Irises!

The irises are happy this year:







As are the peonies:

Nothing sweeter...

Seriously. You haven't smelled sweet until you have smelled the intoxicating aroma of my great-grandmother's roses, some of which now reside in our yard.



The Steve irises are doing great, as usual:



Mom was here a couple of weeks ago, and as we pulled in the driveway she said "Look at them all smiling at us!"





Uh, yeah, the volunteer sunflowers are *everywhere!* In the ground, in the pots (apparently I used soil from last year that had seeds in it...) We really need to thin these so some will get big and strong and flourish.



I think this rose is called Peppermint:



The peonies are in full swing!



And, yum - fresh bok choy from the garden with dinner:

If only the Internet were scratch 'n sniff

Our peonies started blooming yesterday, and it's been raining ever since. I'm sure they'll be all beaten down to the ground after tonight's storms, but we'll see...

I wish you could smell these. They smell so. sweet. They smell very similar to my great-grandmother's roses, which hopefully I will be showing you soon!







And the Steve irises on the west side of the front beds are looking great, too!

Happy June!

Ah, it's June, sunny and 80 degrees. It has been a beautiful day! Here's what's happening in the beds this weekend:

Follow this shot all the way to Flickr and you can see the notes identifying everything in it. There is Bachelor's Button, Lady's Mantle, Echinacea, Geum, Sweet William and Coral Bells. Not everything is blooming just yet. Some things will come along later.



Here's another of Mrs. Pampalone's irises, this one all alone out under the rhododendron and next to the lilies. Hmm, maybe I should move it to a sunnier spot?



This columbine is under the pear tree.



The poppy bloomed! Here it is next to the Bleeding Heart.



And here's an "oops!" Our baby bok choi bolted. Oops! But it's pretty. Steve is going to let it keep going and see if he can save some of the seeds for next year. (Side note: I had a huge sandwich for lunch today of that delectable lettuce you see there to the left of the bok choi. Yum!)

I didn't realize until tonight...

...that the sweet "something" I was smelling recently were the light blue irises! I didn't know irises smelled so good!



The yellow don't really smell good at all, but they are stunning to look at!

Memorial Day Weekend

We spent a LOT of time gardening this past weekend. We ended up getting more New Guinea Impatiens for out front. We were debating whether or not to get them, and decided we probably wouldn't like it if we just left it plain. So we picked up a bunch of different ones and put them out there between the tulips like we usually do. They usually do well out there, so we hope they'll be big and healthy soon!



The "Steve" iris has started blooming! Thanks, Mom!



Bachelor button is blooming, too.



And even the new bleeding heart is getting in on the action! Lisa told me this weekend that she planted three bleeding hearts in a small space, and that they pushed everything out. Hmmm, I may need to move one of these to a different spot.



We decided to go with red dahlias and blue angelonia on either side of the fireplace again this year.



And who says money doesn't grow on trees? (Well, plants anyway.)

Annuals

I planted a bunch of annuals today. I think we're a little behind where we usually are this time of year. Usually we buy and plant annuals on Mother's Day weekend, but I think it rained that weekend this year? Anyway, I'm trying something new with pots out front. For the past two years we've just had the biggest pot on the whiskey barrel, but I thought I'd try something a little more interesting this year. Hopefully I've got a good balance of plants and good mixed heights in each pot!





In this hanging basket on either end are Black Pearl Peppers (kind of hard to see since they blend in with the soil), sweet potato vine and blue angelonia.



I forget what these are in the two hanging baskets in front of the fireplace. You can see the herbs (basil, sage, parsley, etc.) in the background.



We did some geraniums in the window box on the shed. I love the purple ones!



And these aren't annuals, but the light blue irises behind the yellow ones are blooming now. I'm pleased because I see four stalks with blooms on them that will be light blue, and last year we only had ONE blue bloom.



And the bleeding hearts are coming along nicely now, they're not white anymore! :-)



A woman the next street over from us has beautiful poppies, that every time we drove by I say to Steve "look at those poppies!" so we picked up a couple for ourselves today. They're not really doing anything right now, but when the bloom, I'll take a picture.

Lots of purple

The money plant / silver dollar plant is still going strong, and the rhododendrons are blooming, I'm amazed at how they are practically the same exact color!



And I am *so* excited that the irises are *finally* blooming! These blue and white ones we brought with us from Cold Spring. I did our landlord a favor and thinned her iris beds. :-)



These yellow ones were here when we bought the house. Mrs. Pampalone stopped by one day soon after we moved in and told us these were award winning irises, I should have asked her if *she* won the awards, or if just the plants did before she acquired them.



I wanted to show you the lily of the valley "patch" that came to us from my Mom's friend Barb. This is where I took the shots for Christa's birthday post.



This is something growing on the hill that was here when we moved in. Is this some kind of honeysuckle? It does smell sweet.





And again I'm thrilled with the silky dogwood growth. :-)

It's too nice out to blog

The grape hyacinths on the east side of the house are in full bloom now. Still waiting for the ones in the front beds to bloom. They'll look great with the new daffodils I planted if they ever catch up!

The hosta and Steve irises are significantly bigger now!

The myrtle is blooming really well this year. I think it's because we lost a big piece of the rhododendron that used to shade this area.

I love this flowering shrub with it's petite white flowers. We actually have two of these - I don't know what they are, they were here when we bought the house. One is in full bloom now, and the other hasn't even started! I don't know why they're not blooming at the same time, but it's nice that they'll be staggered and we'll get to enjoy them even longer.

I'm so excited there are buds on the rhododendron. It had a terrible fungus last year (we saw many others in the neighborhood with the same problem), and we had to cut out big sections and spray, but it seems like it's bouncing back this year.

I am (im)patiently waiting for the azaleas to bloom! We aggressively pruned them last year, and I'm hoping they'll be phenomenol this year! I'll have to do a post when they are in full bloom and show you the before and afters.