We're rich!

Hah! But look at all the money plant / silver dollar plant. These are mixed in throughout almost all our beds, and they all started from one lone plant that must have reseeded itself from Mrs. Pampalone's gardening days.



The azaleas are starting to join the color show.



Look at all the volunteer sunflowers along the bricks! There are more throughout the front and side beds, yay!



Mrs. Pampalone's primroses are starting to bloom.



This was all seen on our way to harvest part of breakfast from our backyard.





Asparagus and eggs. A heavenly combination we learned of last spring...

Sad news from the vegetable garden...

We had to pull out, cut down and bag two of the tomato plants showing signs of late blight. :-( This is scary stuff. If you have tomatoes and/or potatoes in your garden, beware.

So, on to other things. The zucchini are still coming in strong. (The yellow squash is from our CSA, Common Ground Farm)





I don't know why I didn't take an after photo!

Silver Dollar Plant, aka money plant, is drying okay. Some other ones are moldy. Too much rain!



I told you the sunflowers were bigger now! These are ALL volunteers, planted themselves from seeds that fell from last year's sunflowers.



This one planted itself right next to the front steps. And amazingly, I was able to overwinter the canna!



These pretty "red" ones are on the west side of the front beds.



Voodoo bulbs, still going strong!



Lots of phlox. I really don't want this much phlox here. It's crowding out the echinacea.



Rose of sharon:



Russian sage, yeah, I need more of this, too:



Normal size cucumber and crazy big cucumber we obviously didn't see and pick till it was HUGE! And some zucchini and eggplant in there, too.



Just for fun, because I love them so. Finn:



Wally. Naughtiest cat in the whole world. I would prefer he *not* hang out right there on the counter!

Azaleas and Herbs

Our azaleas along the east side of the house are blooming, the ones out front are not. I hope we don't miss them completely! We are going to Italy for the next 2 1/2 weeks, and I'm hoping to see some wonderful spring gardents while we are there.

We have a lot of sunflowers growing...we'll thin these out and move the biggest ones to the spots where we really want them to grow.



They've even reseeded along the edge of the sidewalk in front of the azaleas!



This azalea didn't do so well this winter. After it's done blooming we'll cut it back.



This is one of our Hardy Mums from last fall. I finally stopped being lazy and actually put four of them in the ground!



I potted up the herbs: parsley, basil, thyme and cilantro.





This strawberry crawled out of the strawberry pot last summer...



See you in a couple of weeks!

Lots Going On

Voodoo bulb #2 bloomed the other day. It had started to crack, so we moved it outside before the stench got too powerful!



We have lots of little sunflowers growing where the seeds fell from last year's crop.



The first of the tulips opened mid last week (I am a belated blogger...) and I was so excited to see them! Then the heat hit, and some of them are kind of wilty now. I'll admit, I'm glad the weather is back to normal today!



These are new grape hyacinths I planted along the east side of the house. I like the blue and white together!



Put this in the "what the heck is this?!" category. These little red flowers, which almost look like tulip blooms were blooming over the weekend. They are on the stems of this little shrub that I have been trying to rip out for the five years we have lived here. I have never seen it bloom before! I wonder if it was the insane heat. I don't think I'm usually out working in the beds this early, so maybe it's always bloomed, but I've never seen it. Weird!





Our beloved strawberry patch. Sigh. I weeded and composted, and now I will patiently wait for June. Sigh.



Mrs. Pampalone's Primrose are blooming, and looking great.



And, we have tons of wonderful blooms on the Bleeding Heart I planted last year! I was worried they might be in too sunny of a spot, but I guess not. :-)

It's September already?

This summer is flying (has flown?) by. I can't believe it's Labor Day. Things happening in the garden include...

A woodpecker on the sunflower out front! (Sorry this photo isn't so great, I stood out on the porch in my towel after getting out of the shower to try and get a shot, so was in a bit of a rush!)



The pear trees are full of pears, and we have started picking - yum!



The sunflowers are still doing really great!



The peppermint rose is blooming again.



We learned a few years ago how absolutely beautiful cotton flowers are, so each year we grow a few - not only because it's kind of neat to pick cotton in our backyard, but for the flowers as well.



And, we had the most delicious, colorful, local dinner the other night. Everything is local, even the sausage is from the northeast. Green beans, cremini mushrooms, purple potatoes, red and green peppes, onions, tomatoes...yum!

Ah, refreshing

It rained the past two days, and we needed it, so I won't complain. Now there is a beautiful breeze and things in the gardens are perking up as the sun shines. Here's what's going on:

The "real" daylilies are blooming. I think I will dig up some of the "wild" orange ones that bloomed earlier and replace them with some Stella D'Oro ones this fall when they go on sale over at Adams.



Cool rooster in the background, right? Uncle Bruce gave us that for our wedding. It's a bummer the paint is wearing off.

Near the daylilies, the Rose of Sharon is also blooming, and has been for a couple of weeks.



In the back corner, it's more purple phlox!



And, brown eyed susans I brought with us from Cold Spring that came back for a couple of years, then didn't last year, and are now back again, but in a slightly different spot. Hmmm.



The only problem with all the phlox doing so well is it's shading the thistle, which is not nearly as big this year as it was last year.



The sunflowers out front are still flourishing:



And the basket on the fence has filled out nicely. Here is is when we planted it, and then the next shot is now. The black eyed pearl peppers did not do well, they needed more sun, so I added coleus which seems pretty happy!





And I cut a couple of huge bunches of silver dollar plant last weekend. This weekend I'll sit there and peel them and harvest the seeds to sprinkle around in the beds and on the hills.



Speaking of seeds, Steve and I are going to a Hudson Valley Seed Library seed-saving workshop on Saturday, should be fun!