Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - March 2017

It's the 15th of the month, and to garden bloggers, that means one thing -- it's time to put together a post celebrating Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, hosted by Carol of May Dreams Gardens.

I usually forget about it until it's too late.  I think I can count on my toes how many times I have posted a "GBBD" post!

But I'm pleasantly surprised that the garden is perking up, in spite of being largely ignored last year while I was recuperating from my surgeries and the few hard freezes we had over the winter.

I already showed you some of the signs of spring in the garden, now it's time to show you some blooms :-)

Our freezes didn't faze these dianthus one little bit.  They stayed lovely and green all winter and now are covered in blooms.  I've got several in various colors (although I don't actually remember planting them all!)

With it's delicate foliage, you would have thought that the Achillea would have succumbed to the freezes too, but they stayed a beautiful bright, feathery green all winter and are now starting to put out blooms.

it's sharing that section of the border, under the Vitex tree, with the purple Homestead verbena.

More dianthus in the island bed, along with either the Pineapple sage or Salvia Greggi.  I planted them together in the same area and neglected to make a good note of which was which.  So I'm not sure which is blooming here.  There's also a lot of Cosmos coming up so this area will be lovely and colorful soon.

Here's a closer look.

And finally, the Star Jasmine is absolutely covered in blooms.  Unfortunately, it's short on scent. We have always called it our "Scent-less Star Jasmine".  There are actually two of them planted side by side and one has no scent at all, which the other has a mild aroma.  I did catch a whiff of it a couple of times when I was out taking photos in the rain on Saturday but I certainly wouldn't call it highly aromatic, which is a bit of a disappointment.  But I like it anyway, the blossoms are lovely and the birds appreciate the shelter afforded by the thick vines and trellis.

So that's about all I have to show for this Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day.  I hope we have nicer weather this weekend than we did last weekend.  I need to do some more weeding and add compost and mulch to the island beds and back border before the temps start heating up too much.

Seem more Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day posts, hosted by Carol of May Dreams Gardens.

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

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - April 2014

 On the 15th of each month, Carol of May Dreams Gardens, hosts Garden Bloggers Bloom Day where garden bloggers around the country (and around the world) share what's blooming in their garden on that day.

OK - I'll admit it, I usually miss it completely - either that or I have nothing in bloom to show off!

But today I remember, and today also, I have a pleasant number of blooms in the garden, in spite of the slow start we got this year, with our unusually cold winter for this area.

So, without further ado, let's take a tour of the back garden.

As you enter the back garden along the path at the side of the house, a lovely light pink fuschia hangs in a container, tucked in to the Star Jasmine. I just picked this up last weekend at Wally World. My mum (who lives in England) always has such lovely fuschias in the garden that when I saw this one, I couldn't resist it!

Here's a view of the aforementioned Star Jasmine (taken before I hung up the fuschia) and an invitation to garden visitors to make themselves at home (and useful!)

The Star Jasmine itself is covered in buds, but if you've been reading my blog for a while, you may remember that this is the amazing scentless Star Jasmine.  We have another right next to it which is only a 10th of the size of this one (and only a year younger) but it's scented enough for the two of them, so our garden will soon be filled with the delicious aroma :-)

In the back corner by the birdbath, this dianthus is blooming well. I thought it might not make it through winter, but it shrugged off the cold like it was nothing.

I've been threatening to rip the Lonicera sempevirens, Native honeysuckle "Major Wheeler" out of the ground because it just wasn't doing anything.  It's still very scrawny. but it does have a few blooms on it, much to the delight of our visiting hummingbird(s).  I still don't know if I will let it stay, but I'll see how it does this season.

On the other side of the garden, by the utility boxes, the Homestead verbena is growing and spreading like wildfire.  This is good, I can't get anything else to grow in this spot, so I'll be happy if this takes over this little area for the summer.
 

Next to the Homestead verbena, tucked in under the Vitex tree, this patch of Achillea millefolium was unfazed by the freezing winter.  Amazing really, when you look at how delicate and feathery this is.  

Five years ago when I moved in here, I planted one Achillea plant here - now look at it :-)

In the island bed,  this blanket flower has been blooming for a while.  I forget the name of this particular variety.

 It's got a lot more flowers on the way too.

The pansies I planted in the island bed at Thanksgiving are still blooming.  They probably will be finished in a month or so, but I certainly got my money's worth! I have purple, yellow and white ones and they have filled the garden with virtual sunshine, through even the most bitter cold days.

And finally, in the new island bed, around the new waterfall we installed, I planted some bluebonnets I found at H.E.B grocery store.  They are doing nicely too. I'm looking forward to collecting some seeds. I'd like to have bluebonnets in the front garden somewhere.

So that's about it for this Garden Blogger's Bloom day. All the action is in the back garden at the moment.

Overgrown shrubs in the front border don't leave much room for flowers there - something I will have to tackle.  But there *are* some tropical milkweeds coming up, and one is even blooming!

Don't forget to head over to visit Carol at May Dreams Gardens and see what else is going on for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day.


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

Easy Garden Border

There's an area off to the left (west) of the garden that's been bugging me.  We have two jasmines (one scented and one mysteriously scentless) and mowing/edging around them is a pain.  I'm always worried I will get too close with the edger and decapitate one of the jasmines. 

The area called for an expansion of the border along the side of the garden.

However, I'm not one for hard labor.  Especially not in Houston... in summer.... so this past weekend, I you might be surprised to hear that I spent part of the Labor Day weekend lugging large rocks around the garden and laying them artfully in the shape of a new border.

Actually it wasn't that bad.  The weather was a smidgeon coolor and less humid (it's a relative thing...)  And I only carried one stone at a time from my car on the driveway, round to the back fence and placed the stone on the ground.

Where I saved myself from hard labor was in that fact that I didn't do any digging at all. Both jasmines are already planted so I laid out newspaper several sheets thick, watered it down ...

... and then covered it with mulch...

Rinse and repeat...

I love the finished effect as you walk up the side of the house to the back garden. And next year, when the grass has all died off under the paper and mulch I'll be able to do more planting in the bed.
 

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

The Star Scentless Jasmine and Other Garden Wonders

I apologize for not being very active this week.  I have a part time job on a large equestrian website in addition to my daytime job and this past weekend was a big one for us - the Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event.  I didn't actually get to go to Lexington for the event (darn it!!), but I was posting reports and photos online most of the weekend.  And when I wasn't posting to our website, I was either out gardening or over at the barn, seeing my own horses.  It was too nice at the weekend to spend any more time than necessary indoors, so I didn't do any blogging.

But hopefully things can calm down a bit now and I can find time for gardening and blogging, as well as visiting all of your blogs, which I'm sure will inspire me to garden even more!

On to my blog for today: My husband is originally from California.  I think I've mentioned before that he's a self-confessed non-gardener, but he has made two specific plant choices in our garden.  One is a grapevine - and it's a table grape, not a wine grape, so there won't be a Wilson Winery (this year, at least).  The other plant he selected was a Star Jasmine, which he used to have on the patio of his townhome in California.

We installed some lattice on the fence for it, close to the patio so that we could enjoy its scent while we sat out there.  It grew very well, quickly covering the lattice and it's covered in blooms.

There's just one problem.... it has absolutely NO SCENT!

Now understandably, we were both disappointed and my husband toyed with the idea of ripping it out of the ground. But instead we opted to purchase another one (preferably already in bloom so we can be sure it has a scent) and plant it next to our Star Scentless. as we call it.

Even before it was in the ground, it filled the whole area with the most wonderful scent! (Perhaps the Star Scentless will take the hint!)

We still need to put a lattice up for it, but in the meantime, it's happily twining around the canes in its pot, so it will be okay till the weekend.

On to other garden wonders.  At the beginning of March I planted some lilium bulbs in the back border -- Dolly Madisons and Stargazers. 

While most of them seem to be taking their time and are just now appearing above ground, one of the Dolly Madisons is blooming already!

I'm not sure if the daylilies that I planted the same weekend will bloom this year, but the one I planted last year are starting to bud.  Finally, I may be able to identify the varieties!

 

When I posted a photo of our new rain barrel last week, someone mentioned we may have to raise it up and, sure enough, we did have to.  With it sitting directly on the paving stones, it was impossible to attach a hose to the spigot at the bottom.  

Since our builder had kindly left us with a pile of leftover bricks in the garage, we were able to use a double layer of brick to raise the barrel up enough to allow the hose to be hooked up easily.  It works like a charm.  I can use the hose to water plants on the patio directly, or I can use it to fill up my watering can to water plants in the hangers, or in the far reaches of the garden.

I've already got quite a bit of use out of it, watering-in new plants at the weekend, in between posting photos and stories from the Rolex.

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