Home Depot bulb weakesses

Dragged the family to Home Depot yesterday, just to see if they had anything perennial on sale - they did, all kinds of grasses for $4 a quart. But they also had their big fancy bulb display out, and I don't know if we were suckers or smart shoppers! We got daffodil Salome and hyacinth Gipsy Queen, both of which are a beautiful salmon color, to go in my coral garden. We got daffodil tete-a-tete to go between the forget-me-nots. We got blue and pink glory-of-the-snow because I love them in blue. We got anemone because even though I'm not sure they're hardy, the package looked so pretty! What impulse bulb purchases are you making?

ruefully, Carrie

I find their prices excessive for the quality. WMis better. They sell comparable items, but you'll notice that the HD item has fewer bulbs for more money. The best deals and much better quality can be found online from moderately sized sources. You can get twice as many bulbs for the money.

Carrie,Sounds like you got some great items! I myself made the mistake of stopping by Earl May yesterday (just to look ) I ended up bringing home another 120 tulip bulbs!!Lord only knows where I am going to put them.I think my hubby wanted to make a suggestion of where I should put them but lucky for him he didn't say it! LOL Nancy

This message was edited Sep 5, 2006 6:45 PM

Handsome Hubby went to HD yesterday to rent a tiller. Wouldn't let me tag along. Sometimes I think I shouldn't have married someone so smart. LOL!

Oh McGlory,That is really funny.Bet mine wishes I would stay home.He says I must be able to smell when he is planning on a trip to HD because I always beat him to the truck!

Ho ho ho ho ho I really started something here, LOL. I guess I know there are better bargains, but these were EXACTLY the color I was hoping for. And now I don't have to think about it until they come up next spring.

xxxx, Carrie

McGlory, you should have told him you needed to start looking for HIS Christmas present. That would have gotten you in the door. LOL

Oh, that's a great idea, Badseed! I'll have to remember that one! We'll see how smart he really is...... LOL!

You're right, Carrie. Best to buy 'em when you see 'em. Our families can't call it instant gratification because we have to be patient until spring. Someone on DG described it as a plant and flower in a time capsule. Very fitting. Myself, I find something instantly gratifying about buying the time capsule. Just don't tell my family. LOL!

Regarding your original question on the original thread, I haven't done any impulses..... yet. I've already ordered about 550 bulbs intentionally!

I succumbed to the Home Depot deals, too! Just couldn't resist 'browsing' while my DH was getting some electrical fix-it stuff (dull aisle) and then those bulbs just appeared in the basket! I bought Hyacinth "Woodstock" to pair with my daffodils (under my reddish purple leaved tree) next spring (I'm still trying to do 'color echoes'!)

Now after reading this thread, I think my kids have to go to Walmart to get some more school supplies (dull) and let's see...what aisle are the bulbs in?!....

But I do my most fun "browsing" at the big box stores when they go on late season sales. I try to hold off 'til then...

And I do my best 'impulse shopping' at the Thanksgiving time end of season sales at B & B and Van Engelen and other on line catalogs...

Ah, yes...the mystery and allure of spring bulbs! Who can't love 'em?!!

Daffodils from my end of season sales...

Girls... I must say reading this thread has been refreshing indeed!!!

What is it with DHs and plants???? I thought I was the only one who got a side look everytime I mention my "plant needs"... and now I see that this is o worldwide thing!!!!!

I'm relieved, on one hand. On the other, I'm beginning to wonder about this, how should I call it... plant envy?? LOLOL

Do our ever so D. H's feel a threat in the air as a new scent comes from the garden/deck/balcony/whatever???

What is this phenomenon???

Thoughts, anyone?

;-)

I guess I better stay away from HD, too. I have no control when it comes to buying plants of any kind! I wonder if there is a support group for plantaholics?? I've never tried HD's bulbs, but have had good luck with Walmart's. I bought a bunch of tulip and daffodil bulbs from Menards one year and not a one of them grew. So, I don't know if it was the bulbs or me, but they were pretty pricey, so I've never bought from them again.

Well, Farmer, admitting you have a problem is the first step. We had a 12-step program for Davaholics last year...

http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/551062/#new

xxxxx, Carrie

That was a terrific thread, Carrie!

I've just been to the chat room and I confirmed my suspicions - all DH's are quite the same!!!!!!!! It's soooo weird!!!!!!!!!! LOL

My DH seems to love my new gardening addiction - because it allows him to spend more time in his shop restoring cars! And he can never complain about how much money I spend, because I could have no grass left and still not even have touched what his hobby costs!

But I do have to say, he would much rather let me visit nurseries and shop for plants with my good friend McGlory than have to accompany me himself!!!

My DH loves it when I "talk garden" with hydrangea80. It spares him from having to listen. His eyes sort of glaze over.....

Hydrangea80 - I could tell them all the pergola story......

Wait, you two live near eanough to meet, and talk, and stuff? And what pergola story?????
xx, C.

Yes, we are so lucky to live right across the street from eachother! We have a ball "touring" eachother's gardens weekly and chatting on DG.

Yes, yes - tell them the Pergola story - a very "glazed-over" funny DH story!!

But you live near Lincoln and she lives in Southeast NE! Furthermore, you're not quite in the same zone. It's no fair, my neighbors are mean and nasty.

xxxxx, Carrie

I wanna hear the pergola story, NOW!

I like all of my neighbors!!! (Knock on wood) It's a nice part of living in a small town.

Lincoln IS in southeast Nebraska - and I guess we just didn't consult the same map for our hardiness zones! She is probably right, though, since she is the plant whiz of the two of us! :)

Well I don't have a DH so I buy what I like! :)

So far (and it's only just into bulb season) I've bought narcissi Misty Glen and Obdam and Muscari Yellow Fragrance and Iris Katherine Hodgkins.

Once upon a time there was a lady in southeast Nebraska, near Lincoln, who wanted a pergola over her patio.....

You see, all the old shade trees were lost to wind, the patio faced west, and there was nothing for shade.

So Garden Lady researched pergolas online and found two nice patterns that would work well over the patio. She approached Handsome Man. "Handsome Man," she said, "wouldn't it be nice to have some shade over the patio?"

"Yes, Sweetheart," Handsome Man replied, "but it will take years."

"I have an idea." She produced printed pictures of lovely pergolas replete with clematis and sweet peas and vines of all colors. "Wouldn't a pergola be nice?"

"A what?" he inquired.

"Pergola." Dutifully, Garden Lady spelled the word.

Handsome Man perused the pictures fresh from the internet. "How does it attach to the house? What will it do to the roof? This is a brand new house; I don't like the idea of attaching something to the new siding."

"That's the beauty of it!" Garden Lady exclaimed. "We set four posts like this diagram shows, and then we put slats on the top. The more shade we want, the closer together the slats go."

Together over the next several months the happy couple plotted and dreamed, even deciding to put latticework halfway up the south side of the new pergola. The grill would set on its own cement slab a few feet off the patio. Brother-in-law Steve might even help if they bought all the materials. Handsome Man suggested that if they purchased the beer, Brother-in-Law Steve might even do it all.

Over the summer, they collected plans, pricing materials at the local Home Depot and online. Sometime in July they set the date for Pergola-building on Labor Day weekend. Life would be grand! And shady.

As Labor Day neared, Garden Lady kindly suggested that perhaps they should be purchasing materials. She was, after all, excited at the propsect of having a place to grow clematis. Would she get blue? Or pink? Or perhaps purple and white to intertwine! The possibilities boggled her mind.

"Purchase materials for what, Sweetheart?" Handsome Man inquired.

Nervously, Garden Lady plunged forward. "The new pergola."

"Pergola? What's a pergola?"

Garden Lady couldn't believe her ears. "It's what we've been talking about since last spring! You remember! To provide shade!"

Handsome Man recovered nicely. "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah! I'm just not familiar with that word." He paused. "You know, Sweetheart, I'm not real sure about this pergola thing. How does it attach to the house? What will it do to the roof? This is a brand new house; I don't like the idea of attaching something to the new siding."

And that is how Handsome Man came to have the black eye.

.....actually the black eye was an exaggeration. I have talked to my brother-in-law however. ;-)

ROTFLMAOAPIMP! Ho ho ho ho ho. Hee hee hee hee.

xxxxx, Carrie

TOO FUNNY, BUT SO TRUE!!

I just had a similar conversation about an "ARBOR"!

Why don't they UNDERSTAND how important this stuff is?!

But ya gotta luv 'em!

Love him to pieces. I shouldn't be too hard on him. He's very loving and generous and supporting of my little garden hobby. But he does have a tendency to get that dull glaze in his eyes......

That's why he's grateful for hydrangea80!!

Oh God!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ROFL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WHY are men all like this????
Mine has a way of driving me crazy - hunny, I'm going over to the nursery this afternoon, wanna come along? "Do I have to?" " No, I can go with my mother" "Oh, OK, then"
....... "Hunny, I'm going to the nursery with my mom, she's at the door.." "Where are you going?" " The nursery" " Now???" "Yes, I told you this morning" "Do you really have to????" ".......sigh"

Short term memory loss.....

Your pergola story is soooo funny...!

Gotta love them, that's so true. God knows what goes on in their minds, but they care.... ;-) ..... my DH even goes out of his way to tell me that I'm really good with plants! Poor man...

LOLOLOL

Thank, you, thank, you, thank you for the Pergola story! I almost popped my stitches!

I'm on post-op gardening restriction for SIX WEEKS minimum and am not allowed to lift or bend, I had a bunch of iris arrive the day I was in surgery. We had very similar versions of that conversation until I was finally able to get him to put dirt in 4 five gallon pots, then fill the pots all the way, put them ON the potting bench so I could at least pot them up until I can plant them! Of course the pots are still on the bench and he's out of town.....

My DH busted me earlier this week. I had emailed a woman on eBay with questions on bulbs she had for sale. Her reply must have come after my bed time. I woke up in the middle of the night and went to the computer. Up on the screen was an unsent email to the woman, thank goodness I read it before I hit send. The message was:

"This is for my wife's eyes only. You are a crazy but loveable nut."

Gotta love him!

plantnut

That's so sweet, plantnut!!!!!! That's right, you gotta love him!

That was great storytelling, McGlory!!!! Want to go to a nursery this weekend?! ;0)

My DH is colorblind, has a black thumb, and loves all the pretty flowers. So he points at things in pictures, at the Botanical Gardens, in movies, on HGTV, and says -- hey, honey, you could grow that!

This year he picked out 100 beautiful bulbs at WMt, because he was sure I wanted them. And I did!

Mine, all mine....

Do you get help with planting all of these hundreds of bulbs? Last weekend I planted 7 irises, 2 peonies, and 2 lily-of-the-valleys, and that tuckered me out.

Of course, several hours of weeding might have contributed.

I don't make impulse purchases. I scan the websites and the catalogs and color coordinate flower beds in my mind before I go out and spend too much money.

And the new Schreiner's catalog is sitting right here beside me....

I've long wanted to start a thread on the crazy adorable things our husbands do because we seem to want so many flowers! Mine couldn't seem to resist those bags of mixed tulips from HD. I got hives at the idea of little "mixed bouquets" all over the yard. At least I got him to plant them in groups instead of in rows! I needn't have worried - each color came up together, I mean all the purple ones bloomed together, all the yellow ones bloomed a week or two later, then the red ones, and they bloomed in clumps!

We got a box of ~ 25 crocosmia bulbs from a DGer last year. DH said Yeesh, who's planting all those? I'd been expecting maybe 5 or 6. Then I promise the extras to another DGer, I go to pack them, I can't find them anywhere. Honey, what happened to the box of crocosmia bulbs? The what? Remember that box that was just overflowing with bulbs? Oh, yeah, those - I planted them. What, all of them? All of them that were in the box, are there more you want planted? (I didn't want those planted.) No, no, sweetie, WHERE did you plant them??? Around, somewhere, I don't remember specifically, what is this, the Spanish Inquisition? (We had to wait until about a month ago to find where they were planted. Those grassy, weedy things that, as the spring/summer progressed, looked less and less like grass, and more and more like something, turned out to be the crocosmia. About ten of them. In the middle of the Blue Garden! There may still be more, somewhere, getting ready for next year. Or maybe we did weed off the tops and they'll be up next year, who knows where?)

But we adore each other, so here we are. He thinks I'm an Expert on gardening (LOL) and I can make anything grow anywhere (LOL even harder). I think he's sweet and compliments make me blush. We found each other in middle age after a false start that took him 21 years to get out of; I was miserable in 2 marriages to 2 diffferent creeps. BUT WE FOUND EACH OTHER, and even if he plants crocosmia in alernating ranks of red and yellow in the middle of the Blue Garden, he's mine.

xxxxx, Carrie

I have a whole team of people (a.k.a. Landscaping Committee) that will help out with the 200 bulbs if I need it . They are great at showing up for things like planting bulbsespecially if the bulbs in question are going in near their condo /townhome. Not so great at showing up for digging up moldy meatball junipers. I take the help where I can get it, and get philosophical when I can't.

DH does a beautiful job of doing laundry, groceries, and running misc. errands. I would rather be in the garden, frankly!

Carrie, you have a pearl of a husband, believe me! And frankly, so do I... :-) I just love the way he tells everyone who has doubts or problems with their plants that I'm the one to ask for help, because if anyone knows what to do, that'll be me!!! (LOL here too ;-) )

And I love the way he looks at me sideways when I mention any new plant coming up.... with a glitter in his eye, pretending to be critical... I love the way he smiles when he sees how happy I am over some little achievement in my garden... and the worried look on his face about some plant that's not doing so well, when he asks "will she live?..."

I myself came across a creep or two in my life, who I'm sure where there for me to apreciate my valiant knight all the more, when we met....

Wouldn't have him any different!!! ;-)

... but sometimes I could swear that I saw him eyeing the jasmin with jealous suspicion.... (LOL)

MyH,

Yes, yes, two gems are ours. The funny part is one year, his daughter (my SD) got him all garden-themed things for his birthday because he seemed to spend so much time in the garden (for me). And I think I've finally forgiven him for mowing down my lilac! (It was very, very small, and once he moved the big sign next to it so he could mow near it, I guess mowing it down was kind of inevitable.) But I wouldn't trade him for a million lilac bushes. :>} Does that look like a knowing smile?

xxxxxx, Carrie

Carrie, it does indeed... ;-)

Love

Hiraeth

For all of the eye rolling and "I worry about you" that I get, my LH is tickled that I get so excited about plants. He loves to see me happy. As a bonus it gives him more leeway with his obsessions, which right now are shooting clay targets and fishing.

2nd marriage for both of us, thank goodness we stumbled over each other! We enjoy each others company & spend a lot of time laughing at each other and at ourselves.

And after knowing me for 12 years he is starting to get an eye for plants. He has even driven me to a yard where he saw something that he though I might like! Of course, I could do without him calling "Citizen's Arrest" out the car window when I'm rescuing something in a ditch.....

:)

ROTFLOLAPIMP, plantnut! Thanks for sharing that scene!!!

xxxx, (LOL) Carrie

WOW, now I know I am not the only one that yells: STOP, I THINK I SEE SOMETHING THT NEEDS TO BE SAVED!! At that very moment DH seems to just step on the gas pedal :( I have become rather good at remembering" land marks" for places that I quickly return to after DH has gotten out of the car :) I always get the " Geesh, why don't you try selling all the flowers you have instead of wanting MORE! HA, I return the thought with ALL HIS TOOLS! He could give every man, woman, and child a tool from his shed and still have tons left over!!!! AND THEY DON'T GROW AND MULTIPLY, LOL

My LH ' s reasoning is that he makes money on everything he collects, that plants are different. Of course with his shotguns come $$ for shells, $$ for going to the clay shooting range, $$$ for gas. His fishing tackle collection creates lots of hidden $. I haven't figured out my rationalization for the duck decoys, though

Bottom line with the LH is the old saying, "If mama ain't happy......"

:)