Archive for Gardening
Spring Gardening Tips for Colorado Gardeners – To Do List
Posted by: | CommentsAs you know if you’ve lived and tried to garden in Colorado for very long there is one very important rule to ALWAYS remember.
Wait until Mother’s Day to buy your flowers!
If you’ve already broken that rule then just know that you better be Janey on the spot about bringing them in if there’s even a hint that it might snow or freeze overnight. All those hours at your local favorite gardening store, bringing all your petaled friends home, hardening them off and then lovingly placing them into your favorite pots was all wasted.
Things to do in April in your Garden
Indoor Things to do
- Plant seeds for peppers, spinach collards, beets, celery garlic leeks, onions, lima beans, endive, escarole and eggplant
Outdoors:
- From seed: Carrots, peas, spinach, turnips, chinese cabbage, parsley, spinach, broccoli, kale, cauliflower, onion sets, garlic and asparagus roots
- Plant Spring bulbs and roots – Ixia, Lily of the Valley, anemone, lilies, freesia, gladiolus, dahlia, cannah lilies and peonies – Plant “Hardened-off” perennials
- Hardened Off = those you have acclimated to outdoor conditions by leaving them out during the day but sheltering them from cold night time temperatures.
Do you have any favorite things you like to do in the spring? Share in the comments below.
Thyme Began in the Garden
Posted by: | CommentsMy Colorado Garden in July 2009
This sign that a friend painted for me severals years ago was the inspiration for the name of this blog…
This has been one of the rainiest summers I can remember in Colorado and it’s made it even more beautiful here than it usually is. The fields are all green and strange things are happening in my garden that have never happened before. My sedum are blooming!
My Dragons Blood Sedum is also blooming. I guess this may be common elsewhere but It’s the first year I’ve ever had it do this here.
These daisies are from Tagawa Gardens, my favorite gardening center on the planet.
I think a ‘ daisy is one of the most gorgeous flowers in the garden.
These were a surprise. I left a few carrots in the garden last fall and they bloomed! I think they look kind of like queen anne’s lace which I’ve never been able to get started.
I have lots and lots of thyme in my garden this year.. Good thing I LOVE fresh herbs to cook with. Here it is mixed in with the threadbare Coreopsis.
I’m probably going to have to move some of this thyme or it’s going to take over the Coreopsis and perhaps the rest of my garden!. My basil is not doing well at all this year.. I’m thinking it must need less rain and more sun.
I just love old stuff in my garden. I rescued this old fence from a farm that was being torn down for progress. I just love the vibrant colors that are mixing together in this corner spot. The blue delphiniums are one of my favorite.
Close up of a echinacea (purple coneflower) I have several varieties of these growing in the garden this year including a peach colored one. It’s first crop of flowers got beat up by the hail but I’m hoping the one’s just budding out will live up to it’s purple cousins.
This Bee Balm attracts hummingbirds like none other! My cats know this now and just sit and stare at the base of this flower the minute I let them outside. Don’t worry.. they never catch them!
This pansy survived the winter.. Another hardy favorite of mine.
And then after weeding and deadheading your garden
…….. a glass of pino grigio with cut berries out of the garden..
I promise you it’s as refreshing as it looks! My wonderful husband always makes these for me.
Which are your favorite flowers in your garden?
I’d love to hear from you and see the pics of any other flower freaks out there.
Cats belong in the house and in the garden
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Meet Weasley my 1/2 Orange Tabby 1/2 Siamese cat. We adopted he and his brother Potter one year ago from a rescue society called Every Creature Counts. They have been a joy to our home ever since. On the other side of that fence are two dogs barking their brains out but my guy just looks at him like “why pray tell are you making all that racket?” I live in an area very close to open space so I never let my cats out unescorted and miraculously they actually have never even tried to jump the fence.
Sitting out in the garden watching my kitty boys banter around in the garden, batting bugs, hopping on stalks of grass waving in the warm summer breeze is such a delight, it’s hard to come inside and get to work each day. They get up each morning with with one thing on their mind… how long it will take them to “TALK” me into letting them go outside to play.
Meet Mr. Harry Potter (Weasley’s sidekick of course, or is it the other way around?) He obviously took after his father while his brother took after his tabby cat mother. Potter is the softest cat you’ve ever had the pleasure to have on your lap. He’s all cuddles, purrs and soft paws keeping your hands close by to keep you petting him.
If you have cat pictures to share, I’d love to see my readers faithful friends too. 
They are so funny in this video, you can see how excited they are just to sniff the smells of nature and watch the bugs and cotton fluffs fly by.
Garden in full bloom in June
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My Colorado Garden Year Two 2009
One of the fun things of moving into a previously owned home is to see what discoveries you’ll make in Spring when the efforts of the previous gardener become evident peeking through the snow. However! this garden has absolutely not ONE flower, bush, bulb, nada but the two struggling fruit tree’s and a very nice drip system throughout the raised gardens. The good part was that I got to start playing from scratch.
I am one of those gardeners who really doesn’t follow all the rules of gardening. I like to buy things because they are pretty and plant them closer together than recommended because I’m impatient to have a nice full garden.. so of course last year with an empty palette of dirt to fill in, i bought TONS of perennials, bulbs and transplanted things from my X-husbands house that I’d lovingly planted and nurtured and I wasn’t going to leave them behind.
In this yard you can see spring blooming phlox, and Icelandic poppies in beautiful shades of peach, white, apricot, orange and red. I planted these from seeds last year and never dreamed they’d come back and be so beautiful.. This year I’m digging them up and transplanting them in other spots in the garden since as I mentioned before.. I have a tendency to over crowd my flowers. You can also see Purple Coneflowers, Oriental Poppies (also grown from seed) Lupine (from the x’s house) . The old piece of fence is from a Colorado farm that I picked up at an estate sale it still has the original latch.. I just love old rusty stuff to decorate with. The wreath I wrapped myself from garden vines from last years yard cuttings. I’m all about recycling and going green whenever feasible. You can also see another of my favorites… Blue Flax.
Orange and Yellow Icelandic Poppies
Blue Flax Up Close
I just love how it looks waving wildly in the field all around the prairie. I find it’s harder to get to thrive in your cultivated garden than when you throw the seeds haphazardly.
Here you can see the Lupine leaves getting ready to grow huge gorgeous stalks of purple flowers (I have faith!) and to the right of them a variety of honeysuckle that hummingbirds love and so do my cats.. they know hummers hang out here, so they do too… just hoping for their big (FAT) chance to pounce.
Spring Gardening Tips – May
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Did you manage to wait until after Mother’s day to put out plants? I finally managed it but only because I’ve been in the hospital this year! I did put out a few herbs into my big tin barrel on the East side of my home. They are doing just fine! Any time after the 15th you can start to sow seeds or plant six packs of seedlings. It’s always a good idea to plant early in the day or cool afternoons and not in full sun. The most important time in a seedlings life is when you put it in the ground so spend a little extra time now and it will pay big dividends in the end.
My favorite part of this month is seeing what great surprises my efforts of the last growing season are going to give me this year. I was pleasantly surprised by my Oriental Poppies that grew from seed. They are just gorgeous bright jewel colors.
Plant annuals and herbs at the same depth as in the container. Dig the hole 2 times the size of the pot and loosen the soil in the bottom. Fill the hole around the plant with the fill dirt, tamp down and water well. Pinch off all the flowers from annuals like petunias and pansies, to direct the nutrients to the roots of the plant for more blooms and healthier growth. Gently spread out the roots at the bottom of the pot so they will grow into the new soil. Water as the plant directions indicate and pay special attention to the new transplants for the first week.
Container plants and window boxes are also due, plant shade loving plants together, sun loving plants together and place accordingly. Your combination possibilities are endless. I like to change it up every year as the plants available change or my mood does. Choose from contrasting colors together or one color scheme in mass in several pots all grouped together. Don’t just think of the flowers, also look for interesting shapes, colors and texture of plants for each pot. Taller things in the back with trailing varieties spilling out the sides of the pot will add to an informal style.
Cut back all your fall flowering plants if you haven’t done that already and clear out all dead twigs throughout your garden. Dead head your Mum’s for increased flowering come August.
I try and grow Zennias every year and they never work for me… I recently read that it’s better to plant by seed and I usually forget, so that’s my challenge for myself this summer… to get some zennia’s to grow.
