Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

It’s January and my garden is a mess.  That’s OK because it’s January!  My garden could be the perfect mixture of evergreen conifers and winter color landscape plantings specifically designed to brighten the gloomiest winter day, but it’s not.  I would love that, but my garden was never put together for the winter color.  I’m gradually adding plants for that…

This post is a little bit of a Hodge-podge of topics. A conglomeration of a couple of interesting things and one maybe no so much for you (but something I can whine warn you about!) Sunrise This morning we had a gorgeous sunrise that highlighted the early morning clouds.  I snapped I picture from our upstairs bathroom window. It’s a…

This time of year it isn’t unusual to see the garden in a crystallized form.  Wet winter weather insures that enough moisture is around to turn the landscape into a frosted garden.  The unique appearance of the frosted garden gives the gardener a great opportunity to play around with some photography.  Here are a few photos from this morning at…

Along the posts of the arbor project we added a little decoration. Welcome to Japanese Maple Leaf Decor 101: How to Stain an Arbor! First we put the initial coat of stain on the 4″x4″s then placed a leaf of a Japanese maple on the still slightly damp wood. Then we removed the leaf after a second coat of stain…

This post may be a little late in coming but I thought I would talk about how I built my raised beds for my vegetable garden. If you you are interested in learning about the advantages of gardening in raised beds be sure check out my post: The Benefits of Gardening in Raised Beds. This spring I built two large…

Tomato planting season is almost here for Middle Tennessee so I thought now would be the perfect time to share some things you need to know about growing a great tomato!  Tomatoes have always been my favorite crop from the garden.  I like tomatoes fresh, cooked, preserved – it doesn’t matter how – I like a GREAT Tomato! There are…

Here’s an update from the vegetable garden! So far things are going pretty good. My tomato frost scare wasn’t as bad as I originally thought and since I have some spares to plant I should come out fine. I saw a scary 39 degrees on the forecast for Tuesday night but I’m prepared with coverings. I’m also starting a few…

Welcome to my bone dry September garden for Wildflower Wednesday! We have an assortment of fall blooming flower pictures to share. You really don’t need a reason other than their beauty to plant wildflowers but the fact that so many of them require little to no care during our current weather conditions is a great bonus. To have something that…

Achillea millifolium is one of the easiest perennials to grow. Almost no care, very little maintenance, and bright punches of color make it a very good plant for low-maintenance gardens. In our garden we have 4-5 varieties which unfortunately are mostly unnamed but their colors include red, yellow, white, and pink. The only thing I do to maintain achillea is…

I would like to thank Roben Mounger (AKA Ms. Cook) for the great write up on her culinary blog Ms. Cook’s Table! I would also like to welcome any new visitors from the Columbia Daily Herald who found me because of her article. I hope you find something that interests you in this visit, if not keep checking back I…

I just can’t wait. Pretty soon the tomatoes will be ripening and we’ll be pulling them from the vine as fast as we can. Unfortunately the hard part of gardening is learning patience for we still have to wait. It takes time for things to grow and mature and you have to grow to appreciate the process from seed to…

I’m not sure how this snowfall counts. Would it be the first one in Middle Tennessee? Would it even be enough to count? I’m not sure, I only know that we did not receive what our northern neighbors have been gifted with this December!I know it disappointed my two year old daughter who asked me several times to make a…

The Corner Shade Garden – April is when it all gets seriously growing. It’s not completely full of hosta foliage since the season has really just begun but as the days pass, the plants will grow, and the garden will fill in very nicely! Looking at the corner shade garden through the arbor you can see a Japanese maple that…

If you’re like me and planted your tomatoes from seed a few weeks ago you may start to notice the roots beginning to move beyond your original potting medium.  I used the peat pellet system for starting our peppers and tomatoes and noticed recently that the roots are extending beyond the pellets. What does this mean? Time to get a…

The hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) is one popular bird in the garden. We have a couple of regulars around the yard. They seem to like almost any colorful flower in the yard but are especially attracted to the zinnias. I’ve not only seen them on the zinnias but also the morning glories, the salvias, and even the tomato blossoms. The only…

Hello home gardeners, I need your suggestions!  You see a couple years ago my dad helped me build the  Blue Garden Shed.  One of the things I was eager to install was a green roof but I determined that I didn’t have the knowledge or the money at the time to do it correctly. As s substitute one of the…

By now you may have received your first seed catalog(s) in the mail. It’s a fun time of the year for gardeners. We get to sift through the pages, read the descriptions designed to entice us, and dream of what we will plant next year. When the weather is cold and dreary the catalogs give us something bright and hopeful…

Maybe your garden didn’t turn out so well this year.  Maybe your tomatoes may died out due to disease or other vegetables might not have produced as well as they have in the past.  It happens.  Sometimes it’s the weather that causes it and sometimes insects bring in diseases, but those factors are hard to control.  One factor you can…