Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

Without this world of blogging there are so many places I would never have seen or even known about. Thanks to VP at Veg Plotting I’ve just learned of one more place that if I’m ever in England I would have to visit. Go read about VP’s trip to the Westonbirt Arboretum and view some of the photos she took. …

It’s been a very busy week for me and I haven’t had much time to write but I did want to post a few photos of what is growing in the garden. Today is a rainy soggy mess in the garden and not very well suited for gardening so looking back at the garden photos from the week is the…

Please ignore the mess of bricks and leftover lumber lying on the floor at the bottom of this picture. Instead focus on the cabinets! Family friends were cleaning out their basement and passed on quite a few pieces of lumber and odds and ends they thought could be reused. The cabinets came along for the ride too. With a little…

As gardeners we deal with all kinds of issue that can make gardening frustrating and difficult.  One of those issues is pests.  Pests come in many forms from thousands of kinds of insects to birds and animals.  No method of pest control is 100% effective all the time so gardeners need be creative problem solvers in the garden.  The best…

By far my most favorite shrub is the viburnum. I’m working on collecting as many as I can, either through propagation or buying them, to fill in areas around our gardens. If you don’t have a viburnum in your garden you really should plant at least one or two. Some are fragrant, some are evergreen, and they are great for…

Last weekend I brought home a few things from my in-laws house. I’m very fortunate to be able to take cuttings of anything they have around or to be able to gather rocks for edging in our garden. So what did I bring home last weekend? I’ve already told you about one thing, the pyracantha cuttings. I took 14 cuttings…

Here is Part Six of The Home Garden’s series of posts on how to garden on a budget.I began planning this post with the intention of talking about the importance of planning a garden. After typing and typing I realized that this is a subject so large that it really needed to be broken down into smaller sections. One of…

If you don’t like kitty cats then perhaps you should not read further! If you can at least mildly tolerate those wayfaring strays, then this plant that I plan on planting this year might be good for you too! It has some profound benefits that don’t necessarily involve fraternizing with your feline friends. The plant in question is catmint. Its…

Imagine my puzzlement when I glanced at one of my two spireas and saw empty branches. This was a plant that was flushing out with its reddish amber to golden leaves just a couple days ago. The leaves around the tips were completely intact but some of the stems were nearly naked. What caused this damage? Aphids! What do Aphids…

There are lot of home and garden products that a gardener can choose to use in the garden. Not all of them are good to use frequently and should only be used sparingly or not all all. Roundup is one of those types of chemicals. It accomplishes its goal very well but will leave residue in the soil. Here is…

Everything has it’s own time, even seeds. They just don’t last forever! Fortunately though many seeds do last a long period of time and you can use seed from previous years to grow your garden. I’ve had tomato seeds germinate that were over 10 years old. Best of all they produced healthy tasty tomatoes! I’ve had echinacea seed as well…

Yesterday I spent some time out in the garden with my 3 year old daughter. We dug, we raked, we planted, we played with worms, simply put … we gardened! Here are just a few photos from our time outdoors in the beautiful weather and in the garden. (Oh and just so you know “free for all” doesn’t mean you…

It seems that the fall colors are slow to fade from one plant in particular in our front garden: spirea. This little shrub was transplanted from a previous location further down the sidewalk. It was little, just a small sprig that emerged in the spring after we bought the house. The previous residents allowed the landscape to grow out of…

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

There are always a ton of things to do in the garden when the growing season is in full swing. Hopefully most of the garden is set up and ready to go with only general maintenance needing the gardeners attention but this isn’t always the case. Sometimes projects pop up, problems arise, and then sometimes we haven’t gotten everything done…

If you’re like me and planted your tomatoes from seed a few weeks ago you may start to notice the roots beginning to move beyond your original potting medium.  I used the peat pellet system for starting our peppers and tomatoes and noticed recently that the roots are extending beyond the pellets. What does this mean? Time to get a…

…spring is here!  Spring is happening all over the place.  The trees are blooming, the bulbs are coming up all over, and of course the weeds are growing too! Daffodils and hyacinths are in full bloom and other flowers are well on their way to a beautiful spring.  Here’s a little of what we get to see in our garden:…

Have you had enough of fall color yet? Not me! We have two more great examples of spectacular fall color from two more great bloggers.In Maine Sarah, a professional writer and blogger of Sarah Laurence Blog, takes us on a weekend hiking trip into the mountains of Maine. The photographs of fall colors in Maine are simply stunning. While the…