How does your Garden Grow?

Thanks for asking! LOL. My garden is doing very well. Finally! It seems like all the local veggie gardens are way ahead of mine. But I keep reminding myself that they all planted early because we had an unseasonably warm, sunny, and beautiful spring. I was unable to plant until May 27th. So I'm not really behind...everyone else's gardens are early! Hey, that's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

Still, I am pleased with most of my garden. The peppers went into a bit of transfer shock but they are starting to come around. Cailey's Science Fair Beans have produced their first green beans.

Doesn't she look proud?

In our "high rise" (the really deep raised beds) the corn is growing very quickly now. The Potatoes, Onions and Carrots also seem to be very happy. I'm very curious to see what the harvest will look like. We've never tried potatoes and onions so it's all very new. Meanwhile, we've never had a successful corn crop and last year our carrots were very short because they needed a deeper bed. So, this year we're keeping our fingers crossed!

The lettuce was planted in small batches to ensure a longer more even harvest but as you can see the first batch looks really nice. And it taste really wonderful in our homemade buffalo chicken wraps and it made an excellent green bean salad with dijon vinegar dressing. Yum!

The cucumbers are starting to flower which is a good thing. But they began to cling to each other. Twisting around each other. So I decided that the cucumbers needed a trellis to climb. I kind of like how it looks. Hopefully, they're "cling" to the new supports the way they were clinging to each other.

After picking Cailey's Beans I realized that the "bush" beans I planted were climbing up the "beans" sign. So I decided to give them new trellis supports too.

I've already harvested our first round of radishes. To which my greedy hubby started rubbing his hands greedily, "Rosy Radish Relish." So having just enough for one batch I guess I know what I'm supposed to do! Then he asked how many radish seeds we still had. I showed him the nearly full envelope and his evil brain formulated a new plan. One that ended with me and Shan planting all of the seeds in every available unused bit of dirt. I figure that we planted over 300!

Not to be outdone my flower beds are being very showy as well. The Daylilies are simply beautiful and making arrangements with them is quite fun.

Guess Who Won The Mulch War...

Not me. Hubby had his heart set on red mulch. So we went to Backyard Farmer and he got 3 yards (approx.) from Brian~who keeps promising that the ice cream is on it's way! LOL. I find the red mulch to be very modern and if you haven't guessed by now I'm an old fashioned country gal myself. But Hubby has done a bunch of manual labor so I let him win the Mulch War. YES, I let him win! It may take me a while to get used to but I have to admit it looks tons better than the weedy walkway.

Before and After

The weed fabric continues over my new flower beds. I have a lot of Siberian Iris and Daylilies to go into the new beds. I think I'll build a bench in one of the new beds. It would be nice to have a place to sit to enjoy both the flowers and the veggies.

Plans, Plans, Plans...So many Plans, So little Time!

Crazy. Wild. Wacky! What else can you say about the weather when your daughter has her June birthday off from school because they've used the last "snow day"? While we didn't actually have snow we did have a State of Emergency in my town due to wild weather. We lost our power and didn't regain it for days. But finally life has begun to resume it's "normalcy". Yeah, right, my life isn't ever normal!

And neither are my gardens! I've gone from lush Iris beauty to well...less than lovely. It's that odd time of the season when spring blooms are over and summer blooms need another week or so. But still I can find beauty, peace and tranquility (and weeds) in any garden!

Like this last of my Iris beauties to bloom.

I was surprised by this lemon yellow Iris when it bloomed amongst it's already spent purple counterparts. I find that my gardens go through color changes throughout the year. You might think I planned for Early Spring to be yellow (daffodils, narcissus, and such)...Late Spring to be purples and blues (Bearded Iris, Siberian Iris, etc)...Summer tends to be more fiery with pinks and oranges (daylilies my one true love) and...Fall with it's deep dark solomn reds, oranges, and browns...But you'd be wrong. I simply toss everything in together and then marvel that I haven't made a mockery of the gardening experience. Yet, I've never been truly unsatisfied with any of my gardens.

Such is the case with my Compost Garden. Every plant in this new garden (planted fall of '07) was saved from a Gardening Friend's Compost Pile. I really had no idea of what I was "saving" I just grabbed anything that I could and shoved them in the ground. I am pleased to recognize many of my favorite plants (Siberian Iris, Daisies, and Daylilies) and even more excited about the plants I've never had before including Virginia Bluebells. I love the entire garden but I'm not loving the weeds creeping up over my rock border as they launch yet another attack on my garden bed.

However, this isn't the only gift from a Gardening Friend that is currently giving me delight.

Thanks Apple for this bit of fire in my "Adirondack Fire Garden".

And another "Thank You" to Marci for the gift of Sundrops making today Sunny!

My Secret Love: Daylilies

My daughter came to me today with my wedding album in hand (something she does quite often). As usual, she pleaded, "Tell me a story about this..." Despite having my hands in dishsoap at the time I said OK. We sat down together and were soon paging through the album. As I reminsced and she listened intently my eyes were drawn to my bouquet.

I remember as hubby and I planned our wedding he wanted a June wedding but I gently nudged him into an August wedding. I had a secret desire for my wedding day. Only one person knew of my secret desire: My Mom. I remember the day Mom and I visited the florist (the only florist for 35 miles). How excited we were to purchase flowers for such a happy event. We spent the usual amount of time pouring through her pictures before deciding on a very simple round bouquet. Then began the discussion I'd been waiting for: FLOWERS! I smiled at the florist and said, "I want the orange daylilies found along the roadside to be the main star of my bouquet." Immediately, I could sense that she was less than pleased with my announcement. "Dear," she said condescendingly, "I'm not sure that's possible. After all, those are daylilies." The young me still didn't understand the problem so my mother said, "If it's an issue of you trying to find them we can deliver them to you that day." The florist said, "Mam, I'm sure YOU understand that daylilies just don't make good bouquet flowers. They wilt so quickly. Besides, those ORANGE flowers will leave dust all over her dress. It will be positively ruined." I began to get emotional because those flowers had special meaning to me. As flowers often do. When I would visit my soon-to-be hubby I would travel down a road that was lined with these spectacular flowers. Just seeing their orange beauty reminded me of him, of us. Seeing how upset I was quickly becoming she said, "No. I just will not make a bridal bouquet with those roadside weeds!" Knowing I had no other affordable options I chose carnations & roses to fill my bouquet.

My flowers are my only wedding day regret. Had I been a bit older and a bit more confident in myself I would've argued with her. After all, the customer is always right. But I was young and unsure. Still, if that's my only regret...It doesn't seem that bad, does it? Besides I did end up getting my way because now my garden is filled with my secret desire. I've got big clumps of "those roadside weeds" strategically placed throughout my front garden beds. I've also begun collecting some of their "uptown" cousins. I love the beauty of these simple flowers but I also the love the idea that I have to treasure them today because tomorrow will be too late. It's a good motto for a garden and for a marriage.