Yes...that's me...aka Rj
My Cottage Garden as Pictured Today :)
Glad to meet cha' rj.
LouC
Likewise!
I've got to see where Desoto is!? oh wait...now you said you would be driving from Dallas...is it by there?
14 miles from Downtown Dallas.....14 miles from Downtown Waxahachie....west of 35E
Cool . I use to go to Dallas for Market....I tell ya..Texas highways mess me up something fierce...not so much anymore, but when I first moved here...these signs and arrows come rushing up on ya...turn here, next exit, last exit....thank goodness for the feeder highways...that is the neatest thing since sliced bread. In Seattle, you drive to Mount Ranier before you find a way to turn around..(okay..slight exagerations that I"m prone to)
Deborah your so kind :) I keep trying! Deborah.. I think I might be about to have an extra brug or two if your interested :)
Lou, lets just say it's the best one for me to tend to! :)
Rj, yes I understand clearing things out and cleaning things up.. I was just cleaning out my front bed of zinnias and after i got in there I started thinking about how certain things I have in pots would look great there..... so I ended up ripping out the whole area.. got the pitchfork and and pulling eveything up...just had lunch, will recover and go back once the sun starts to go down divide and plant it in again :) It's bad when I start Mondays needing a nap.. but that's the way it happens when I garden hard all weekend. My kids help when they want to.. I asks if they want to do things with me but I don't force them to work with me cause I don't want them to dread it. The one thing I told my husband I absolutely would not do ever was cut the grass due to bad memories of having to do it. I have cut grass since.. but it took a long time to warm up to it! They were just cutting the seed heads off the zinnias cause using scissors is "cool".. but when they tire of it they walk away and ride their bikes.. just like kids should.... But sometimes they do HAVE TO do stuff.. just not in my garden :) Lots of times when I'm digging, they stand around waiting for worms to play with.. when they miss them, I don't say anything.. I like my worms in my garden! :)
:)
Susan
LOL...
I know what you mean, my mom made is weed the flower beds, and my Grandmothers rockery on a hill side.. HATED IT! So I completely understand.. Later on, Mom wouldn't let anyone mow the lawn, and this place they had in Bellingham Wa. was acres...She would be zoomin around on the riding lawn mower...it looked like a park with huge flowers...all gone now.
I did the same thing with my Zinnias..was going to pull some dead ones out...and ended up just yanking them all out...They definately have their time, and then it's time for them to go.
louc....i drove past you today and didn't know it....i am on vacation and drove from lubbock to athens today:)
Well, sweetness. Just when are you doing a turn-around. DH has an uncle in Athens.
OH, I know where you're going. Either Canton or Round Top.
YES>....i am on my WAY!!!! we shall be leaving athens at 6 am tommorrow to shop till we drop!!!! i am going to start my own thread of my little adventure so stay tuned!!!!!
Ok this was first Monday at Canton and it closed today so that means Round Top. Been a couple of times.....like walking into a magazine. All the things you see pictures of but never really see them. Marburger Farms is part of it....takes several days......places for 20 miles around are involved. We have been in the Spring in April. A magical place. You will love it.
Rj, it's so sweet to have those memories. I want my kids to have the same. I know about the sadness of a garden being "all gone".. There were several old timey lovely gardens locally and they were wiped off and replaced with huge homes. I called one lady to see if I could dig and she said she no she bought the home for the garden, then she let it rot for years and then she tore it down and is rebuilding a megahome.. Her right I know, but sad still. I use to take a special way when i could jsut to see this amazing camellia every Jan. New owners came in a jsut took a chain saw to it for no reason! There didn't make any upgrades to the landscape. :( Oh well, all I can do is hope mine get so big and beautiful and grow my own garden.. But I have no illusions of the garden living past the point I stop working in it!
oh so there is an Athens in Texas.. I thought if your in Athens GA, come on over :)
Susan
When will Walter Reeves be over to do his television program from your yard.
Susan that is really a show place. You have really got a talent.
Well I sure am glad you believed in me when I was a greenhorn...
I have plants ALL OVER this garden that came from you!!! :) And I SOOO appreciate it too
:)
Susan
Well that makes me feel really good. To think that I had a small smidgen of something that looks as good as your gardens makes my day. You were on your way before I stepped in. Just glad you took the bull by the horns, and the bull crap by the truck loads, and wouldn't stop until you have it your way.
This message was edited Oct 2, 2007 12:29 PM
I've been wondering the same thing... or when they will film "a Gardener's Diary" at your house. Maybe I should give hgtv a call :)
I was in Athens a few weekends ago at a football game. We were walking around and ended up near theHort./ Ag dept. I wanted to take a peek in that greenhouse soooooo bad!!
Susan
Jim.. did it really look like I was on my way.. I was driving blind!! :) Have a little bit more sense in the garden now, but still lots to learn :)
Susan .... I've never made it over there.. wanted to. They have a sale each year too.. Unfortunately, It's my understanding that gardening isn't generally as popular as it once was and it is declining as an activity people enjoy and do.. and HGTV reflects that change and that show is not longer on :(
Susan
It's sad, I know... I have a couple episodes recorded on the dvr.
So sad indeed!.. HGTV was the reason I subscribed to cable as well as DISNEY for the pumpkins...both are dismal disappointments, so we have unsubscribed. Gives me more time to check out favorite gardening books and magazines at the library with the bonus of the pumpkins spending more time reading..
Susan~ is your redbud in full sun or afternoon shade?
susan (love your moniker too)~ I love your garden! It is truly a labor of love, mine went to heck this summer with little to no rain, and I couldn't get out there to water. I like how you combine your plants with abandon, it looks so free and natural. I also love your "can do" spirit! Rock on mighty gardener girl! :-)))
Susan,
all that with a four-year-old too! Congratulations, good job! i like your attitude towards your kids, too. When mine were MUCH younger, we used to play hospital - me at the table with the scissors and dirt, the two nurses bringing in the patients, one by one, I would cry out "Nurse Emma, we need WATER!" they seemed to like it at the time... today I asked my younger daughter (Nurse Nancy) to help me get some stuff ready for OUR round-up, and she said "Mom, you're gonna have me all 'gardened-out' so by the time I'm a grown-up, I won't want to have a garden!" She's thirteen - about the age i started planting dried split peas in my grandmother's back yard!
xxx, Carrie
LOL, one of my Darling Son's (as a teenager) asked me "Why does the BACK yard have to be beautiful?" I told him he could ask HIS wife that question in 10 years!
My oldest two live together in a house they bought and they do NOTHING with the yard or landscaping. I mean they don't even water and mow. It kills me to see it. Maybe someday some lovely ladies will inspire some pride in their home! Stranger things have happened!
Garden6, it is in full afternnoon sun morning shade It on the west side of the yard.... Yes, I barely seem to watch HGTV as much anymore for the decreasing gardening shows.
Thanks PrarieGirl!!
Hey Carrie, thanks.. i hope my kids grow up enjoying it. :)
Psych... I now fully understand the reasons for making the back yard a secret paradise.. Now that I've seen some of the pitfalls of having so much exposed in the front.. I could write an article about it! I can't tell you how glad I've been to have my well for watering.. The well is now connected to the front irrigation system and we now have a permanent plaque we ordered and put on front of the mail box. I want you to know that there is help for your son and his wife. When I first moved in.. we didn't have anything to water and we mowed the patches of weeds we had.. and I've made some changes :)
Susan
Well, soul, at least you had a mower and you mowed! It was a big step for us to get our own lawn mower (in our 40's, 10 years of borrowing Mom's!).
Soulgardenlove, neither son are married yet. I just meant that when the time came for him to own a house and be married, his wife would help him understand why the back yard had to be pretty! I didn't figure I could convince him! My two sons just really don't care that much about WHAT the outside of the house looks like. And what little they do care is overshadowed by allergies. I have offered to draw up a landscape of completely rock, cement and garden art type of thing for the front when they have the money for improvements. I'm going to rely on the color and texture of rocks, cement stamping etc. Something as absolutely close to NO maintance as I can get and still have some beauty.
Susan! I'm trying to catch up on threads and I am I so glad I found this one!! your gardens are so lovely, i want to stroll down to GA right now ;0) The brugs are magnificent..I have one that I have had for 2 summers and babied thru the winter in my sunroom. It's huge, but no blooms. I don't think I water it enough.
You have so many beautiful roses...now you are talking my language LOL. and your angel in the first post is the perfect garden ornament. Really, I just love everything. Thanks so much for taking the time to give a tour.
jan
Soul...BEAUTIFUL ! Thanks for a great tour.
What is the bronzey/orange plant in the photo labeled "Other side by driveway" ? Is it a berberis?
Yes Carrie, and after we installed the sod, we got a riding mower! So much easier to ride.. and i love it for the wagon attachment I use all voer the garden :)
Garden.. If I can pull one out of the trash and bring it back, you can baby yours and make it happy!
Jan, glad you found it :) Yes, you know I love roses :) Thanks!
Thanks Jasper.. nope not Berberis.. it's actually a tender annual.. I got it at my garden club plant auction held after their sale.. I thought it was one I had previously grown that stayed small.. Obviously, this was not it! I don't know the name.
:)
Susan
sgl---
What is the name of this flower and, if possible, would you have seeds for this? It's such a neat looking, very different, flower...
JUST "ME"...Jan
Think it is some sort of ginger
I first thought it was some kind of shrimp plant but maybe the bloom is too big for a shrimp plant. Ginger is my second guess too.
It's Pachystachys lutea:
http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/1870/
It's related to shrimp plant and is also a good hummingbird plant. Now you have me curious, I'll have to check mine for seeds! :)
Danita
(WHINE!!!) I WANT it!!!
Actually, does anyone have seeds or a cutting that you'd be willing to spare???
I'd promise my first-born, but seeing as that he's 30 yrs, don't think he'd appreciate it...LOLOL!
Just "ME"...Jan
Hmmm, well I'm single!
LOL!!! :)
Too funny Danita!
And she's a very attractive young woman too! I've seen her! And she's a walking botanical encyclopedia.. I promise we were walking around my very own garden and I was like "hey Danita.. whats this called"?? And she'd tell me the latin name and I had to tell her I needed the plain jane name! She would be a gardeners dream daughter in law :)
It is as Danita says I'm sure :)
Garedclay gave it to me and he told me he picked it up at his local Wal-mart. I'd love to grow it again too... but I haven't got any idea where the seeds are. None of the blooms have browned, so i'm just going to let it be and watch. if I get any seeds.. more than a few I mean, I'll let you know and share.
:)
Susan
Danita-
He's single, TOO!!!...and, he has a good-paying job, just bought his own house, loves animals, needs someone to help him with gardening at his new house...
He attended Boot Camp in GA---nicer weather than WI. Hmmmm???? ...wanna see a picture of him???
FMIL (Future Mother In Law.....hee!hee!...just kidding?!) Jan
Jan, I've tried many times to trade MY first born for a good plant - but no one will take her off my hands! She'll be a wonderful person when she's done being 17!
Carrie