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Finally

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All of my annuals are planted!

I can’t believe that it took me so long to get it all done. I bought the majority of the plants at the beginning of May. It’s never taken me this long to get them in the ground or in their planters before. Tsk tsk.

The good news is that the majority of the plants somehow survived in their tiny little cells of earth or peat moss – whatever that stuff is that dries out so very quickly. They even managed to grow and bloom. I think they will take off now that they are in the ground or their new containers. Their roots can spread out and they’ll finally be happy for the rest of their short lives.

I even managed to divide my Cannas that I had growing in pots. Two large and over grown cannas became 5 plants.

I did buy one more plant today. It’s a Star Jasmine. Well at least I think it’s a Star Jasmine. I purchased it at Home Depot and if you are a gardener or home owner, and you’ve ever purchased plants there, you know their labels aren’t very specific as to species or even care guidelines. The tag said jasmine and it definitely is a Jasmine. It’s viney so I’m assuming that it is a star Jasmine. When it blooms I will find out.

Now my garden will be really smelly. But in a good way. Roses, two jasmine, fragrant Nicotina, and white four o’clocks that also smell a bit like jasmine. Mmmm I can’t wait for all of them to start blooming and giving off those luscious scents. Well my roses are blooming … but I’m dying to smell those jasmine and jasmine like scents. That fragrance makes it so enticing to sit in the garden in the evening and relax.

I hurt my right knee very badly on Saturday and my leg is wrapped with two tensor bandages from just above my knee to my ankle. So it was quite a feat to accomplish the task of getting about 300 plants installed into 16 plus planters and into the ground – considering I can barely walk. My husband helped … if he hadn’t the job would still be waiting and I fear the plants would soon die. We are going to have a heat wave in the next few days and the job just had to be done.

Now all I have to do for the rest of the summer is feed, water, occasionally trim and most importantly enjoy the garden.






War of the Roses

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It figures.

I finally manage to get out into the garden this weekend and of course it’s during a heat-wave. Needless to say I didn’t go out into the garden until late afternoon or early evening as I was waiting for it to cool down a bit.

Still, I made some progress!

The wind was blowing quite hard on Friday afternoon – probably bringing in all the hot weather that’s settled in this area. I noticed that my climbing rose- Antique89 was tipping over in the wind and was crashing into my patio table.

The rose is approximately 7 feet tall and has very thick canes. It was leaning over at more than a 45 degree angle. I quickly grabbed some stakes and my garden tie (plastic ribbon) and scissors and ran outside to fix the rose.

Antique89 rose and bud

While I was wrestling with the rose our boarder apparently came outside looking for me. She didn’t find me. I was under the rose! Hello! Roses don’t normally scream. That was me that was moaning and groaning as the thick thorns dug into the skin on my hands, arms and even my legs.I’d say that Antique 89 and Baron Prevost are probably the thorniest roses that I have in my garden. I’ll be working with all of my roses over the next few days and I’ll let you know if I find any other ones that fit in that category.

Unfortunately, since I haven’t been in my garden all that much over the last two months I have a lot of work to do and a lot of rose wrestling to do. I know, I know … this is the time of year that a gardener should be in the garden regularly, but I’ve been sick and just haven’t been able to get out there.

Much to my dismay and joy as well, the rose are growing as if they are on steroids. Must be all that alfalfa tea I put on them last year. They are huge! Since they are so large they are beginning to flop all over the place too.

Last winter as we prepared the garden for it’s cool slumber my husband thought he was doing me a favor by removing most of the stakes I had in the garden supporting many of my somewhat floppy roses. He did me no favors – especially now, since I’ve let the garden become somewhat overgrown. I’m going to have to climb right into the flowerbed and try to untangle rose branches and discover perennials that are hiding below them.

I’m proud to say that one half of the backyard garden has been tamed! The roses have been straightened, and the plants below them can now be seen. Half the beds have nice red cedar mulch on them. It’s starting to look pretty nice back there. I hope to get the other half of the backyard and the front garden done within the next two days. I still haven’t planted all those annuals though. I thought that I’d better tame the garden first so that I can actually see what areas are a little bare and need annuals. The rest will go into my planters.

I’m going to get my husband to take a picture of my arms tomorrow and if he does I’ll post it. I must have about 50 scratches on each arm – pretty much from the elbows down. They are burning and they look terrible.

Neglect

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I’ve been off work since the beginning of December due to a Crohn’s flare. I thought that since I was home I’d be able to putter in the garden and that it would look just lovely this year. However, I’m still not feeling all that well and I’m sorry to say that I haven’t been in my garden anywhere near as much as I’d like to be.

I purchased a number of annual flowers to plant in the garden at oh, the beginning of May. These plants are to fill some baskets – hanging and otherwise, containers and a few are to fill some empty spaces in my flower bed boarders. I purchased well over 300 plants! Just little ones, you know the ones that come in containers of four? Yep …. 300+ in total.

I managed to plant 9 hanging baskets, and put some marigolds around the border of our boulevard garden bed but that’s it. I still have many containers of plants to be planted.

My garden also needs some tidying. The roses are going wild since they are so much bigger this year due to our mild winter. I have to get out there and put some stakes in the ground and tie those unruly plants so they look tidier and straighter. I also have some red cedar mulch that I want to put down on the beds.

I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me and I hope to get most of it done this week before it starts to get too hot.

Wish me luck!

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