The Color Purple and Other Garden Pleasures

This week we've been blessed with perfect weather, bright moonlit nights and sunny days without the oppressive humidity we get in summer. Each day I've been eager to get home so I can wander round the garden and just enjoy it.

Sure, there are some areas that make me frown -- one bed that seems to spell d-e-a-t-h to whatever I plant in it, and areas of St. Augustine that are seriously compromised and may end up having to be resodded -- but there are other areas that make me smile.


For example, those little pansies I put out in the front garden before Christmas are still blooming. 

This is Matrix Purple with Red Wing just behind it to the right.

This one is Matrix Morpheus - I love this delicate color.

Unfortunately, the one below was also labeled Matrix Purple, although it's obviously a different variety, and quite lovely, I have no idea what it is. 

Among the other garden pleasures:

The Vitex tree is bursting back to life and covered with bright green leaves, as is the Rose of Sharon. (below)

On the patio are a variety of pass-alongs from a new friend I met through my garden blogging - thanks Ursula!   These will either get transplanted into the ground, if I have a suitable place ready for them, or re-potted into a more permanent home this weekend, since I have a long weekend off from my day job.

And finally, in addition to starting some seeds and transplanting or repotting some plants this weekend, I see an inviting corner of dappled sunlight with a comfy chair in my future!

 It doesn't get much better than that!

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

Anyone Home?

I'm looking forward to getting out in the garden and getting my hands dirty today, so just a quick post this morning, with some photos of my feathered friends that I took in the last couple of weeks.

 Anyone home?

This Chipping Sparrow waits to see if the fairy living in the base of our pine tree will come out to play.  This photo was taken on March 20, and I realized this morning (while watching the darned cowbirds swarm the seed I had put out) that I haven't seen a Chipping Sparrow in several days. They must have headed north already.

 Where's breakfast?

 

 This mockingbird stayed on the fence while I sprinkled seed out there for him, instead of taking to the trees until I had gone back indoors again. Brave? Or bossy?

 Darn wind - it's messing with my 'do'

I thought the goldfinches had all moved on, there had been no activity on the finch feeders for a week or more, but last weekend, I caught sight of this little guy, and a couple of his friends, on the one feeder  I left out for them, just in case.  Is it a goldfinch that got left behind, or is it something else?  

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

Planning for Color in the Garden

Well it's not really all my fault, but then again, it is.  Other than the pansies and allysum I planted a couple of months ago, we have absolutely no flowers blooming in our garden right now. Tons of things leafing out all over the place, but a total absence of blooms (other than the aforementioned pansies and allysum, which have been blooming, bless their little hearts, all through the winter.)

And seeing other garden bloggers posting photos of the beautiful blooms in their gardens is a little disheartening, but serves only to make me more determined to plan ahead for next year.

My focus with the garden so far has been getting the backbone of the garden planted, planning for winter interest with evergreen shrubs, planting for the birds etc.  Other than a few daylilies and lilium, I haven't even got started with flowers yet.

Still, the garden is new, and we're planning on living here a long time, so if I can just find a smidgeon of patience, in a few years we should hopefully have the garden that I dream of.

I started thinking about blooming seasons and how some plants bloom early, but fade as our summer approaches.  Others are late starters but can take the heat of a Houston summer.  I'm sure that experienced gardeners can roll off the facts:  this plant blooms from early March through May, that one blooms from July through September, etc.  I, on the other hand, don't have that experience and knowledge. I'd have to look everything up and then try and remember it when planning my flower borders.

So I thought about making a chart that would show the information in a graphic format that would make it easy for me to see a) what I currently have and b) where there would be "holes" - times when nothing was blooming. 

Here's the sort of thing I came up with. Just an excel spreadsheet that I can print and keep in my garden journal.

What I'll do is to start with the flowers/flowering shrubs that I have already, and mark their bloom times on the chart. Then I'll easily be able to see, what seasons I need to plan for so I can get planting!

I could do one for the front border, and another for the back border, or the corner garden etc.  I could color it to match the plants so I could get an idea, especially in the planning stages, of what would look good and what would clash.

I can't wait to get started :-)

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

A New Work-in-Progress at Green and Serene

It was a cold, wet and windy day afternoon down here in Texas, so I started playing around with my blog.  Recently, I've seen some really nice blog designs from The Cutest Blog on the Block so I went over to see what they had to offer.

While they have tons of beautiful free blog backgrounds, they didn't have quite was I was looking for, for my own blog. But what they did have was a page with instruction on How to Make Your Own Blog Background. 

So I spent a while playing around in Photoshop Elements and, with a background image I found in one of my scrapbooking kits by Jaelop Designs, I made my own simple background. 

 

 I'm not sure that I'm finished with it yet -- I'll probably add an image up in the header area -- I just have to take the right photo yet.  


As the title says, this is a work in progress :-)

Springtime Quotes for the Gardener

When I got home from work last night, I took a tentative stroll around the garden to see if anything else is coming to life in the back garden.  I was particularly worried about the Flame acanthus and the Rose of Sharon that I had brought from my previous house. 

That Rose of Sharon had done so well last summer, did it make it through the freeze?  As recently as this past weekend, I would have said "no" -- there were no apparent signs of life, in spite of all the other buds I was able to blog about last week.

But as I approached the Flame acanthus, I was thrilled to see some tiny specks of green down at ground level. I had hope it might be root hardy, and it seems it was.  But, more than that, closer inspection revealed little buds of green all over it.  I don't have to cut it back to the ground after all!

And the Rose of Sharon, apparently dead sticks last weekend, is now covered in leaf buds from top to bottom!

I didn't get any photos yesterday evening, but I'll be sure and take some photos to document their progress.

In celebration of the new life in my garden, I thought I'd share some favorite gardening quotes about spring.

******

No matter how long the winter, spring is sure to follow.  -- Proverb

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold:  when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.  -- Charles Dickens

I love spring everywhere, but if I could choose, I would always greet it in a garden. -- Ruth Stout

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. -- Anne Bradstreet

Yesterday the twig was brown and bare;
To-day the glint of green is there;
Tomorrow will be leaflets spare;
I know no thing so wondrous fair,
No miracle so strangely rare.
I wonder what will next be there!
-- L.H. Bailey

If you've never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a flower in spring bloom, maybe your soul has never been in bloom.  -- Terri Guillemets

The first day of spring is one thing, and the first spring day is another.  The difference between them is sometimes as great as a month.  -- Henry Van Dyke

In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours.  -- Mark Twain

The naked earth is warm with Spring,
And with green grass and bursting trees
Leans to the sun's kiss glorying,
And quivers in the sunny breeze.
-- Julian Grenfell

Spring makes its own statement, so loud and clear that the gardener seems to be only one of the instruments, not the composer.  -- Geoffrey B. Charlesworth

 *******

I hope you enjoyed these quotes.  Do you have a favorite quote about spring? Add it here in the comments, so we can all share it.

In An English Country Garden

You know how it is when you get a song in your head and can't stop humming it?  Well, for me today it's "In An English Country Garden," a folk song that was popular when I was a child growing up in England.

I was going to post the lyrics and a photo, but then I found this lovely rendition by Nana Mouskouri, so I thought I'd share part of my childhood with you :-)

Spring Has Sprung!

 As I looked around the garden this weekend, I realized that although the pansies are still the only things in bloom (as they have been since before Christmas), there are some hopeful signs of new growth.

In the front garden, the daylilies that were planted in the foundation border are naturalizing beautifully.  I can't wait for them to bloom so I can figure out what varieties there are, since I lost the diagram I had noted them all down on. The new ones that I planted a couple of weeks ago are also poking their leaves through the mulch, but I didn't get any photos of those. I was pleased to note that the gazanias that I thought had perished in the winter freeze have perked up and are leafing out like crazy.

Here's a different view of my "little path to nowhere" and you can see more daylilies.

Also in the front, on a different day,the Indian Hawthorns are absolutely covered in buds.

In the back garden, I saw something I'd never noticed before -- tiny flowers on the dwarf burford hollies.  I suppose there had to be flowers,  in order for there to be berries, but I swear, I have never noticed them before!

Over in the corner by the utility boxes, Dolly Madison is peeking out, just over a week after I planted the bulb! (I wish I had labelled the daylilies in the front bed, like I did with these in the back)

As I was sitting on the patio this morning, drinking coffee, I nearly jumped out of my chair when I saw this guy sitting on the telephone pole opposite.

I zoomed in as far as I could, but I know nothing about hawks and wasn't able to identify him. Anyone know what type of hawk he is?

One thing that surprised me -- I would have thought that, with this guy close by and keeping watch, the birds in my garden would be keeping "vewwy vewwy qwiet" but perhaps they felt safe in the boughs of our pine tree because they were singing as much as they always do, keeping me entertained.

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

Back Yard Project Part One, or Back on the Chain Gang

Back in January, I wrote a post called So Here's the Plan which outlined my plans for our, as yet, blank canvas of a back yard.


Naturally, almost as soon as we put the back border in last year, I was dissatisfied with it and wanted to enlarge it.  However, we knew there was an easement there and weren't sure where the utilities actually lay.  A call to 811 quickly resolved that issue and we came home one day to find bright little red and yellow flags across the lawn, marking the phone and gas lines.


The other thing that needed to be done was that Eric had to replace the backflow valve (I think that's what it's called) on  the sprinkler system, which froze over the winter.  So he replaced the valve last weekend (and now we just have to pray we don't get another hard freeze) and we were able to run the sprinklers to see where the spray heads are.

At last! I had a clear idea of the amount of room we had to work with.

Now to move the rocks! 

 My poor husband had visions of moving 25 tons of rock with his bare hands, and we giggled together when I found this amusing cartoon by British cartoonist, Norman Thelwell.  

I'm not sure if Eric found it so amusing when I dug up an mp3 of The Pretenders' Back on the Chain Gang to play for him, lol.

 

But as you can see, we're really only expanding it a foot and a half at the most and it really wasn't much of a chore to move them.  

Even though we didn't expand it much, I think that will give us the room we need to create a pleasant border, with some taller shrubs against the wall and shorter plants in the front.  Who know, I may be able to hide that ugly wall eventually.

When I first started on the border, I realized very quickly that trying to remove all the sod would be a huge chore.  So I decided to take the easy route.  What I did was to plant some base shrubs where I wanted them and then lay down a layer of Weed Block around them, and then finish with a thick layer of mulch on top of that. After several months, all the sod underneath had died off and I've been digging it back in to the soil a bit at a time.

Much easier than trying to remove all that sod at one go. 

So when we were expanding the border, I decided to use the same approach.  Basically just covered all the sod with a layer of weed block and covered it with mulch.  When I'm ready to plant in it, I can work the soil a bit at a time and in the meantime, with mulch over the whole thing, it sort of looks done.

You can see, in the center of the photo, one of the flags marking the AT&T cable. We laid the rocks just to the inside of that line, so we can dig in the bed without worrying about cutting the phone line.

I love it when things come together right :-)

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

Woody Woodpecker And Friends

What a great weekend! Even though I had to work on my second job (posting content to an equine website, Equisearch.com) for a few hours on Saturday and Sunday, I was still able to work in some quality time with Eric, some horsey time at the barn and some gardening time.  Housework, not so much...

Since I had to get up early to work I sat in the breakfast nook for a while, drinking coffee and gearing myself up to get started. Suddenly, I saw a quick flash of red outside. As I watched, I saw it was my friend, Woody Woodpecker, (original name, huh?) a Red-bellied Woodpecker who often wakes me up on weekends if I'm not quick enough getting food out for him.  He's usually one of the first, if not the first, bird to arrive at the buffet line of my fence, where I sprinkle feed for them.  

On Saturday, however, he was checking out the suet feeder, since I had just put a fresh one out there the night before.

 

He hung around, literally, for a while posing for photographs and pecking at bugs before disappearing into the tree next door.

 

On my second cup of coffee, I again caught some movement out of the corner of my eye.  At first I thought Woody was back, but it was a different woodpecker this time, a Downy Woodpecker.

Downy Woodpeckers and Hairy Woodpeckers are very similar in appearance, and I had to consult this page in order to confidently identify this little guy as a Downy.

The Downy Woodpecker's bill is much shorter than that of the Hairy and they are smaller. 

I was excited to see this little guy, I hadn't seen one before.  He even stayed around when I stepped outside and sat on the patio to drink my coffee.  He was really into that suet feeder!

Which reminds me, I need to add that to the shopping list...

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

Say It With Flowers

 Art Explosion by Nova

When I was growing up in England, my grandmother always had bouquets of flowers or potted plants in her house, and she often gave them as gifts to friends.  She always talked about the meaning of the flowers -- forget-me-nots for remembrance, as she gave them to someone who had lost a loved one, for example, or a small pot of pansies for fond memories.


The custom became popular in Victorian times, when they gave small bouquets as gifts with special meaning for the recipient.


This list comes from The Language of Flowers, published by Nelson & Sons, Edinburgh, 1872.


Azalea ..................................................... Temperance
Basil ........................................................ Love/hatred
Camelia ................................................... Excellence
Carnation ................................................. Fascination
Chrysanthemum....................................... Longevity
Clematis .................................................. Mental Beauty
Dahlia ...................................................... Instability
Daisy ....................................................... Innocence
Dill .......................................................... Irresistability
Forget-me-not ......................................... Remembrance
Gardenia .................................................. Ecstasy
Geranium ................................................ Melancholy
Gladiolus ................................................. Geranium
Iris ........................................................... Good News
Hydrangea ............................................... Boastfulness
Lavender ................................................. Distrust
Lily .......................................................... Majesty
Marigold .................................................. Grief
Narcissus ................................................. Egotism
Pansy ....................................................... Fond Memories
Parsley ..................................................... Festivity
Red Rose .................................................. Love, beauty
Rosemary ................................................. Remembrance
Sweet William ......................................... Gallantry
Thyme ..................................................... Courage
White Rose .............................................. Silence


Some of the meaning have changed and some meanings differ from region to region.


Here are some more online resources, if you'd like to browse:

The Language of Flowers - Flower meanings, flower sentiments


For Peace of Mind - Flowers, Learn Their Secret Language


The Language of Flowers - Texas A&M PlantAnswers

It's Azalea Trail Time

I love this time of year -- the days are starting to get a little longer, the weather is beginning to get warmer, spring is in the air!  And it's time for the annual Azalea Trail Home and Garden tour, organized by the River Oaks Garden Club.

This year, the Azalea Trail takes places from 11 am to 6 pm on March 5, 6 and 7.  The tour locations for this year include the famous Bayou Bend, former home of Miss Ima Hogg, and six other locations.  You can get more information, and a map of the locations, at the link above.

It's been years since I have followed the Azalea Trail, but the weekend weather forecast is optimistic and I think it will be nice way to introduce my husband to his adopted hometown.

Tickets are $20 for all seven locations or $5 single site admission. Tickets may be purchased in advance from the River Oaks Garden Club, The Arbor Gate in Tomball, and a variety of other locations listed on the link above.

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

I should have known it would be a hard winter...

This isn't gardening related, but it does have to do with the natural world. It also gives me an excuse to show off my equine companions :-)   


Nature tends to prepare itself in advance for the seasons, with perhaps a sixth sense we don't have.  If I had paid attention, I would have known it was going to be a hard winter.  One look at the unusually thick and woolly winter coats my horses put on this year should have told me that this winter was going to be like no other winter I have seen since I moved to the United States, or at least in the 22 years my ex-racehorse, Annapolis, has been in my life.

 

Annapolis (left) with the love of his life, my Percheron mare, Star

 

See what I mean by long winter coat?

  

Even though Annapolis is now 31,  we still enjoy going for a stroll around the farm where I board.

 

Annapolis and Star love my husband, as long as he keeps the treats coming!

 Of course, looking at the bright blue sky in all these photos, taken in December 2009 and January 2010, and you'd wonder if it was winter at all. I have to admit, although it's been the coldest winter the Houston area has had for decades, we have had some glorious, if chilly, days.


I'll try and remember that when it's August and I'm whining about the heat and humidity.


Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.