gardening done. I still have to spring clean at least half of the back garden and all the roses need a trim.

With all the snow cover we had over winter I don’t believe that I lost any plants, but I should have a final tally later today. Well if my tum stops hurting long enough for me to do some work that is. My Crohn’s is acting up bad this week.The other day I went outside and took some photos of the garden. We have five established Peonies and they’re all coming up:

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Soon we’ll have beautiful peony flowers.

I expect that shortly after that we might have our first hydrangea blooms. The hydrangea that I planted in our of our backyard garden beds last year appears to be thriving:

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One of my favorite roses – Theresa Bugnet – is thriving in her planter by the front door:

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I can get away with growing Theresa in a planter since she’s hardy to zone 2 (I’m a USDA zone 5b or Canadian zone 6b). Most years we do put some burlap or another form of protection around her, but we didn’t this past winter. I’m happy that her planter had lots of snow around it for the coldest months.

I love this roses red branches. They stay red all year round, although they are most vibrant in the spring and fall.

How are your plants doing this week?

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information. GTS participants remember to check in at As the Garden Grows each week so that we’ll know you made a new post!

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