I spent most of the day in my garden. Such a fulfilling way to spend the morning. When I got out there it was so cool and quiet. The only things that were awake were the birds. Oh, how they serenaded me.
This year for Mother's day my hubby bought me a tiller, no it was a great gift, I really wanted one - I loved it. And I loved it even more that he did the tilling for me. He spent the entire day letting me tell him what I wanted done and doing it without questioning me or arguing with me. It was a dream come true! Now just to clarify, we don't spend our time arguing in the garden. No in fact usually we both have our own agendas. You see we have his and hers gardens. Mine is strictly flowers, his has become what I call, the woodland garden. So we often go our separate ways and work our own areas. We have strict rule that we don't mess with each other's gardens.
I do my thing, he does his.
At one time his was a vegetable garden with these fancy raised beds he built with bendy board and cedar. But after a couple years and a few end-of-the-season sales at the garden center, the once veggie bed had become an oasis for sad, half-dead shrubs. He mixed this fantastic soil. A blend of peat, poop, black dirt, clay and sand with a great drainage field of river stones for a base. The magic soil worked wonders on the pathetic looking shrubs he'd bring home in October. By spring they would be twice their size and flourishing! So, some of the shrubs stayed and some moved around the house, and the addition of a weeping willow near by gave his beds shade and his flair for structure and symmetry gave the beds depth. Thus the name, woodland garden.
I, on the other hand , just want flowers. It's a great blend of perennials and annuals. And this morning I finally got some annuals in. After the tilling we had cleaned out the beds of all the grass and weeds that popped up in spring and mixed in some new compost to give it a boost. My first round of perennials: ajuga, phlox and spurge are done blooming and the second round is coming right along. Only for some reason it's all purple this year. My catmint and salvias are blooming beautifully but I pulled all the annoying spreaders that had been bugging me and now I have a monochrome garden! It's kind of cool though, but I'm in desperate need of pink and yellow. I'm determined not to fatten the bunnies again this year so I'm avoiding my favorite petunias and going for marigolds, zinnias, dianthus and for kicks, a couple spreading geraniums. We'll see how it goes. But the annuals, oh, they are such instant gratification!
This year for Mother's day my hubby bought me a tiller, no it was a great gift, I really wanted one - I loved it. And I loved it even more that he did the tilling for me. He spent the entire day letting me tell him what I wanted done and doing it without questioning me or arguing with me. It was a dream come true! Now just to clarify, we don't spend our time arguing in the garden. No in fact usually we both have our own agendas. You see we have his and hers gardens. Mine is strictly flowers, his has become what I call, the woodland garden. So we often go our separate ways and work our own areas. We have strict rule that we don't mess with each other's gardens.
I do my thing, he does his.
At one time his was a vegetable garden with these fancy raised beds he built with bendy board and cedar. But after a couple years and a few end-of-the-season sales at the garden center, the once veggie bed had become an oasis for sad, half-dead shrubs. He mixed this fantastic soil. A blend of peat, poop, black dirt, clay and sand with a great drainage field of river stones for a base. The magic soil worked wonders on the pathetic looking shrubs he'd bring home in October. By spring they would be twice their size and flourishing! So, some of the shrubs stayed and some moved around the house, and the addition of a weeping willow near by gave his beds shade and his flair for structure and symmetry gave the beds depth. Thus the name, woodland garden.
I, on the other hand , just want flowers. It's a great blend of perennials and annuals. And this morning I finally got some annuals in. After the tilling we had cleaned out the beds of all the grass and weeds that popped up in spring and mixed in some new compost to give it a boost. My first round of perennials: ajuga, phlox and spurge are done blooming and the second round is coming right along. Only for some reason it's all purple this year. My catmint and salvias are blooming beautifully but I pulled all the annoying spreaders that had been bugging me and now I have a monochrome garden! It's kind of cool though, but I'm in desperate need of pink and yellow. I'm determined not to fatten the bunnies again this year so I'm avoiding my favorite petunias and going for marigolds, zinnias, dianthus and for kicks, a couple spreading geraniums. We'll see how it goes. But the annuals, oh, they are such instant gratification!
