Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

While I can assure you that my back is perfectly fine (at the moment!) I do need to have some work done on the back of the greenhouse shed. A few more things have been accomplished since my last greenhouse update but there are always more tasks to tackle (it seems like I’ve said that before). Since last time I’ve fitted a…

Broken branch of a crape myrtle Sometimes in gardening, as in life, we experience bad breaks. We don’t intend for these to happen, they just do. Whether caused by too much stress, mistakes, or happenstance the only power we have over these breaks is to clean up and hope for the best. Such is the case with one of my…

Over the past month quite a few people have hit this blog searching for information on various topics. Sometimes their searches are in the form of a question and I thought it would be fun to go back and answer the questions. Most people looked for information with the word “how” but a few used “what”even fewer used “where” and…

As far as gardening chores go direct sowing squash and zucchini seeds is a very easy task for any home gardener to accomplish. In fact it’s a great one to do with young children who you want to encourage to get outdoors and in the garden. Squash and zucchini seeds are large seeds that are easy for kids to handle….

I wanted to say thank you to Barbara Wise for an excellent container gardening presentation this past weekend at the Spring Hill Garden Club Meeting! The slides and photos of the work you do were fantastic and the garden club appreciated seeing the ideas created by a expert in the field of container gardening. It was definitely a perfect start…

I’m always looking for new plants to experiment on to see if I can get them to root.  Yesterday I took some cuttings from a grape vine at my mom’s house.  Grape vines are pretty popular with home gardeners who want to grow their own food in the backyard so I thought I’d give them a try.  I haven’t successfully…

Over this weekend our travels found us at one of the local big box stores looking for shelving hardware for our downstairs closet (another project but not one that will make it to the garden blog).  While there I went through the seed kiosks looking for the plants that made my master list for seed purchases.  Now you’re probably wondering…

While we were out of town this past weekend we visited one of my wife’s aunts. She has a custom built log cabin in the woods surrounded by her garden. Since her property is very shady one of the most prominent plants in her garden is her hydrangeas. She has several kinds of hydrangeas that I’ll show you in a…

The other day I mentioned I had another daylily that was about to bloom called ‘Primal Scream’, well that daylily is screaming now! ‘Primal Scream’ has large orange blooms that have faint hints of reddish coloring in the outer edges of the petals and a more true orange color the further toward the center. I planted my ‘Primal Scream’ daylily…

Many people have patios with permeable materials like sand and pea gravel in the cracks. These patios are open invitations for weeds that decide to drop in and make themselves at home in those cracks! It doesn’t take anymore than a seed to sprout an annoyingly hard weed to pull out. There are many methods that will work to clean…

A couple years ago I was fortunate to participate in the Better Homes and Gardens 48 Hour Blog Challenge. Three other blogs and myself competed with projects subject to online voting to see who would win. The winner took home $5000, unfortunately it wasn’t me but the whole project was fun anyway – and it paid for the arbor! My…

Recently on Facebook in a group I am a part of someone posted about a plant they didn’t know after discovering that her daughter ate some of the fruit. I can imagine the fear that must be in her mind. I have 5 children and would panic as well if one of them ingested something that could be a poison….

Welcome to Tennessee where spring comes early, leaves again, comes back, leaves again and repeats that process until April! We really have about 4-8 different “Winters.” Somewhere along the way to springtime we are blessed with a bounty of blooms that brighten moods while the long awaited anticipation of the start of the gardening season is almost at it’s end….

Here is a quick list of things that need done in our June garden.  Keep in mind that we’re located in Spring Hill, TN in a zone 6b-7 area and these chores may not correspond with the growing season in your area.  You’ll need to do many of these tasks too but at different times. Sucker those tomatoes!  Removing the…

Gladiola Flowers The beginning of June is quite capable of leaving us mesmerized by all the flowers that appear. There’s no shortage of blooms for pollinators or for the gardener to gawk at!  So today I’m going to share with you a bunch of blooms.  And I mean a bunch!  I probably took too many photos for this post but…

Over Thanksgiving we spent some time in Mt. Juliet at my in-laws home. I always enjoy traipsing around the woods near their house just to explore. I did that often as a kid at my grandfather’s house and I’ve always been fond of spending time in the great outdoors. Often I come home with rocks for my garden borders but…

Last night I had a crazy thought “why not take a few last minute cuttings before the cold weather moves in for good?” The cuttings would need warmth to root and survive, so keeping them outside was not an option at this time of the year. I found a decorative pot that my wife bought a few years ago at…

Very little progress has been made on my greenhouse shed project yet. The persistent rain combined with a much needed family vacation postponed construction, excavation and pretty much everything except for planning. But the planning is probably the most important part in any big project.  This is easily the biggest project I’ve attempted so far and I’m making sure to spend…