Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

And though it’s been said, many times, many ways… Merry Christmas!   May your season be filled with friends, family, and joy!  

So on Wednesday of this coming week I’ll have had this blog open for a month. I find it interesting that about two weeks after I start articles all over pop up about garden blogging. Is it something that is catching on? Or is it publicity brought on by the talented folks who have paved the garden blogging way. The…

This week my daughter and I put together a couple more raised beds in the garden. They aren’t exactly what I planned to do in the vegetable garden layout that I made a couple months ago but the addition of the extra beds has definitely improved over the layout I had last year, at least in terms of space. They…

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…

Best Wishes for an Amazing 2018! May your life be happy and prosperous while your garden grows green and lush! Happy New Year! Happy New Year

Do you know the feeling you have when everything major is accomplished for a while and you have nothing pressing that needs accomplished? You may still have chores and tasks that need done but it’s more maintenance than giant projects that constantly beckon for your attention. After hosting our garden club meeting where I lectured about building an arbor and…

If you remember a couple months ago I spent some time working on a garden remodel for my parents. I had purchased a few plants as gifts for Mother’s Day for my mom and decided that I would redo the garden along their backyard fence. The remodel mostly involved moving plants around, installing a stone block border, and mulching, lots…

Last week I told you about a garden pavilion I’ve been working on and off again in my parents yard. I was working on building the railing to begin enclosing the structure for eventual screening. We completed the rails last Wednesday and here’s how it looks now. The railing pattern: We designed this pattern after a couple images we saw…

Over the weekend our family visited Bountiful Blessings Farm here in Middle TN.  Bountiful Blessings is in the Williamsport area about 30-40 minutes away from where we live here in Spring Hill. The big draw for us was the strawberries.  My mom gave us a couple pints of strawberries from their farm about 2 weeks ago and they were so…

Isn’t this just a pretty tomato? This is one of the new varieties of vegetables I’m trying this year in the vegetable garden. Cherokee purple is an heirloom tomato that actually has a Tennessee origin. In 1990 man in Sevierville, TN named John Green sent a package with an unnamed tomato variety to Craig LeHoullier in Pennsylvania. According to Green…

This week marks seven years since I began this blog, Growing The Home Garden. It’s amazing to see how many changes have taken place in the garden and in my life since that late October day. When I started this blog our backyard was vacant of trees, plants, and anything resembling a garden. It’s grown and so has our family….

Today while at my in-law’s house I made a few cuttings from one of their viburnums. I’m not entirely positive about the variety but I believe it is a Viburnum plicatum var. tomentosum.  Viburnums are beautiful flowering shrubs in the spring that have very few pest and disease problems. The fall color can be good too so you get a…

On Monday while all three of my children were napping at the same time (that is a major feat!) I spent some time preparing some cuttings. Until Monday I really haven’t had many opportunities to get outside and garden. The weather has been too cold and with my youngest, who doesn’t seem to like taking naps during the day, I…

Before the first frost of the fall I took a few cuttings of my Persian Shield (Strobinlanthus dyerianus) to hopefully overwinter it as a houseplant. This was the first year for Persian Shield in my garden and I’ve only seen it at one nursery around so I wanted to be sure I had some for next year in the garden….

Spring is a great time for what? PERENNIAL PLANT PROPAGATION! OK, I get excited about making new plants and I wanted to share a little of what I’ve been working on in the garden. Spring really is a great time to take cuttings of your perennials, in fact it might be the best time. If you have never tried propagating…

I put together a short slideshow of the greenhouse pictures I’ve taken since beginning the project. They start in August with pictures of the site and end with the greenhouse’s current state (in December 2009). I hope you enjoy the look back!

Tonight Middle Tennessee is resting peacefully beneath a blanket of snow. Bitter cold set in here as it has in much of the eastern United States.  With the cold came swirling winds and all this white stuff.  So far this winter cold we’ve been experiencing is about 20 degrees below the normal averages for our region. December has been extremely…

This spring has brought us a ton of rain but has also made things really nice for flowering. There are so many things in bloom right now that I may have to save a few for a future post. It’s time to get started then! To the left is out tulip poplar tree in bloom. Catmint ‘Walker’s Low’ is one…