Our Garden Dirt

One Rainy Afternoon........

Sunday, June 1, 2008

We had rain, thunder & a little lightening for a little over 2 hours this afternoon. We were sitting on the back porch as I said in my earlier post, through the whole storm. Our little 5 yr old Pembroke Welsh Corgi, Dudley, is afraid of storms. He did pretty good today considering. He mostly kept looking at me with that distress in his sweet little brown eyes. LOL! Poor kid. We loved on him, don't worry. He is babied constantly. Oliver, our 8 year old Boxer, could care less. He's like his mama (me), he can sleep through anything. The cats and our almost 7 yr old Australian Shepherd, Chloe were out in the garage (we have a pet room out there for all of them. The garage is their humble abode.) Chloe is deaf and mostly blind, missing an eye and can barely see out of the one she has. She feels the rumbles of the storm and is very sensitive to the vibration. The video below shows Dudley and also some of the rain and wind in some of the gardens out behind us. The large garden that is outlined in Liriope is Olivia & Quinn's Memorial Garden that I am up in arms about. Can't see much through the screen and with the rain and wind. Dudley sure is cute though. It is almost 10 pm and we are back out here on the porch, Bruce reading a garden architecture book and I am feeding my computer addiction. I think I can hear all the flowers and plants faintly sighing with relief and grateful for that long, tall drink that God just gave them.

Baby Garden Dilemma

Wow! Is it really June already? Yesterday and today were the first really insanely hot days here in Florida this year so far. (Where we live anyway.) The Garden is starting to show stress from the heat and drought. We have been hand watering in addition to our regular irrigation just about every day and things are still dry. We are also having trouble with some moles or voles. It's very disappointing. There are tunnels all over our yard. It's like the NYC Subway. They eat off the roots of plants while searching for earthworms in their tunnels. This of course starts to damage the plant and it is starting to show especially in some of my rose bushes in our Baby Memorial Garden. I went out this morning to do some planting in the Baby Garden. All I managed to plant were 3 Pink Gauras. I just couldn't figure out where I wanted to place things. The whole garden is starting to look so hodge podge to me. I haven't thought it out well enough. As my husband says, I am an impulse plant buyer. I buy it because I like it and then I try to stick it in somewhere. But I think that's an okay way to garden. Hey, plants can always be moved, right? It's all about trial & error. The Baby Garden theme is pink for Olivia & White for Quinn. At first I had trouble finding alot of true pink plants. Now I seem to be coming up with an abundance of them. So far, these are the plants that we have in the Baby Garden:

2 Pink Serissa, Belinda Rose, Abraham Darby Rose, Our Lady of Guadaloupe Rose, Moonstone Rose, Sexy Rexy Rose, The Fairy Rose, a miniature garden rose, a Conversation Azalea, Mansize Camellia, Kitty Camellia, Pink Perfection Camellia, a Sioux Crepe Myrtle, Near East Crepe Myrtle, a Cameo Quince, a Blush Quince, a Pink Althea, Flowering Almond Bush, Hoshima Flowering Cherry Bush, Loropetalum, 2 Sago Palms, a Callaway Crabapple Tree, White Muhly Grass, White Nemesia, Nicotiana Flowering Tobacco, Appleblossom Pennestemon, White Four O'Clocks, Pink Four O'clocks, Miniature Mallows, Pink Hollyhocks, Liriope, Narcissus, Indian Hawthorne, Pink Celosiana, Evergreen Giant Liriope and Vygie Sedums. There are also 15 Marcia Faye Daylilies planted there that I am going to dig back up and move to another garden. They were not as pink as I was led to believe. They are very pretty but alot of orange, peach, yellow coloring to them. This morning I planted some Dauphin Gaura. I still have a Siskyou Pink Gaura to plant, August Beauty Gardenia, Pink Muhly Grass, Pink Cleome, some Zinnias and a few more roses. It sounds like alot but everything is basically small so the garden still doesn't look like much yet. I have a wish list of alot more plants that I still want to add to it. We also have a bird bath, two little statues and 2 little baby wrought iron chairs. I am just having such a time planning this layout. I think it's just soooooo important to me because it's my daughter and sons memorial garden, that I am not able to make it perfect enough.

As I write this, Bruce & I are sitting out on the back screened in porch watching it rain and listening to the thunder. Haven't seen any lightening yet and I guess that's a good thing since I am sitting out here with my laptop plugged in on the porch. Probably not the brightest thing I've ever done. We really need the rain but I don't think it's going to amount to much. It's coming in waves. The thunder is getting louder RIGHT now! Funny though, there are still birds chirping.

I joined Blotanist which is a collection of worldwide garden blogs. I am really enjoying it. I get so excited as I look at other gardeners blogs and read their stories. I have to say though that I realize that my blog really pales in comparison to most of the ones that I see. The photography on some of them is absolutely gorgeous so I find myself daydreaming about getting a really good camera so I can improve my garden photography which is something I love to do almost as much as the gardening itself. Also the blogs are so interesting. I find that most have a really good sense of humor, are very talented, and much excellent writers. I have a long ways to go here but I will improve over time. I am starting to really enjoy this blogging thing!

I didn't get to take photographs this morning because my husband had the camera at a job today but I will take some picture this week and show the perils that I am having with the baby garden. Does anyone else have a memorial garden like this that they've created? I would love to look at some pictures, layouts and ideas.

Well, my blog wouldn't be complete without some pictures and I just happen to have some that I took the past couple of nights.

Here is a picture of the Pink Cleome

This is a Manarda but I am not sure which one.

Pink Hollyhock

Mutant Four O'Clocks

Here are some Four O'clocks in the backyard. One is 5' tall.

Mutant Four O'Clocks

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Okay, I know you're probably all getting tired of hearing about our Four O'clocks........but, I told you all about my mutant "Pink Peppermint" looking Four O'Clocks which I just love. Tonight, this bloom opened. It is half Fuschia and half Pink Peppermint on the same bloom. I am not kidding. It looks like I spliced this together, but I did not. Isn't it incredible?! There was also a bloom that had the Peppermint look with larger Fuschia striations on it. I love them! This is the only plant that I have seen this on to this degree. I think this plant was originally white and we had planted a fuschia one behind it. It is so cool what the mixing of the seeds is doing. I definitely want this in our babies, Olivia & Drayton's Memorial Garden! Does anyone else have blooms like this on their Fours? I've been growing them for years and this is the first I have seen this particular mix.

Did you know that Four O'clocks are also called Marvel of Peru & Beauty of the Night and the botanical name for them is Mirabilis Jalapa

A Good Morning Surprise....

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Bruce & I walked out the front door this morning and this is what we saw................................this Butterfly was hatching out of it's Chrysalis. It was hanging on the side of one of our urns on the front sidewalk. What a strange place for it to have wound up. So we got to take a lot of photographs! It was really neat. I think it's a Black Swallowtail.

See you later Babe!

Gallardia Galore!

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

I told Bruce that I wasn't going out into the garden tonight. I was just too tired. I had some things that I needed to get done in the house anyway. But those of you who are addicted to gardening as I, will realize that it didn't take long....and I was out in the garden! I just can't seem to pass up checking out all my plant babies every day to see how they have changed since yesterday, and change they do.

Our Climbing "Souvenier de la Malmaison" rose which I was just deadheading last night had twice the blooms on it that it did yesterday. It looks great! I hated to see though that our spectacular "Seven Sisters" roses are starting to fade. They are so beautiful but the great showing only lasts for a few weeks and it fades away for the most part. Alot of the roses are kind of fading and getting ready for another bloom. It's kinda sad when they're in that in between time.

On the other hand our Gallardia "Desert Sun" just keeps spreading and is so cool. I just love that plant. There are about 5 different looking blooms on it at one time and it is blooming profusely. Gallardia "Desert Sun"

Gallardia "Desert Sun" Gallardia "Desert Sun" blooming next to "LaMarne" RosesThis is Ritidiba blooming among Belinda Roses

Now of course, this just wouldn't be complete if I didn't show you some more Four O'Clocks photographs. I just really want to convey their "personality" if you will. They are just such a cool plant!

I told you that Four O'Clocks are the coolest plants!White Four O'ClocksHere is a flower from each different color of Four O'Clock that is blooming so far. Incredible, huh!

Well, it's time that I get to bed. But I have more for tomorrow. I love this time of year! Happy Gardening!

Love Those Four O'Clocks

Monday, May 19, 2008

(This is the white Four O'clock with pink specks from last year)

As I've said many times, Four O'Clocks were my Daddy's favorite and they are also one of mine. Bruce & I even got married at 4:oo in the afternoon just for that reason. It was kind of a sentimental thing. Those of you that don't know much about them, don't know what your missing out on. They are an old fashioned garden flower. They usually bloom after 4:00 in the afternoon and into the evening, hence the name. They are night bloomers and have a wonderful, sweet fragrance. They bloom all night and close during the day. When a flower is finished blooming it leaves a seed that falls to the ground and reseeds itself or gets carried and dropped in another part of the garden by a bird. I love to collect the seeds and use them in other areas or give them to friends. Butterflies & Hummingbirds also love them. They are easy to grow. They don't require alot of care, in fact they can withstand alot of abuse. They come in many colors now. They use to be found mostly in Fuschia or Yellow but now they are also Pink, White, Peachy, Broken Colors, Kalediscope. As a result of all these different colors, alot of them are what I refer to as 'Mutant colors" because sometimes you don't know what you are going to get from year to year. One year I took my mom some seeds and tubers from some Fuschia Four O'Clocks that were blooming at my father's grave. I brought them up to her in Pennsylvania and she planted them. They came up Fuschia. The next year they were yellow! That's one of the things that I also love about them. They are always full of surprises. In a particular area of our front yard we have a Fuschia one called "Limelight" planted next to a white Four O'Clock bush. The first year all color was at it should be. Last year the very same white ones were white but with a couple of faint pink specks or pink lines. This year they just started blooming 3 days ago and to my pleasant surprise they look like a pink peppermint. I have attached a couple of pictures below so you can see what I mean. Also, alot of our Fuschia ones have developed light pink or peach around the outer edges of the flower. Some of the whites have a pink stamen and then on another white bush they will have yellow stamens. I love the variety and the surprise! We also had one that hasn't bloomed yet this year but the past two years that one same plant had two color flowers on one plant; yellow and fuschia. I can't wait to see what it has in store this year. I know that I am very enthusiastic about my Four O'Clocks, but if your a gardener, then you understand this crazy love of plants. I get so much joy from them! Oh the simple things in life that God has created for us to enjoy! I know I will have alot more to say about my Four O'Clocks throughout their blooming season, so you haven't heard the last of me on this! Haha! Forgive the photography below. It had stormed and was still lightly raining and dusk when we took these pictures. Hope you enjoy them anyway! If you want to know anything about Four O'clocks send me a message. I'll be happy to help! I may even have some extra seeds laying around for you! Happy Gardening~

This is the Four O'Clock that came up as a Pink Peppermint looking flower this year. Bruce is holding it so you can see it better.

This is one of the white ones which were the first to bloom this year.

These are some of the "Limelight" Fuschia ones that have

developed kind of an apricot color around the edges.

This is a yellow bush and there is a white starfish shape in the center of the flower.

There's the "love of my life" posing in the rain, at night in the Four O'clocks. (He's such a good sport!)

Look how big the Four O'clocks have already gotten.

Those are 2 big plants but there are about 6 more there also.

This is another picture of the pink peppermint looking ones with the fuschia ones behind it. Fuschia & Yellow Fours growing by Seven Sisters Roses Fuschia Four O'Clocks

Busy In the Garden

Friday, May 16, 2008

Wow! I can't believe it's been over two weeks since I've posted. As you can tell by my absence, we've been busy in the garden! I have to say that on Mother's Day Bruce took me out to the cemetary where my Dad & Granny are buried. I am always spreading Four O'Clock seeds out there and trying to get them to take hold and come back year after year, bigger and better. Four O'clocks were my Daddy's very favorite flowers. There isn't much rain out there and I don't get out there weekly to water them. But, when we got there, I was happy to see that there were some baby plants coming up. Just a few but that was better than none. We spread a bunch of seeds from our garden last year and watered everything. When we got back home it was early evening and I was elated to see that some of our Fuschia Fours & some Yellow Fours were blooming! That was a nice Mother's Day gift from God. Mother's Day is hard for me because both of our babies are in heaven and my mom is in Pennsylvania. It's a day that makes me feel lonely and just blah. Bruce always tries to make it special for me but the reality of it is what it is. So, having these other Fours blooming when we got home was like God saying he cared and my babies are there with him and wishing me a Happy Mother's Day. I will take some pictures of them tomorrow to post on here. I have some other photos to post. Let's see, which do I want to show you today........let me look through my photo album. By the way, we seem to have the grasshopper problem pretty much under control. We are seeing some here and there but not bad at all. Now the moles or voles......ughhhh, that's another story!

White Four O'Clocks

Seven Sisters Roses

Gallardia "Desert Sun"

Boltonia & RitidibaClimbing Eden Roses growing up our GazeboElly in the GardenAlachua Red Climber RosesThese are some new annuals that we just planted; Coleus