Blooms

Took a 5 mile hike today with my dog at Frick park and the trees there were blooming these pretty pink flowers. Too bad they won't last long, but they were beautiful today. The magnolias everywhere have been blooming their heads off. Wished I had the space for one of those! I have also always loved these little violets and dug some up to plant in my yard in hopes that they will naturalize there too. Just a gorgeous day...

This weekend when I was without internet I also planted my columbine. Since things are just coming out of dormancy or are still dormant I couldn't tell where anything was. It wasn't until I finished that I saw some sprouts coming up right next to where I had planted the columbine! I'll have to move it later probably.

My peony, Sorbet, is coming up! Very exciting! My bleeding heart came back up too. Still waiting for the little red hydrangea and this one Japanese Painted Fern to come back. We'll see...

The last few nights have been pretty chilly here....almost freezing. My rosemary kicked the bucket, but I did get a new one today. It's going to warm up tomorrow. I hope it won't get cold again! The picture above is my new gardenia bloom that just opened indoors today. Got some other plants too today. One perk of annuals...you get to buy them so you get that itch out of you from wanting to buy plants! LOL

Cyprepedium

Yeah, it looks like a pile of soil and bark pieces, but somewhere in there is a little "nubbin" that is the growth tip of a Cyprepedium! Looks like it has survived winter as the cage I had it in with leaves and other dried stuff on top of it to keep it warm got blown off somehow. Or maybe some *thing* carried it all off since the stuffings are no where to be found. I did find the cage i made for it. I'll keep updating it as it grows! Keep your fingers crossed that I will see a bloom sometime!

Plantings

56.4*F today! Not exactly warm, but at least it's not freezing!


Planted a fern, but then realized most everything was still dormant so I wasn't sure where all my plants are. The plant tags I left in the ground are approximate since the freeze and thaw pulled some of them out. So I left the one fern and the other shade plant in their pots instead.

Planted 11 of the 12 six pack of pansies and left one for a neighbor since I bought too many as always. Next year, I really only need about eight of the six pack pansies. Maybe this blog will help me remember that! :)

I also limed the lawn, dug up some weeds that had survived the winter and I put some more corn gluten down behind the shed even though technically it's not our property, but I hate seeing weeds all summer long. It only harbors fleas and who knows what from those feral cats my neighbor feeds anyway.

I finally got to re-pot some of my newly acquired orchids from the show last month since I finally got the pots that I needed for them. Repotted an African violet 'Blue Dragon' also since it was in such a teensy weensy pot. Will have to top dress some of my other soil plants later since I forgot to do that when I came in even though I left the pot of soil ready to go in the kitchen!

So that was all I did today garden-wise! Tomorrow is cooking day!

Plants!

So I stopped by Lowes today and found two new ferns that I don't have! I just had to have them for my fern garden. I am aiming at all different sorts of hardy ferns with an occassional non-fern interspersed into it. Should be a nice shade garden. Ferns are about the only non-blooming plant I want!

I also got two flats of pansies, one of which fell off my Costco cart as I was maneuvering things around to fit so that I could go home! Ack! They looked ok though...they'll recover I'm sure!

I also picked up a lavender even though I don't have the full sun for it, but it's so hard to resist how fragrant they are! I just love them!

Tomorrow....lime the lawn and PLANT PLANT PLANT!!! :D Can't wait! I hope it doesn't rain!

Seeds Sprouting

So I planted these hot pepper seeds over two weeks ago and we thought they weren't going to sprout since I had trouble wetting the soil. I should've never used it dry! Let that be a lesson to myself and anyone else wanting to take the short cut! Wet your soil before using it! So last night....while peeking at all the new seeds planted....I had the original ones with them and one of them has SPROUTED!!! YAY! The heat mat and plastic I guess did the trick finally!