lavender4ever, I am like the other hotties, I love that balsam. I love the whole garden.
Just got in from weeding. Cloudy and cool here. Look at the calendar and freaked. Next weekend busy, weekend after busy and then guess what Sept will be here! I still don't have everything planted!! AHHH
Had a lunch of fresh picked corn on the cob and fresh tomatoes. It was great! Going back out, what a mess I have.
Have iris to move and thin and have iris coming from a group swap. I had better figure out where everything is going or start
She's about to..... #10
Okay hotties, I’m home being good and trying to get some things done. You all have made me feel so much better. I was disgusted with my mess and felt like just giving up. Then I take a break, come in and read this and find I’m not the only one that has plant and garden paraphernalia inside and out. I’m going back out and doin some more, just wanted to say thanks, I really do feel better now.
lol Donna, I am always disgusted with my messes. You cannot garden on a big scale and not have messes!! Right now my yard needs to be weedwacked and looks like a darn jungle! My potting area has a creeping tools syndrome and has spread out more than I would like! Peg, there is a forum for wintersowing and is not like you would think. You sow seeds in jugs and leave them out in late winter. I tried it with just four jugs last march because I could just not believe it would work and it is wonderful and soooo easy and no indoor seedling mess at all!!! LOVE IT! I have twenty jugs right now I am saving for this winter lol. Go check it out! Balsam seed is the easiest seed to do. Sprinkle it where you want it and forget it. It grows like crazy and will grow anywhere. Look for the double flowered kind it is prettier. I have both, or I can collect some seed and send you some later this fall. Joyce, I have a Petes blue hib for you if you want one. All three shrubs turned out to be the same. Yummy fresh corn! I have no room for that unfortunately. Got lots of tomatoes though and I adore garden tomatoes!
I'd like to have some double balsam. At one time, years ago, I had some. I don't see it anymore.
Here is a pic of the scarlet milkweed. I really wish my camera colors showed off the intensity of this plant. Healthy and green and those scarlet buds are outstanding! It stands just under 3 foot tall right now.
This pic shows off the resiliancy and forgiving nature of this balsam. It is growing in a pot saucer less than three inches deep and 14 inches across. I had started this saucer for hen and chicks and the balsam volunteered in the saucer so I just let them grow to see what would happen.
One of my new favorite plants. Trachelium. Camera cannot capture the deep purple color, sort of like heliotrope purple. Going to try and over winter it.
lavender4ever, I would love to have Petes Blu Hibiscus.
I didn't even start any new garden projects this year because I wanted to get my garden squared away.....Yeah right. I would once like to walk out and see the hose coiled up, tools in their place, and all the plants planted (and I am not talking about December and January...LOL)
I don't usually plant corn, I have the space but don't have that much tilled up, but DH and a couple of his partners in crime did it when I was at work. Don't really have enough to put up. I will freeze a few ears, but most will be eaten quickly.
The areas I weeded look so nice. I am going to tell a secret. The weeds were so bad on the west side, that when I was weeding I forgot I had put strawberries in there. What a wonderful surprise to find them doing so well....LOL I found an oriental lily I planted this spring I forgot about.....how sad....LOL
Hey hotties,
Louise I love all the plants you posted, I will be try the balsam next season. I’m also going to try winter sowing for the first time. I have been saving the gallon water jugs all summer. I still have more reading to do on it but so far it sounds easier and a lot less messy than the indoor seeds I started last spring. I don’t ever want to create that kind of a mess again.
Joyce I dream of the perfect yard, right now I’m just aiming for reasonable.
Peg the inside of my house sounds like yours right down to the ES on the kitchen table.
I started too many projects and then have to spend so much time watering so nothing gets finished. Seems like I just turn around and poof I have a war zone, an obstacle course of epic proportions. I spent the entire day cleaning up.
I'm need to get some ZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz's now. I'm done in.
Joyce, I have some very scary areas in my yard. This the four foot tall opening to the top of the pool privacy fence. The brug forest complete with crab crass going nuts because I have not weedwacked it. Donna I love winter sowing!! I did tomatoes, purple millet, celosia and cilantro just as an experiment and it all did great! I did the indoor mess too, but never again!
LOL girls.. you sound just like me .. or I sound just like ya'll...hehe..I am afraid to sweep my kitchen.. if that tells you anything!!
Peg... that sounds sooo nice.. all pink.. my favorite color!! I do like that balsom.. and that other one.. started with T.. trachelium....That recipe sounds good too..Peg.. you girls must luv to cook!!
BTW Donna and Clemie.. it was chilly here too.. about 75!!..LOL I bet ya'lls "chilly" was chillier...hehe
it was 80 ish here today not too bad still to humid though. But this evening it cooled off and felt very fall like... alot like Clemen said. You can tell it is getting closer.
hi hotties, been out all day in the sun, sorry, cannot catch up with all of you, love you though and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz like kim writes, lol, Clemen
I thought it felt like fall here today and it scared me....LOL
Oh, it makes me feel sooo much better to know others have frightening spots in their gardens.
I am going to have to look up winter sowing. You guys have my curiosity up.
Hate to beg but here goes, does anyone have seeds for Mexican sunflower? I think that is what it is called. BIG orange blooming plant? Butterflys love it.
Need to get the garden room finished. We have the insulation was done last year but we got the interior walls up this summer. Now I need to get the and the interior walls up. Need to get the ceiling, lights, and cabinets in before I need to bring in the plants.
I think you are looking for tithonia? I sure don't but I will keep you in mind if I find any or see any offered around the forums. I am sure out of all the hotties someone can scare some up for you lol. WINTER SOWING ROCKS!!!!
Morning Hotties,
Quick, quick, quick this morning. I over slept, now I know that sounds ridicules on Sun morn but am meeting DD and DGD at the beach. DD is in her 9th month so she needs help.
Joyce I have some leftover Tithonia Torch seed from this seasons in house sowing disaster. I found them, easy to find, still on the table in the den. They are the tall ones. It’s only ½ a Burpee pack but you are welcome to them. I think you wanted a piece or seeds from H Hib also, they are just starting to boom here so I can now post pic. I will try and post some tonight.
Mid August and winter sowing, yessh, but I’m planning ahead. I’m good at planning, getting it all done, not so good.
Got to run now, so morning to all, hope your day is wonderful.
Good morning hotties!!!! I finally figure out that Mama brug is called Charles Grimaldi, I have a charles blooming next to her and they look alilke, the mystery is finally solved!!! So baby brug Melissa has a name now. By the way, where are you hiding these days Santeedlady???
Great day everyone, Clemen
Thunder and lightening, thunder and lightening for 3 hours this morning.
I counted 10 whole drops of rain, but it did cool it down a bit now, just 86 degrees.
Donna, don't you know the harder you work on cleaning one area, the worse the other areas look! I have even set up a timer for 30 minutes and that is all I spend in one area. Then on to the next area for 30 minutes. You spend about 4 hours and everything looks better and nothing looks worse. And since I am limiting my time, I really get more done than usual. And if you do this three days in a row, you'll be shocked. Or at least my family is.. Tee Hee...
Oh Clem, Mama brug is a Charles? Here we go again with mixed up genders.. (She is still beautiful!)
Louise, the trichelium in your picture looks nothing like what's in the plant guide. Any more names for it??
Oh, Joyce, congrats on the strawberries but I hate you missed the oriental. They are so pretty. I only have one kind and they are some my daughter planted when she was 12.. (now 29).
Remember my baby bananas in the garden? Here's one month later. Same DH, he has not shrunk...still 6'4"
LOL Peg on your DH not shrinking. That is a happy nanner!!! Is that a hardy one? I agree with you on doing a little at a time, that is how I do anything. Otherwise I would be just overwhelmed with the workload in this house. It is pretty one sided lol. I made freezer pickles for the first time last night and my oh my are they good! What an easy wonderful recipe. I still have a bunch more cukes to grind for relish and I think I am finally caught up with the cukes. Green beans are next! We had roasted grape tomato pasta last night with the grape tomato bounty and it was delicious. Got that recipe from Rachel Ray. The trachelium comes in different colors I guess. This one is very purple. Purple petioles and stems and flowers. Just love it. I am hoping to over winter to do cuttings in the spring for planters. Sure wish I had a greenhouse!!
Now honestly hotties, I have even thought about starting a new thread on this.
You grab your camera and run outside to get that perfect picture that you want to post. But wait, what is that in the camera display, right there in the corner. A weed. So down goes the camera and you take care of that.
Then, you know that angle isn't showing the bloom off to its best. So you move around and adjust your angle. What's that? another weed and it's taller than the bloom you are trying to photograph. Down goes the camera again, and weed, weed, and weed.
Grab the camera, and now the lighting is all wrong, because the sun went down while you were weeding. Oh, well, it got weeded and hopefully you can get that picture tomorrow. :)
And if you say you haven't done this, I ain't believing ya. Lov ya, Peg
OH how hilarious!! I have done that. Or I have taken the perfect picture and then realized my mess is in the pic too!!!
lol peg... yes! and then when you go to take the pix the next day...a bug at a bunch of leaves...or the flower wilted away :(
roflmbo!
isnt there a photo program that you can cut the weeds out of the pix? lol! would save me a bunch of weeding time!
Louise, Its a hardy musa basjoo, zones 6 through 10. In my zone 7a/b, it's hardy to 0 degrees. But I have seen pictures with snow on them. So we are really hoping. We planted two and we now have about 7 pips that are ready to be moved.
I am putting them around the swimming pool next year, hopefully with some blooming brugs and some other tropicals. At least maybe I can block my back neighbor's view! I get tired of him mowing every time I swim.
Got to head to bed. My weekend to work. Peg
can I cut out the 'piles of projects' in these pix?! lol!
maybe paint in the cement that is supposed to be on the ground...oh and the bricks that are supposed to cap that raised bed?
Anjl! Cement, you?? I thought you had fought a war with concrete and won!
No, as long as we are gardening, there will always be messes... we do play in the dirt, don't we?
Nite, zzzzzz Peg
lol, no that bottom area will be all one huge cement slab :o( but I am trying to get one area left as dirt so I can plant a tree....
maybe I should just plant the tree! lol! then he would have to cement around it right?! lol!
LOL I like that theory!
I once had a pile of stuff I wanted my hubby to stack in the garage and he kept saying he would etc you know how it goes, so one morning he came home from work and it was piled in front of the gate, he couldnt get in without moving it LOL. It did work!!!
lolol! well.. thats how my WHOLE yard looked in Feb... I wanted a garden and DH said first we have to do this, then that, and the list was a mile long! and he didnt have a roundtuit....
so.... I just decided I was going to get my garden :o) tee hee....
this is what I started with in feb.....
in April things started growing in a little :o)
and end of June... DH finally found his roundtuit :D started doing some of that to-do list! lol!
ps...that bench and pond are behind DD ....just burried in flowers! lol!
I did all of the flagstone and pond work myself...... DH is building trellises and arbors :o)
Oh Anjl, What a difference and how lovely!!!! You are the woman!!! Your daughter is such a pretty flower too!! What a cute baby! That april pic should be submitted for the calendar. Just love the difference!!
what calendar?
Nice change in your yard Anjl, i first saw the last picture without looking at the thread and now i can say gorgeous yard and blooms and the girls too, so sweet. Peg i love that banana musa, I bought a variageted one this year and she is beautiful too. Problem is she must come inside for the winter, grrrrrrrrrr, another one, just like the brugs. Hey by the way, you must be some hot chic anyway, your neighbor mowing the lawn everytime you jump in your pool, mmmmmmmmnnnn i wonder why??? lol, I put up some butterflies bushes next my my neighbor's pool and they are so big that they do not see us anymore! I do not trim them to the ground, just let them grow and i think they are probably like 11 feet tall now, no kidding! Clemen
Hey girlies...
went to church and actually came home and cooked lunch...hehe sitting back enjoying the A/C.. and aint going to do a thing...
anjl... WOW how beautiful!! I can't believe how those plants grew sooo fast.. you must have gold in that soil!! Take a look though.... on the 1st pic.. that poor kitty was getting the "heck out of Dodge".. and in the 2nd pic that kitty was soooo happy to be home!! LOL...I got a chuckle out of that!!
Howdy to everyone!!
lolol! beck...thats cause kitty in the first pix was neighbors kitty...and MY kitty wouldnt even go in the back yard...cause it was a junk yard!
DH commented....wonder why the cats hang out in the back yard all the time now?....uh, probably cause there are flowers and shade...and all sorts of hopping, flying, things to stalk?! lol!
oh and most of those flowers are from the mixed seeds swap that I did...just tossed them all on the dirt in one bed and let them grow! lol! still trying to figure out what all those plants are!
Becky, just noticed your screen name and the numbers 57 11, one of my favorites! We must have something in common! Let's play the lotto,Clem
Anjl, it looks like you have gladioulas, perennnial sun flower (the yellow one) some lavender there at the botton. Let me look again, Clem
Ok poppy, the orangie cup one and I think I also see an alium in the back, the purple ball.
So pretty! Green thumb lady!