The Living is Easy?

It's been a busy couple of days. Last night my daughter Vanessa, her boyfriend Chris, and our son Casey came over for dinner. Kim and I decided to eat "en plein air." (Can you tell my French lessons continue?)

So we dragged the dining room table outside in the shade. Since the dinner was for Vanessa's birthday I made bruschetta (her favorite appetizer), Calabrese pork and fennel ragu with pasta, fruit salad, and chocolate cheesecake for dessert.





This morning after breakfast at Goldys we decided to ride our bikes to the Idaho Botanical Garden. The garden is about 4 miles from our house so it was a decent bike trip for us.

There is always something new to see at the Garden. This is the first time we've seen Amber Conger's metal sculptures. We were very impressed.






























There is some sculpture in the Garden I'm not fond of but I loved Amber's artwork.


Also at the Botanical Garden, wouldn't you have fun with this hollowed log? It's big but I'd find room somewhere for this.

























Cool plants...































































And what great use of a fountain - fill it with succulents.






















And what do you think? Would you put purple pillars in your garden?


I think I would.


















Back to our garden......

We have Monarda 'Pink Lace' blooming.







Florida Sieboldii is also looking great.
















Another clematis, Comtesse de Bouchard, is blooming in the Moongarden,





























along with our Heritage rose.











The Nicolas daylilies are blooming with lychnis coronaria. This photo shows just one Rose Campion, but you know, if you have one of these plants, you have ONE TON of these plants.





Kim harvested the first carrots from the cold frame, and they taste good! We're excited since this is the first time we've actually tried growing veggies in there. We've also harvested lots of lettuce and chard from the cold frame.



Also, our new kitten, Jessie, has been busy meeting the "girls." Here he is, nose to nose (nose to beak?) with Tootsie. (Jessie is hard to see, but he's in the lower right corner, just peaking out.)

So far, so good.



And finally, Tootsie looks like she's posing for the cover of Horticulture magazine.
(Don't think she'll make it, but she's giving it a good try.)





Summer has been great for us so far. How has yours been?

Back Garden Tour

Well, I've shown lots of pictures of our front garden. Time to see what's happening in the back garden while spring is still in full gear.

Two years ago I planted these Blushing Lady tulips from Brent and Becky's Bulbs inside the metal gazebo which is just off our back porch. But, I messed up and only planted them on one side. (Don't ask, I don't know.) Anyway, last fall Kim planted more of them on both sides and they're looking great now.






Here's a close up.





The Akebia quintata vine is blooming now and growing like nuts as usual.



The sun was setting the other evening and I shot this backward dogwood bloom.



You can see the dogwood tree from this angle, right in the center beyond the metal gazebo. It is small and seems quite happy living under the canopy of our locust tree.
The redbud tree is blooming on the left. Normally the purple bench stays in the arbor by the redbud tree but now it's sitting on the deck in front of the pond.
The Aurinia saxatilis, or Basket of Gold, is blooming at the bottom.



Here is the left side of the garden. The grass looks great because we've had so much rain lately. On the left you can see vines growing up the Moongarden. (I'll show it some other time.)





See all the yellow surrounding the sumac tree at the lower right? It looks like more basket of gold. It's not. It's that annoying Euphorbia, 'Fens Ruby'.




And Kim's latest project. He replaced the willow arch, on the left, with the new one he built, on the right.

We'd had the willow arch for years. It was fine. Free, natural looking, and it held my morning glory vines fine. But it was getting old and tattered looking so we decided to replace it this year. I think Kim did a great job. (Even if he is a Tomato Traitor).



That's most of the back garden. There's also our pond in the center of the yard, the Moongarden, the Asian shade garden, the Tuscany back porch, and the small veggie garden.

Lovin' all this rain we've been having.

Next Kim will start our chicken coop, as our chicks have been ordered and will be here in less than a month. Can't wait!

Dog Days

Casey is home from fire fighting. For a few days at least. Nice to see him. Alive and well.

Vanessa just finished her LAST college class! She is now the proud recipient of a bachelor's degree in accounting. We'll be taking her out to celebrate at Emilio's this week.

And a garden update:

Sadly, we're not guaranteed tomatoes this year. Perhaps with another month of warm weather. We should have been running out of room to put them by now.
But not when they look like this:




Even having this guy watching over the garden has not helped.






The usual August standbys are blooming in the garden;





Patsi at Garden Endeavors also enjoys morning glories, along with hummingbirds, vines and hawks in her garden.

The thunbergia vines have been blooming at last and I'm pleased with them;




Our neighbor's hibiscus. Gorgeous isn't it?



Still loving the datura;



A volunteer hollyhock in the front garden;



The back garden is looking normal for August - overgrown and tired. (Kind of like me?)



Truthfully I'm looking forward to fall, winter, and the promise of another spring.

But Chelsea's still enjoying the August sun.





And a final note on the Olympics............

A new olympic sport according to Cute With Chris.....

Synchronized Sleeping!

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - or my gardening successes and failures

Summer is about half over already. September is usually a great month, weather wise in our area, so I usually count it as part of the summer season.

My seedlings didn't perform as anticipated this year. Here are some of the successes:

One geranium managed to do it's thing. It's bright, pretty and colorful. I like it.
















The blue salvias look great in their pot;



















The nicotiana and the datura are adding their individual bits;






I like the Teddy Bear sunflowers (left) and I'm glad I saved my dahlia tubers from last year (right);


































So the pots in the front of the house - one group on either side of the driveway;




They're looking OK. There's plenty of green foliage, but not much color. My petunias from seed are still considering blooming, the bidens were a disappointment and the daylilies and lily bulbs I keep in pots have finished blooming. I have two pots of purple millet grass which are doing well. It's an inexpensive alternative to purple fountain grass. (At least I think so.) If you click on the upper picture (with the porch) you can see it just to the left of the elephant ears.

I'm still hoping the thunbergia will bloom. They're growing well enough.



My hanging baskets are just serviceable. Nothing exciting. I planted them with nasturtiums, some pink baby's breath and a moonvine. I'm hoping to eventually receive some satisfaction from the moonvines, but that won't happen until September at least.


I've only had a couple of blooms from the nasturtiums. I never have any luck with those. I guess the best I can say is, they're green and growing.






















In the back garden the lobelias have been chewed to bits by somebody;


The phacelia are looking tatty and I'm still waiting on the dahlias from seed to bloom (they have buds). The zinnias are blooming though along with morning glories and some snapdragons.
All in all, the garden is looking well enough. Just some major disappointment with my annuals from seed. After all the tender care I gave them I expect a better return. Oh well.

I'll leave you with a couple pics of the front garden. Keep in mind, we only water this once a month during the summer. You can only see our garage from this view, the front of the house is on the right and out of sight. (click to enlarge)







We transplanted four butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa) from the back garden to the front and they're doing very well.