A Gardeners Journal

    I've kept a gardening journal for over 16 years now.  The past few years I have written little in it.  In the earlier years I grew alot of vegetables and plants that I started with seeds and cuttings.  I have alot of information on length of germination, when to start, how they grew, and should I grow them again.  I also added in a lot of weather and sitings of different birds in the yard.  I guess this blog is my new journal.  Although it won't have detailed information, I will be able to look back and see what I planted and how it looked.  These pictures I took are some of the last color of the season. 

    I can always count on Dahlias!  As long as the bunnies don't eat them.  I planted alot this year and they seemed to do well.  I save my tubers and replant them in early spring, but I noticed they didn't flower very well.  I'm not sure if I will bother saving them this year.



    I also tried a red vinca.  It flowered all summer and is still going strong.  I had never seen a vinca in red.

    Chrysanthemums are just starting to pop.  The Dusty Miller is on it's second year, and I have some that is three years old.  They're sold as an annual, so I've always pulled them out.  A few years ago I didn't get a chance to do my fall clean up and was surprised to see new growth on it.  The second year they are bigger and get a small yellow flower on them.  I have decided I like purple Ageratum.  This has done very well for the past two years.  Marigolds have not done well and Impatients look like they rotted from the heat and humidity.

    It's too bad that it is so hard to find winter hardy Mums anymore.  I have a yellow one that wintered over from last year, but we had a very warm winter.

    This is the tomato I grew in compost.  It is mid September and all these tomatoes have yet to ripen.  I wish I had done a complete count of all the tomatoes I got from this one plant!  I know it produced over 30.  Will pick these green and wait till they ripen.  I usually dehydrate what we can't eat, for soups and sauces over the winter.



    Last, but not least, is the Begonias.  These always make a nicely mounded plant.  The bugs and the bunnies don't seem to bother them, and they come in so many colors.

Instant Grass

    This is the lower level of our front yard where I took out all the rocks and patio stone to do my project out back.  We've decided to put grass back in here, so we purchased sod.  As you can see, we need a new walk-way to the front door.  This is on the list for next spring.

    All finished!!  Next year we will edge with woodchips and maybe add impatients.  Lets hope this grass takes and we don't have to do it again in the spring.

                                                                                         

An Overgrown Corner

    After losing our cat in June, I was looking for something to do to get over the loneliness of the house without Isabella.  She was almost 13 and had chronic lung disease.  I was sitting on the deck watching the hummingbirds and chipmunks when my eyes were drawn to an absolute mess in the back corner of our yard.  I had started a few forsythia bushes and the birds had added a grape vine.  My wisteria had gotten out of hand, and oregano was everywhere!  I jumped in and started clearing it.

    At the end of the week-end it was a little better.  I saw a garden snake about 2 feet long and was glad he was on the way to my neighbors.  In the middle of all this is a small red maple tree that I decided would look nice as a focal point.  I am taking out a patio that we made with stones, bricks, and pavers and reusing them out here.  It has been hard working with this awful heat and humidity.  I feel like I'm living down south, not in the northeast!                  

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

    These are some of the old pavers and bricks I used to put around the tree.  I'm still digging out roots and stones from the ground.  I have no plan, so I make it up as I go.  I'm also trying to come up with a play area for four grandsons to amuse themselves.

    I decided to do a small sandbox for the older boys to play with their construction equipment.  Give two five year olds some sand and trucks and they're good for hours!  They were already playing in my flower beds, but now they have a place of their own.

   All I did was edge with brick, scoop out some dirt, and add a couple of bags of sand.  Not the best job, but I got alot of brownie points for this one.  The first thing they ask for when they get here is the bag of trucks.

    This is what happened about 3 weeks after I heavily cut this wisteria back.  It had barely flowered in the spring.  This is one plant that needs to be watched or it will take over everything.  If you cut it back a few times over the summer, you will get it to rebloom.

    And something for the youngest grandsons.  This has been in our cellar for about 10 years.  My husband has been saying he's going to throw it away for about 8 years now.  I told him our grandchildren would love this, even before they came along.  We put our youngest grandson, Tyler, on it and he didn't like it.  Lets hope Sam likes it when he sees it!

                                                                              

    Well, Eli sure looks like he's enjoying it!  I think this also was a hit, and now they have a place to go to when they visit.  Sure helps with the fighting!

    After lifting this thing out about 3 times, I finally got it leveled enough to keep the water from sitting in the seat.  I transplanted patches of a yellow sedum that I had out front.  I'm hoping it will take here with all the afternoon sun.  I put down rocks for a walkway in hopes that the kids will stay out of the flowers.  I can't believe this is me letting kids play in my gardens!     

    I will probably leave this till next spring.  It's very hard to find flowers at this time of the year.  I am looking for low growing perennials and alot of color from annuals.  Will check out catalogs during the winter.           

                                                                                                                                                  

Bottling Cider

    At 7:30 this morning I was washing beer bottles and getting ready to bottle my hard cider.  I used to pick fresh blackberries to go in this, but have since realized how much easier it is to go to the store and buy my fruit juices.  It tastes just as good.  I capped 43 bottles and broke the neck off of one.  I don't know my own strength, or these beer bottles get weaker the more you cap them.

    I'm still working on my back corner.  Will probably wait till next year to add my plants as there is not much left at the nurseries at this time of the year.  It is Sept. 2 and the Ash tree in my backyard has been sending down it's leaves for about a week now.  Seems awful early. but I'm looking forward to the fall after this hot dry summer.

    The flowers on this stairway have finally filled in.  We may not have deer, but we do have very hungry bunnies that seem to like my choice of annuals! 

Saving your Geraniums

                                                                                                                                 

 

    I took these pictures in July and I'm finally getting them on.  This is an older Hibiscus that I have had for years.  Not sure of its name, but beautiful this year.  This plant is over 6 feet.





   I love this grass!  It's called Golden Japanese Forest Grass.  It says it's deer resistant.  Thankfully I don't have that problem!  Mid summer, this gets a touch of pink on the stems.  It has been slow growing, but I've managed to divide it and now have two.  The geranium on the far right is one that I pulled last year and over wintered in the garage.  Just pull them out and shake off the dirt.  Put them in a plastic bag and hang them up till about February.  When you take them out of the bag you will probably see some new growth.  I clean off some of the dead stems and then put them in water.  Plant them in potting soil after a week or so.
I can usually bring back 2 out of 3 plants.  We are a zone 5 here ( or maybe close to a zone 6 ) so it's pretty cold in the garage.  Something to do in the winter, and it's nice to see something flowering!

    I'm actually beginning to like Hosta.  This one takes quite a bit of sun without burning.  The older I get , the more I'm thinking about plants with no upkeep.

                                                                                                                                

     A beautiful daylily!  It's too bad they only last a day.  I love this color, but don't like how they die back after flowering.

     Bee balm ( monarda) I think this was called Raspberry Sundae.  The hummingbirds go crazy over these.  If I dead head, I get about 5 or 6 weeks of bloom.  I have just finished transplanting the whole bed of these.  I hope they do well where I put them.