Garden Update

The new plants I ordered back in February arrived. Of course, we were totally unprepared! I should have been ready with new/expanded beds prepped, but winter stayed so late this year we are just way behind schedule. The forsythia is still blooming for goodness sake. So we found spots for what we could, and the rest were given temporary homes. Hopefully they will survive a second transplanting if I’m really careful...

The one thing that had a designated spot was the hellaboris. I wanted it to have a spot where we can see it from the deck/dining room when it blooms in the late winter. Originally I wanted to put it in the planned mailbox garden, until I remembered that if we had another winter like this one, it would have been buried until 6 feet of street snow until April! What’s the point of an early bloomer if it’s buried under too much snow? So instead I found it a good home out back.

Next to the hellaboris on each side are two temporarily placed plants - the perennial snapdragon and one of the Autumn Joy sedums. The other temporary 2 sedums are in the bed over by the quince and crepe myrtle tree, along with the echinacea. I actually did want to plant another flower in this bed, but I’m not totally sold on it being the echinacea (I planned to put this one down by the mailbox). Things will probably shift around in the future, but for now I’m just glad to have everything in the ground instead of wilting and dying in their sad little plastic bags.

And while we're looking at this garden bed - check out the quince! Last year we had just a couple of blooms when we finally figured out what it was. I'm so glad we saved it from a twig in the grass, I'm so glad we didn't give up on it. It's an even more gorgeous shade of coral in real life.

Back to planting - last but not least, this vine was a gift from a totally different shipment that arrived this week. We were given a second clematis vine and it's part of why we decided to make our trellis so wide (so the two root systems don’t run into each other). Our existing purple clematis will grow 8-10 ft tall, so we are going to let that one primarily have “ownership” over most of the trellis for beauty and privacy. The new vine will grow to 20-25 feet - perfect for covering the roof of the pergola with green leaves and pink flowers. So we will train that one to grow up and over.

Lastly, indoors my tomato seedlings continue to grow. They are getting so tall. With the late spring this year I'm concerned that the tomatoes will be ready for the garden before the weather.

This year Oliver has yet to knock the tray over and instead tells me we will “go do-may-does” (grow tomatoes) when pointing at the seedlings. I might have a little gardener on my hands. We really need to get the peas in this weekend, which means adding more dirt to the raised garden beds in back. I also have to do some serious weeding back there - so much to do, so little time.