Category: garden.

My hostas are doing amazingly well this year.  This seems to be the year that many of them have started to ‘leap’.  I’m pretty excited about that because it also means that soon I’ll be able to divide and thus have more plants, possibly next spring.

Over the past several years I’ve been putting in some really gorgeous varieties.  Unfortunately I haven’t done a very good job of keeping track of all of the names.

I’m fairly certain that this one is Lakeside Dragonfly …

And some of you may remember this favorite that I’ve shared here before called June.

I’ve completely lost track of what this next variety is.

I think there are some gardening snobs out there who sort of turn their noses up at hostas.  Maybe because for so many years people used them in foundation plantings without much imagination at all.  They just plunked the standard dark green or variegated hostas in evenly spaced holes with rocks around them.  Yawn.

But the beauty of growing hostas is what also made them perfect for those foundation plantings, and that is that they don’t require much care.  You’ll want to avoid planting them in the full hot sun and you’ll want to watch for slugs, but otherwise they are pretty much care-free.  Unless you have hungry deer in your neighborhood, in which case you are pretty much hosed because deer love these things.

I used to think that when the plants started getting really huge you were supposed to divide them to maintain the health of the plant.  However, I recently learned that you don’t have to divide your hostas.  It’s perfectly fine to let them be huge.  The only reason to divide is to get more plants, but if you don’t care about that you can just leave them alone.  This was great news for me since I have quite a few really large plants that I don’t necessarily want to divide.

I think the trickiest part of growing hostas is figuring out where to place them in the garden for the best effect.  I’m still working on this skill.

Hostas come in all sizes from tiny mini’s, like the ones in my fairy garden …

To huge ones like Sum and Substance.

I included my hand there so you could see how big that leaf really is.  And keep in mind, I have fairly large hands, not delicate lady-hands.

The colors can range from almost yellow like these May hostas that I’ve paired with a Purple Palace heuchera …

to blue, like this variety that I can’t remember the name of!

Hostas can be solid colored like the two examples above, or variegated like this hosta montana “Aureomarginata”.

Some hostas have really puckered leaves, they remind me of seersucker fabric.

Upright hostas like this next one grow … well … more upright.

You’ll want to plant something in front of a large upright hosta like this one.  I have found that these work beautifully for the center of the garden that is between my house and the driveway.  Since this garden is viewed from both sides, I have the taller upright plants in the center with lower plants on either side.

Hostas ‘bloom’ in mid-summer, but I usually cut the flower stalks off mine as soon as they appear.  Mostly of them are rather straggly and messy looking, although there are a few varieties that have a showier flower.  There is no need to allow the flowers to grow unless you plan to try harvesting seeds.  I’ve also read that removing the flowers allows the plant to focus all of its energy on growing more leaves.  So I say “off with their heads!”

How about you, do you grow hostas?  Do you mercilessly hack the flowers off like I do?

Peony season is way too short!

I wish we could make it last longer.  Unfortunately they are predicting a hot and humid weekend coming up for us in Minnesota, and really hot weather tends to zap the peony blossoms.  Heavy rain spells doom for them as well.  So, I decided I may as well cut some and bring them in to enjoy.

I just picked up a new peony to add to my cutting garden.  It’s called Raspberry Sundae and is the one on the bottom here …

Isn’t it yummy?  I love the pale pink fading away into white and then into a pale creamy yellow towards the center.  I like to buy peony bushes when they are blooming so I can see what the flower will really look like.  The photos on the garden center tags can be extremely misleading.

Peonies can also look quite different once they open fully.  I purchased this one a few years back without realizing that it was a Single.

I much prefer Doubles.

I’ve had the white peonies (these are Doubles) for quite a few years now.

 The medium pink peonies (in my first photo) were here when we purchased our house.  That means they are at least 30 years old or more.  Imagine that!  I’ve moved them a couple of times, although peonies do not like to be moved.

I put in a hot pink peony about 3 or 4 years ago.  This one looks gorgeous out in the garden with those vibrant pops of pink.

For the most part, aside from this bright pink version, I don’t think peonies look that good in the garden.  They are gorgeous for the very short couple of weeks that they are blooming, but after that they are pretty boring. Mine are very susceptible to powdery mildew too, which looks pretty awful.  I’ve tried all kinds of different remedies for it, none of which worked.  But I’ve read that although the powdery mildew can weaken the plants, it won’t kill them.  It mainly just looks ugly.  For that reason, this year I’m planning to move several of my plants to my cutting garden out behind the carriage house once they are done blooming.  They can look ugly all they want to back there.

Moving peonies can mean a year or two without many blooms.  That’s OK, I can steal some from nnK next year.  Shhhhhh, don’t tell her, but I stole these for a photo shoot last week …

You’ll see more of them on Friday when I post the pink dresser!

How about you, are you a fan of peonies?  Have you got any tips for getting rid of that pesky mildew?  If so, I’m all ears.

First things first, I picked three names to win some Touring cards from Monday’s post.  Congrats to Mary (Moore), Wendy and Melanie!

Now, on with today’s post.

Since I seem to usually share only my successes with you guys, today I decided to share a failure, my lilac hedge.  I just thought I’d keep it real and let you all know that not everything I do turns out well.

When we bought our house 28 years ago or so, there was an unruly hedge along the back property line.  I have no idea what kind of shrub it was, it didn’t flower or look pretty in any way whatsoever. It did however provide tons of privacy.  We could barely see any of the houses behind us.  In fact, in over 20 years I had never even met the lovely woman who owns the house just behind me.  This photo gives you some idea of how it looked back there behind the photo cottage.  It was tall and full, but also very straggly and unkempt.

After many years of trying to prune it into some sort of shape, I finally gave up and we pulled it all out.  That year I met Claudia, whom I now secretly call the ‘neighbor behind the hedge’, and realized that she’s a lovely person and had lived back behind there the whole time!

I have to admit though, as soon as we pulled the hedge out I got a sick feeling in my stomach.  I felt like we had exposed ourselves to the world.  What was once a private oasis was now a wide open view of suburbia.  Ugh.  But I knew that I had to start somewhere with a new hedge and I reminded myself that gardening takes a lot of patience.  I told myself that it would only take 3 or 4 years before we had some privacy again.

I decided to put in lilacs.  I wanted something that would flower, and also something that would grow just as large as the last hedge.  I also wanted something old fashioned and not too formal or fussy.  Lilacs seemed like the perfect choice.  This all took place b.b. (before blog), so I wasn’t thinking about how lovely they are to photograph, but that has been a bonus.

I selected a few different lilac hybrids for my hedge, some really dark purple, some pale pink, some more of a wine color.

I planted them as per instructions and initially they did well, but of course were short and spaced rather far apart.  After their first winter, I had a couple of shoots that died off.  I cut them back in the spring and kept hoping for lots of new growth.  But then the next winter I had more branches that died off.  I cut those back, and now my plants were fairly misshapen.  I continued to hope that they would fill in during year 3.  You know the adage, first year they sleep, second year they creep, third year they leap.

Unfortunately I am now on year five and my hedge looks likes this …

It is not a pretty sight and it certainly isn’t giving me any privacy.  This past winter even more branches died back, and the plants on either end of the hedge are almost completely dead.

The branches that are still alive are covered in flowers though!

I need to decide what to do at this point.  Do I attempt to prune them properly again this year and see if I can get them to fill out?  Do I replace the dead ones on the ends with new lilacs?  Or do I try something different like some Limelight hydrangeas or maybe a Viburnum?

I hate to give up on them when they provide such lovely flowers for furniture photos shoots!

But they sure aren’t living up to my expectations.

If any of you have any lilac advice, I am all ears.

I’m ending out the week with another garden themed post.  I have tulips, scilla and crocuses coming up in my garden.  Just you never mind that we got a snow storm on Wednesday!  It’s mostly melted now, so it’s safe to start thinking about what annuals to plant this year, what perennials need to be divided, which garden beds need to be revamped, and what new things can I use to ‘decorate’ my gardens.

Along those lines, I’ve dropped off a load of garden decor items at Reclaiming Beautiful, including a whole new crop of plates with words.

I did a few of these last year and they were a big hit, so I’m doing more.  If you’d like more details about how I create these, check out {this post}.

 You can tuck these plates into a wooden crate with some vintage garden tools for display in your potting shed or on your porch.  Or you can add them to a planter, like this example.

 I kept this plate in my boiler pot window box all summer and the vinyl letters held up just fine.  I’ll be putting it back out again this year.

I found some sweet plates at an antique shop in Buffalo, MN a week or so ago when we went out there to see my niece’s school play, The Wizard of Oz.  These were perfect for turning into garden plates.

But these plates that I purchased at the Macalester Groveland neighborhood garage sale last year are my absolute favorites.

Isn’t the detail on these plates just gorgeous?  And I just love the colors.

How about hanging this larger platter outside your front door?

I’ve also done up a couple of garden quotes on plates …

After I took these photos, I switched out the font I used for the “flowers” on that last plate.  I wasn’t loving how that one turned out.  I don’t have a photo to share though, I forgot to take another one before I sent them off to the shop.

In addition to the plates, I’ve also added ‘grow.’ to this old enamelware pot.  I used a large nail and a hammer to pound some holes into the bottom of it so that it has drainage.  You could plant some bright red geraniums right in the pot.  Or perhaps you’re more partial to petunias!

And this enamelware plate is probably my favorite of all.  I really was thinking about keeping this one.

There’s just something about the rustic, farmhouse style simplicity of this one that appeals to me.  I can picture it added to a planter made out of an old galvanized tub, can’t you?

Are you starting to think about spring gardening where you are?

I’m so ahead of myself this year!  Last year I waited too long to get my winter window boxes done.  As a result, the dirt was frozen solid so everything had to be sort of placed on top of it.  That really doesn’t work well at all, so this year I was determined to not let that happen.  Maybe I overcompensated just a little, but the weather was so lovely last week that I decided I would get a jump on them.

 I think the trick to a gorgeous window box is to fill it chock full, and here is how I make that happen.

I start by placing in my twig lights, spruce tops and some filler evergreens.  I purchased the evergreens from Bachman’s (my local nursery).  I spent about $60 for enough evergreens for my front window box, my two galvanized boiler window boxes, a planter on my deck and some small planters that hang on the mailbox post that I share with nnK.

Those twig looking things are my twig lights.  Each end has a little light on it.  Last year I wasn’t able to use them because the boxes were too frozen to poke them in the dirt.  I mentioned this to one of the clerks at Bachman’s and she recommended using a drill (to drill a hole in the frozen dirt) should this happen again.  Great idea!  But easier in the long run to just get this done before the dirt freezes solid!

Once I have a base of greens I fill in with lots of hydrangeas.

It would cost me an arm and a leg to purchase enough stuff to fill in this huge window box, so I sort of wander around my garden looking for dried plants that might add some interest, like these alium flowers …

I don’t know what these are called, but they grow from the ferns.

I also added some dried Astilbe flowers.

As Christmas gets closer, I’ll add some more festive yuletide touches to the window box, but for now it just has a simple wintery appeal.

I used a similar process on my galvanized boiler turned window box that is hung on the side of the Carriage House.

I went with a bit more color in this one though.  With the exception of the spruce top and the ornamental kale, everything in this arrangement was salvaged from my garden (well, or nnK’s garden across the street).

I have used hydrangea, sedum, lavender, foam flower and burning bush.

I also tucked my garden cranes in this year.  I purchased these at a garage sale several years ago.

I put away most of my garden planters for the winter, but I add a winter arrangement to this large planter so I have something nice to look at when I come home every day.

That planter, by the way, is faux.  It looks like concrete, but really it’s a Styrofoam like material that is very light.  I purchased it at a garage sale (naturally).

This year I decided to add some birch logs to this arrangement.  It’s all the rage you know, and I have to say I really love the look.

This arrangement is mostly evergreens with a few hydrangeas in the front.  I purchased those tall brush-like things last year and last spring they were still in good enough condition to put away for use again this year.  This year I’ll save the birch logs to re-use as well.

You can see that my ironstone platter with my house numbers on it is holding up really well.  This is another plate that I did with my Cricut and some vinyl.  It has been hanging outside since June and the vinyl isn’t peeling at all.

Well, I hope I’ve inspired you to go gather some things from your garden and put together some winter arrangements whether inside or out.

This year’s summer window box was kind of a bust.  I tried something new and it was a fail.  I used a couple of annuals that were new to me, unfortunately I didn’t even keep track of their names.  By mid-August, it just looked like I had a bunch of weeds growing in my window box.

Ugh!  Terrible, right?

So when I heard an ad on the radio saying that the mums were in at Bachman’s, I went to Menard’s to see if they had them too.  Mainly because Menard’s is usually a bit cheaper and I can get there on my lunch hour.  Sure enough, they had rows and rows of them.  The larger ones were only $3.99 and since I needed 9 of them that seemed like a do-able price.  So I grabbed a bunch of mums, threw in some celosia (at $6.99 each) and called it good.

I ripped everything out of the window box except the euphorbia, planted the celosia together in the middle and filled in with the mums.

I’ve added a fab pop of color to the front of my house with this combination!  I didn’t go overly ‘fall-ish’ with my color choices since it is still rather early in the season.

And sadly, these mums aren’t going to last much more than a month or so, if that.

But they are a huge improvement over the ‘weeds’.

I still think I liked last year’s monochromatic fall window box better though.  Remember it?

Which one do you prefer?

I’m sorry to say it, but my garden has gone to hell in a hand basket this year.

I usually get tired of gardening around mid-August.  I figure a frost is coming soon (that is a ridiculous exaggeration, FYI) so why bother to continue weeding, etc.  But this year I have been motivated to give up weeding much earlier than usual because I have an unwelcome visitor!  A snake!

He appeared in my neighbor Arlene’s yard first, but he moved over to mine just hours later.  I think it’s a bull snake.  I’m no snake expert, but I did a little google research and that looks like the likeliest culprit.  When I saw him he was sunning himself under my clothes line.  I came around the corner and he freaked and ran (well, slithered) under the photo cottage!

Good gracious!  Why did he have to pick there?  He’s probably under that hosta right now!

He looked to be at least 4′ long.  OK, that’s another exaggeration, but he was pretty big.  Even nnK didn’t want to get near him, and she doesn’t mind snakes.

So the garden is getting a little scruffy.  It still has some bright spots though.  The hydrangeas are going gang busters this year.

And the lemon slice million bells are taking over the boiler pot window boxes.

The fairy garden is looking lush, but then again, I don’t really have to worry about finding a snake in there so it gets more attention!

Cossetta is looking a little worse for the wear with a spider webbed face and her wonky crown.  She’s trying to cloak herself in ferns out of embarrassment.

Can you blame her?

I have a Tiger Eye Sumac that has totally engulfed my arbor.  The clematis is tangled up with it, but still blooming away happily.

You’ll notice that I have skillfully avoided showing you the weeds.  I’m also not taking pictures of the plants that have been totally decimated by the dreaded Asian Beetle, but trust me, they are there!  But nobody wants to see photos of that stuff, right?

If you stand back and squint your eyes a bit, the garden still looks pretty good.

Just don’t get too close, and beware of snakes!