Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

Thanksgiving is coming up next week and soon those turkeys will be filling our homes with the savory scents of a delicious dinner to be enjoyed among friends and family (and perhaps a nap to follow).  A lot of preparation goes into preparing that perfect Thanksgiving dinner and this being a gardening blog we aren’t talking turkey here but rather –…

Of all the fall colors I’ve seen this year the Japanese maples seem to have topped all other trees.  This Japanese maple at my mom’s house was figuratively on fire with red foliage lighting up the scenery.  I didn’t have my camera with me when it was at its peak but even past peak it’s beauty can still be seen….

For a couple years now I’ve watched and waited for our hellebore to bloom. Every year I jealously read the posts of other gardener bloggers who are happily displaying their hellebore blooms but alas, I had no flowers to share! But now the single Lenten rose I have has grown into an 18″ little bush with glossy green leaves and…

In my last post I mentioned 5 garden chores I have on my to-do list. If it were only five items I would have it easy! As usual there is an endless supply of garden chores to do this time of year and here are a few more. Deal with the leaves – Most of the leaves are still hanging…

It’s fall and the gardening season is winding down, but it’s not too late to save a few dollars for next year. There are lots of techniques gardeners can do this time of year to save money for next season. Today I’m going to give you five ideas that will help you save money on next year’s gardening budget! So…

Today I stopped by one of our big box home improvement stores and visited the declining stock in their gardening area. I’ve mentioned before about the good deals you can find there and so today I found a couple deals! While they are desperately cleaning out their summer and autumn wears to make room for Christmas trees, I picked up…

It isn’t often I have a product to test in my garden where I actually say “Holy crap, this is awesome!” when no one else is around. Really. Products that good are really hard to come by because I’m fairly picky. A few weeks ago I was sent two items from Fiskars to try out. For disclaimer purposes I was…

In late May I wrote a post about how to propagate Asiatic lilies from leaves. I figured it was time to show you how things are coming along. After small little bulbs began to form on the base of the leaves I planted the bulbs into small pots. As you can see in the picture below the old leaves completely…

Flowering of the Purple Homestead Verbena If you haven’t tried growing ‘Purple Homestead’ Verbena in your home garden you really should! I’ve used this purple flowering perennial in three places so far and can think of many more locations I would like to see them. ‘Purple Homestead’ has found homes in our landscape in the mailbox garden, our front garden,…

Here are a couple videos that I pieced together of our backyard during the recent flooding rains. I do want to reiterate from my post yesterday that my experience was insignificant compared to how this flood has changed the lives of many fellow Tennesseans. We are doing fine with very few problems in our yard but please keep those people…

So what is a weed? By nearly every gardener’s definition a weed is simply a plant in the wrong place. It could be a flower that self-seeded in an unwanted location but that’s not what most people really consider a problem plant, and true weeds are problem plants. So for Worst Weed Wednesday here are several plants from my gardens…

Yesterday we attended the Bloom’N Garden Expo at the Williamson County Agricultural Exposition. Center. It was fun to go to an event with so many garden related vendors. I spoke to the people at our local garden club, we visited a booth that was sponsored by a wildlife rescue group, and saw many many plants and other displays at the…

Are you looking for something, anything to keep you going until spring time?  Are you frantically searching the garden for signs of life?  Here are two early signs to look for that will tell you spring is just around the corner! The daffodils are rising!  The foliage of daffodils always comes up early but these are especially early.  This photo…

It’s almost always true that success in an endeavor brings excitement and enthusiasm for more and I’ve always found this true for plant propagation. If you’ve never tried propagating plants because you think it’s difficult or just too much work then think again! There are all sorts of plants out there that are very easy to propagate and barely require…

I’ve been working on establishing my bird bath garden over the last couple days. I’ll show you the results soon but I thought I would show you the layout of the garden first. I’ve chosen plants that both the birds and the butterflies will enjoy for their diets. Of course the main reason I selected the plants was I liked…

This week we began a series of posts on edible landscaping.  Below you will find several articles to get started on creating a productive and beautiful edible landcape.  There are many more articles to come in this series so please check back or bookmark this post for updates! How to Begin a Plan Create a “To Grow” list, identify a…

I’m always excited for a new challenge to accomplish in the garden and recently I was invited to participate in Better Homes and Gardens 48-hour Blog Challenge.  Together BHG.com and The Home Depot are proposing a very interesting event that is sure to be fun for me and hopefully for you as well.  Here’s the deal.  They have given me…

Before I begin to highlight a few more front garden spots in my yard let me just say that many of these locations have not been prepared yet for the year. I still need to weed more, mulch more and add new plants in places!These first few pictures are from the mailbox garden. Pretty much everyone has something around their…