Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

One of my goals this year is to add more herbs to the gardens (not just the vegetable garden). Herbs have many different characteristics that can make the attractive as well as useful.Basil (Ocimum basilicum)Last year I became painfully aware that after making a delicious batch of pesto that we were out of fresh basil and it was the end…

Over the weekend I tackled more prep work in the vegetable garden. I’ve already planted several things in the raised beds including onions, potatoes, lettuce, and spinach but planting wasn’t the main weekend task. One of the things I really didn’t like about my vegetable garden is now officially a thing of the past – the grass! In each of…

Our second submission for the Garden Blogger Fall Color Project comes to us from Anna who put together a really neat slide show of her trip. Anna’s trip to the Shanendoah Valley in Virgina is full of great Autumn photos from the old grist mill along Silver Lake to the mountains of Virginia. She also shows us a visit to…

On Monday I posted about 5 Plants I Want in Every Garden.  In case you missed it the post was about plants that should I ever move I will plant again in the new garden.  As several of the commenters pointed out it’s hard to just pick five. With that in mind I’ll add four more to my list.  Neither this…

This week I went to my mom’s house to do a little digging.  Back in the late spring we noticed small butterfly bush seedlings beginning to sprout in the pathway’s of her vegetable garden. As they grew large enough to transplant the weather became hot and transplanting wasn’t a great idea. Then my father passed away and just about everything…

This weekend was the annual Bloom ‘N Garden Expo at the Williamson County Agricultural Center.  You can bet that when there are plants and me in the same location I’ll end up coming home with something!  When going to these festivals I make two rules for myself with purchases.  One, the purchase has to be something I don’t have and…

The legumes are one awesome vegetable family (Leguminosae).  Really, they are!  Legumes are essential to any crop rotation plan because of one major trait: legumes are nitrogen fixers!  What does that mean?  It means that legumes have an amazing ability to take nitrogen from the air and change it into a form usable by plants.  But it’s not really the…

The plants are gradually beginning to come to life here in my garden. Yesterday’s post highlighted a few of March’s blooms, today here are a few more flower photos! The hyacinths are blooming all over. So far I haven’t been able to detect their sweet scent on the wind, but maybe I haven’t been outside enough lately. If it would…

Have you ever stood in one place to take a few pictures in all the different directions of your garden? It’s a great way to observe the progress of your garden from slightly different perspectives. (Click on any of the below pictures to enlarge them.) We’ll start here against the house. Up close there is a pyracantha and a young…

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…

To say I’m a fan of heucheras is an understatement. I like to think of myself as a collector of coral bells, as they are often called, even though my collection is still just a work in progress. I’m gradually adding different varieties to my garden but seem to be running out of room in the corner shade garden (corner…

The holiday season is in full swing and the good news is that gardeners are very easy to shop for! Whether your gardener likes gardening with vegetables, herbs, or ornamental plants there is something for everyone. Today here are some Christmas gift ideas for gardeners to help you find just the right thing! (Disclaimer: The links in this post are…

Many years ago back when I was in college I brought home a lemon from the store. On a whim I decided that I would plant a couple of the seeds from that little lemon into a cup and see if I could grow a lemon tree. The seeds sprouted and several little lemon trees grew. The little lemon trees…

A few years ago I found a maple tree on sale at one of our local nurseries.  It was only five dollars so I bought it, planted it, and left it alone.  It was a ‘Brandywine’ maple tree which is a cross between an ‘October Glory’ and ‘Autumn Flame’.  With parents that good it had to be something special! Almost…

Hopefully this will be the last time this year but there is a chance of a slight freeze tonight and tomorrow night (April 28 & 28)! The weather forecasters are predicting temperatures in the mid to upper 30’s for both nights. After that we should be in the clear.Protect those plants!If you are like me and have already planted some…

Maybe you’ve heard of this already or maybe you’ve seen it in the stores yourself but Triscuit is promoting the “home farming” movement. It’s an interesting idea that backyard gardeners have been doing for many many years. Simply put home farming is growing your own food in the home garden. While gardening may be an all inclusive term to describe…

Not many plants bloom in the dead of winter but you can count on Mediterranean White Heath (Erica x darleyensis) to put on a subtle show.  It blooms with tiny little snow colored blossoms that (at least in my Tennessee garden) emerge during January and February.  I have five of these little winter gems located throughout our front garden and…

I planted these daffodils late last fall. I found them after they went on sale in December and planted them soon after. They are just now blooming while all the other daffodils are fading which is pretty neat! I may plant a few late daffodils each year to achieve the same effect!