What's in Bloom July 14, 2021

 Hello anyone who is reading this. The weather has been lovely with lots of rain and heat, perfect growing conditions (grows great mosquitos as well). I went around the property this morning, cell phone in hand. If you are someone who has read my blog for a while, you've likely seen these same plants last year at this time, but since I'm not super busy with my silly broken toe, I don't have much else to report on. So... here's what's in bloom:

Pots on the porch. The canna lilies have just bloomed!

Looking down on a bed that contains hostas and a pretty pink hydrangea, as well as the top of Aristotle's head.

Luscious dark daylilies!

This is Incrediball hydrangea, pretty much taking over the world.

This was one of the only still-standing delphiniums. Later this evening, I lassoed a bunch of delphiniums that got knocked over (but the stems weren't cracked) and tied them to a porch spindle and to the rail fence. The rain has been wonderful, but it's no friend to tall flowers like this.

Daylilies, daylilies, daylilies. So dependable, such a nice pop of colour.

Hollyhocks are here and there on the property. I seem to have a lot of pale yellow / peach, however I seem to have not taken any pictures of those! 

Potentilla (also known as cinquefoils) makes a lovely shrub right now.

I cut these spirea shrubs back quite a lot this spring. They are called Shirobana and they combine white and pink on their blossoms.

Limelight hydrangea is in its beautiful bright white stage.

I seem to have less and less purple coneflower (echinacea) in my flower beds, not sure why.

My crocosmia is just starting to bloom. The hummingbirds love it.

This is a medium height cranesbill (have no idea the specific kind) which blooms later than the lower growing kind. It gets a bit straggly, but it's a good filler.

My poor old Hansa rose is looking a bit dumpy, but it's still producing blooms.

I'm pretty sure this is spirea Anthony Waterer. It got a good cutting back this spring as well and is blooming very well now.

Finally, sometimes it's not about the blooms, but about the foliage instead. This is my block of lettuce in the vegetable garden. I planted alternating little mini rows of different kinds (colours) of leaf lettuce and it makes me smile to see it, plus it's so pretty in a salad. (Excuse my giant shadow in the picture!)

I'm enjoying reading my Elly Griffiths books (see my "pages" at the top for my reading list). The kitten is growing and is 80% adorable and 20% arse, but that's the way with kittens. I'm waging a constant war with cucumber beetles (also attacking my zucchini). Summer is at its height of loveliness, all hot and buzzy. 

Breath Deeply and Enjoy

 I believe it is nearly impossible to have an unattractive garden in June. One of my favourite perennials is the peony. Imagine the exquisite scent and the silky petals.

This peony, a gift from my daughter after a tragedy at my school three years ago, is now starting to come into its own. It's so delicate.

Similar light pink peonies that I've had forever. I believe they may have come from my mother's garden.

This peony starts with light pink buds, but then opens up as creamy white blossoms.

I may have also started these with plants from my mother's garden. 

I don't have many roses at all, but this is my first, a Hansa. It also has a beautiful scent.

This variegated weigela is not much for scent, but it's so very pretty. It has responded well to a severe cutting back last fall.

I must have this low pink cranesbill in every bed on my property. It makes great ground cover under our big old spruce tree.

A deep fuschia weigela is also blooming now. I am not sure if this is Red Prince or not. Again, not heavily scented, but gorgeous.

Some people manage to have swaths of Oriental poppies and I can barely keep a small bunch alive. These were blowing in the breeze as I was trying to take a picture.

I am a very bad clematis owner, planting them in places where they must compete with grasses and wild grapevine, but thankfully this one prevailed. I love seeing great masses of these blossoms on proper trellises. 

My lilac tree is fading fast, but there are just enough blossoms left to keep enticing the bumblebees. I apologize for the very blurry image. They really don't stop moving.

It was very hot today. I don't mind at all. I am supply teaching (online) tomorrow, so I wanted to get lots of tasks done today when I could. The chicken coop is as cleaned out as it's going to be and I've vacuumed and dusted parts of the house that have been neglected for a while. It was lovely going around and taking pictures of these flowers after supper, even though it was still 29 degrees at the time. 

What is your favourite scent of flowers? I would have to declare a tie between peonies and lilacs.

Raindrop Walk About - June 3rd, 2021

 We had a lovely rain last night, and things were still very wet when I walked around with my phone late this morning. (Does anyone use a proper camera anymore?)

Our "lilac tree" (don't actually know the name of this, but we've had it for years and years) is coming into bloom and it smells heavenly. The bumble bees and butterflies enjoy it, and I've already seen a hummingbird moth hovering around it, too.

This purple bearded iris can be found here and there on the property in various beds. I've had it forever, dug it out, thrown it away, transplanted it, sold it at yard sales... it just keeps being dependable.

One of my favourite flowers is the Siberian iris. It was part of my wedding  bouquet many years ago. I appreciate perennials that behave themselves and on which you can depend, year after year. This is one of them.

I'm not a big hosta gardener. I honestly only know the name of one of them, this being 'Barbara Ann'. Any other hostas I grow were part of a fundraiser "mixed bag" that I purchased years ago and have divided and placed here and there, and don't know the names of any of them. But this hosta, with its pretty raindrops, is gorgeous and HUGE. I really should divide it more and use it in other locations.

This soft yellow bearded iris used to be a lot more prolific in my gardens, but I tired of it and tore a lot of it out (again, selling it in plastic grocery bags at yard sales for $2.00 a bag), so now I don't have much left. I always thought it was a rather insipid colour, but other yellow irises are too "bright", almost a dark, Laurentian pencil crayon yellow that doesn't work with anything else. 

Here are two of my big cast iron urns, sitting on the rarely used "front porch". They don't get a lot of constant sun, so I often plant them out with some coleus, which is the lime green, taller plant you see. These are just freshly planted, so not much to look at, but they will fill in and the trailing vinca will increase and soften the look at bit.

Here is my vegetable garden, laid out with string and rebar stakes. The two little plastic footstools and the kneeling pad indicate where the paths are. Until the vegetables germinate and fill in, I'll leave the string (as my own personal tripping hazard!). I waited until just recently to put my more tender plants in because of our nasty late May cold spell. 

Rhubarb, anyone? I don't understand people who say they can't get rhubarb to grow well. We've already had three desserts made with rhubarb and I have SO many bags of frozen rhubarb in the freezer. Since we don't really visit anyone, or have people over (provincial lockdown is over as of yesterday, but everything is still closed until Ford thinks we've hit another moving target), I'm stuck with this rhubarb and refuse to feel guilty about not cutting up and freezing more of it. (Lord, that was an awkward run-on sentence!)

I got a shovel full of this plant, centaurea Montana I think, probably twenty years ago from my mother. Since then I've divided it, given it away, and ripped it out (see a theme here?). The thing I love about it, though, is how it is almost iridescent in the light of the fading sun in the evenings. 

I was lucky enough to time this just right. to capture a busy honey bee.

As I was literally walking about, through the wet grass, I thought I should take a picture of the girls for those of you who enjoy them. Four eggs so far this morning.

I wish I could remember where I first got this bearded iris. I used to have a lot of it, and now, just a bit. I absolutely love this deep wine colour. This is a big, beefy iris that is gorgeous until it tips over under its own weight.

I have two of these in the pool shrub border. They are Miss Kim dwarf shrub lilacs and they have just opened up. They are gorgeous, but not particularly "dwarf"! They require no special care, which is perfect for my style of gardening.

The dappled willow recovered nicely from its severe cutting back and is now providing Gerald with a lovely backdrop. Beside it, the Red Prince weigela is just about ready to bloom. 

June is such a perfect month for colour. My peonies are not blooming yet, they are always a bit later in the month. I have one more bag of potting soil to purchase so I can finish my container planting. Thank you for coming with me on my walkabout.

Look at My Bloomers!!

Did that get your attention? But seriously folks, isn't June the best month for flowers? With the glorious heat we had on Saturday combined with the rain on Sunday, my gardens have filled in and started to burst, so with no further ado, come look at my "bloomers".

Let's start with the closest thing to heaven on earth: white peonies. I literally sink my nose in them and breath deeply. I also love how the petals are baby-skin soft.

My oriental poppies are almost all done, some of their petals hanging on by sheer determination. I love the shocking pop of colour they provide, but when they start to fade, they have all the charm of a mangy dying thistle so I usually cut them as far back as possible.

In addition to purple irises which I have already shown in an earlier post, I also have some pale yellow irises. I enjoy their large size and the combination of purple and yellow is lovely.

I am not very good at growing clematis so it always warms my heart when this Nelly Moser blooms in  a relatively neglected corner. The booms are quite large and a lovely blend of pale and medium pink.

I saw great healthy clumps of this plant at a magnificent garden  called Lark whistle on the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario. Its more common name is spiderwort. It has lovely round petals of various shades of purple, and leaves that are quite like a day lily's.

Purple Salvia is a nice upright plant. It can also be a bit of pest if it is allowed to self seed.

I love this shrub. It is a wigelia (sorry, can't remember which kind specifically, bristol tuby? Little prince?)) When we  travelled through Prince Edward Island several years ago, I took note of how so many gardens or borders contained these beautiful flowering shrubs. I've  since planted a number of them around the property.

This Statue of Aristotle moves around from garden to garden. This year he is in an East - facing bed. The white plant beside him is a miracle in itself. It is a gas plant which seriously  did not bloom for the first  five years I even dug it up and moved it to a different location. Finally it started to bloom. It is not spectacular, but I still get excited when it does bloom. Beside it, you can see a very nice cranes bill called John son's blue which I have chopped pieces out of to plant in other locations. It does start to look stragglers when the blooms fade, so it gets  a severe haircut later in the summer.  (Husband's "project car" can be seen in the background... it is supposed to be tucked out of sight... grrr)

Oh how I love this flower, so slender and elegant. Siberian irises are definitely one of my favourite flowers. I love them so much that they were in my wedding bouquet.

I've always admired lupins, but a trip to P.E.I., where these gorgeous flowers grow wild in great multi-coloured waves made me adore them even more. Unfortunately, I am not terribly successful at growing them. They last only a year or two and don't self seed well. Other people seem to grow them with very little effort.

Our old century - plus house is not formal in design or detail. The setting of our home is rural and even somewhat wild to the west of us. Rail fences suit my gardens well providing structure and definition. The fence holds taller plants up and looks rustic and pretty when plants spill over its rails.

I was raised by an annual loving mother who bought and planted flat after flat of petunias, merigolds, begonias, and alysum. She kept geraniums inside over the winter, conjuring them back to life the following spring. Although I love the consistent colour  provided by annuals, it is perennials that provide me with the most joy. I have divided and transplanted hundreds of perennials. I have schlepped grocery bags of iris roots and hunk of cranes bill to work to share with colleagues. I have even ruthlessly cut out the bullies of the plant world and encouraged the timid and gentle to establish themselves and flourish. Perhaps the best aspect of perennials is the anticipation and then the celebration of old friends coming back for a visit because they, like you, have survived another long cold Canadian winter.