Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

You’ve probably heard of adding lime to soil.  Farmers and lawn experts recommend it frequently to add to gardens and lawns to help your plants grow, but why? Why should you use lime for your tomatoes? What is Lime? Lime is calcium carbonate.  Which leads us to one easy answer for why it might help tomatoes – to combat blossom…

After being cooped up all winter my daughters and I hightailed it to the backyard and spent the day outdoors digging in the dirt. We accomplished many of the chores I mentioned on Friday (wait they weren’t chores because I enjoyed doing them!). One of those tasks was a rearrangement of the vegetable garden. I wanted to move four small…

Yesterday would have been my father’s 68th birthday.  He was a Halloween baby born back in 1943 but since July 6th, 2011 we’ve been without my dad.  I think about him in some way everyday and I definitely don’t need anything to remind me of how much he helped me through life, but to honor my dad in a small…

The number one thing people think of when the fall season comes is the leaves.  Thoughts of harvests, festivals, and cooler weather come too but when the fall season comes to mind its the leaves that get the attention.  Everybody loves the leaves!  Here’s why: 5 Reasons to Love Your Leaves The colors.  Mother nature gives us a spectacular color…

Things are looking good for my butterfly bush cuttings. So far none have succumbed to damping off. Only one lost any leaves. One good sign of a cutting is when new growth starts to develop. As you can see on the closest cutting that new growth is starting to sprout. This usually means that roots have emerged! I’ll leave them…

Finally the major air gap that lurked just beneath the roof line has been enclosed and trimmed up. It’s not air tight yet and needs sealing but the major 3.5 inch x 16 foot gaps are no longer open on the sides of the greenhouse. I’m not ready to open the champagne yet but I feel like a major weight…

I just posted on the greenhouse shed page with a new report on the siding installation. The garden shed is shaping up! Adding the siding really changes the look for the better – much closer to what I’ve envisioned. There’s always more to do but progress is being made! I forgot to mention in the post but I also installed…

I couldn’t help but snap the picture below.  It’s white clover and it’s in my lawn. What lawn companies will tell you is that this little beautiful green plant that grows in patches is a weed.  Don’t believe them.  Clover is a useful little plant in many ways! First of all clover is a legume. It’s similar to beans and…

‘Bluecrop’ Blueberry Bush As I indicated in my last post about the two camellias in one pot I’m always looking for ways to garden cheap.  Imagine my excitement when I stumbled across some ‘Bluecrop’ blueberries that are normally over $20 marked down to $5 each!  Of course I snatched two up (I might have gotten more had they had a…

Good morning gardeners! I wanted to write a post to update you on a few events going on in my life. I don’t write much personal information on this blog. I always like to keep my writing very close to gardening, but I felt it was time to share an update with you. For the last 8 years I have…

This year one of the tomato varieties I decided to grow was the ‘Tasmanian Chocolate’ tomato. Overall it proved to be a tasty and easy to grow tomato. The ‘Tasmanian Chocolate’ tomato is a determinate variety that is well suited for growing in pots. It grows to about 3 feet tall, at least the plant I grew did in my…

Today I begrudgingly bring you some very beautiful flowers. The only reason I’m hesitant is because of the tree that these perfect little white blooms flower from each spring. Can you guess it? If not I’ll give you a couple clues – it’s over planted. Still can’t guess? It’s smells awful in the spring, I’m talking rotting-fish awful. Still can’t…

Over the last two months life has thrown many curveballs that have beaned the batter on numerous occasions. You would think that I’d be making some runs here or there but unfortunately I seem to be getting out at third every time. What does this baseball analogy have to do with anything? Well sometimes we get taken away from what…

You hear about it all the time crape myrtles being unceremoniously chopped off before they can become what they should be. This pruning method is best known as crape murder. The result of crape murder is a plant that ends up with lollipop like flowering tops with branches that flop all around in the slightest breeze. Can you tell I’m…

Last week I put together another downspout dry creek bed to help escort the water away from the house foundation. We don’t really have any issues with too much moisture around the house but it’s better to think preemptively and solve those dilemmas before problems arise. Besides this is such an easy project to do that it can be started…

I don’t have any pictures ready for this post although I did take some. I’m working to prepare my in-laws landscape for my brother-in-law’s wedding in July. Here’s just a quick list of some of the projects we’re working to complete.Weed the various gardens including a patio garden, a front yard sidewalk garden, a shady woodland garden and a raised…

Even though it’s been a short week we have lots of fall color to share for the Thanksgiving edition of the Fall Color Project! I won’t be posting for the Fall Color Project on Friday due to the Thanksgiving holiday so I thought I would highlight these posts a little early! What could be more perfect than fancy foliage, a…

The gardener gone A.W.O.L. was me of course, but for good reasons I assure you! No doubt you are familiar with the saying “make hay while the sun shines.” Well…the sun has been shining in our Tennessee home garden. The past couple days I have been busy in the yard trying to turn this place into a fantastic garden this…