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Alfresco Entertaining in my small Garden

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We’re at the height of summer and I find that almost every day we’re having a meal in the garden on the patio. It’s lovely to sit outdoors enjoying the beauty of the garden and when we’re lucky it’s bounty as well.

As I mentioned in my last post, our tomatoes are just beginning to ripen and very soon we’ll have cucumbers and beans. We’ve already been enjoying strawberries and raspberries from the garden and I expect that we’ll continue to enjoy them for another month or so.

It’s at this time of year when I most enjoy entertaining. I love inviting a few friends or some family members over for an informal visit. We’ll get together and have a barbecue or just a snack and a few drinks. Just a chance to get together – but of course it’s always in the garden surrounded by my lovely flowers and all the lovely scents they produce.

One quick and simple treat that I whip up when guests come over is cheese and crackers. I almost always have both cheddar cheese and a soft cheese on hand like Boursin Cheese and of course a variety of tasty crackers is always handy.

Do you do a lot of entertaining in the summertime? Do you keep supplies on hand for “drop in” guests? Supplies such as tasty spreadable cheeses like the Boursin cheeses discussed above or other quick foods?






We’ve been very busy in the garden the past two weeks

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It feels like our garden is behind this year. It’s not because this year started out a lot rainier than most, no, it’s because our next door neighbors decided to replace their fence and thus the fence between our two properties had to be replaced, so we spent about two months waiting for it to be put in.

Our garden was on hold for a good part of that time. Oh I did regular garden maintenance on it, such as pruning the roses of dead branches after the long cold winter and making sure the garden beds weren’t full of weeds. However, I didn’t put in any new perennials or plant any annuals until after the fence went in. The shared fence didn’t start going in until the 6th of June so I’ve spent the last two weeks playing catch up with my garden … oh and giving the plants along the new fence tender loving care since new post holes and a big trench had to be dug which likely disturbed some of their roots.

I’m exhausted … but I have to say, here on this first day of Summer, that my garden is starting to look the way I want it to. I must admit that a few weeks ago I was certain that my garden would pretty much be a write off this year. Oh and when the fence was going in I thought that my roses were going to be damaged. I have some very special roses along that fence line – Prince Napoleon, Sympathy and my gigantic William Baffin. I’d hate to lose any of them, but of the eight roses along that fence line Prince Napoleon and Sympathy would have been the worst ones to lose. As it was, we had to lean a few of the roses over while the fence work was being done and Prince Napoleon was leaning right over onto other roses and plants. I thought it was a goner for sure. As it is, it has a terrible case of Black Spot right now because of lack of air circulation due to basically lying on other plants for a week.

Since we’re in Garden and Yard sprucing up mode we sanded off the old paint on the doors of our storage areas under our enclosed back porch and I spent several hours yesterday repainting them. Wow .. everything looks so nice and new now.

Perhaps by this weekend I’ll have slowed down from my outdoor activities and I’ll get around to moving some of my photos from my camera to my computer. If I do I’ll post some pictures of the new fence and how the garden looks now. It does look pretty good if I do say so myself.

It hasn’t been the best summer – garden’s puttering along

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Well, so far this year I can’t say it’s been a great summer or great gardening season … Some of my plants are behind while others are not liking this weather at all!

We’re finally having some warm humid weather here in Toronto (still not as hot and humid as it usually is!) and that’s helping the plants make up for what’s been a cold summer! We haven’t had tons of rain, but when it does rain it rains a lot!

My roses don’t seem to like this weather. They’ve been hit fairly hard with powdery mildew and several have just about completely lost their blooms! I’ve treated the roses with my organic mix and I think they’ll begin to recover soon … but they’re going to look straggly for a while!

Actually … it’s just the roses in the backyard that are depleted of leaves. The ones in the front look great! Especially The Fairy rose and Bonica! Oh and they’re blooming like crazy too! Take a peak:

The Fairy Rose 3

Lovely aren’t they? These are The Fairy Roses.

Oh well … at least most of the plants are growing and or producing veggies! My Tomatoes (cherry, tiny tom, early girl and Glam) are all full of green tomatoes. Hopefully the heat starts to help them ripen! Likewise my cucumber plants have tiny (smaller than Gherkins) cucumbers on them that I hope begin to grow soon. I can’t wait to have fresh tomatoes and cucumbers around!

At least I can eat some fresh fruit from my garden – even it’s only a handful! We finally picked our first raspberries off the bushes yesterday. Yummy!

If you’re weather is similar to mine you might have noticed that some of your plants are behind, smaller than normal or even taller than normal! For example, my Hydrangea is blooming, but the flowers are a little smaller than they normally are … yet my Phlox (Phlox David) and Balloon Flowers are blooming like crazy and they’re also much taller than normal … my Balloon flowers are over 4 feet tall! Biggest they’ve ever been!

Here’s my Hydrangea:
Hydrangea blooms 2

The sunflowers that I always grow in our planted boulevard were only two or so feet tall up until a week ago … then we got all that rain last weekend and they grew another two feet or more just like that. Their flowers are finally blooming, but again, they are smaller than normal. Geez … I’m used to having 8 foot tall sunflowers that the city tells me I have to cut down! LOL

At least my plants are blooming and growing. It could be worse!

I’ll leave you with this lovely picture of my Graham Thomas English rose … aren’t they gorgeous?

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How’s your garden doing this week?

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