Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

Today while at my in-law’s house I made a few cuttings from one of their viburnums. I’m not entirely positive about the variety but I believe it is a Viburnum plicatum var. tomentosum.  Viburnums are beautiful flowering shrubs in the spring that have very few pest and disease problems. The fall color can be good too so you get a…

May is a great time in the garden. The plants are full of growth, flowers are coming alive, the weather is good (except when it’s not 😉 ) and the irises are blooming! Lots of other things are blooming too but the irises are the standouts of the moment. The iris flowers even withstood the harsh rains of last weekend…

Last week I told you about a garden pavilion I’ve been working on and off again in my parents yard. I was working on building the railing to begin enclosing the structure for eventual screening. We completed the rails last Wednesday and here’s how it looks now. The railing pattern: We designed this pattern after a couple images we saw…

It’s always nice to have a few flowers that are so extremely reliable that you can count on them even during the most awkward periods of weather.  Recently it’s been raining which has been helping us recover from our drought but these flowers were doing great in the drought conditions.  Let’s take a look! Orange cosmos is always a standout. …

I’d like to thank all the participants of the Fall Color Project this year! We’ve been able to see lots of wonderful colors from across the country.  In a few days I’ll put together a wrap up post with all the participants listed but today I would like to take a moment to announce the winner of the solar water…

Every now and then it’s fun to go back and look up the statistics from The Home Garden to see what people are looking for and eventually wind up here. Sometimes the search terms are funny but hopefully the results lead the searcher to great info. So here are ten search terms that showed up that all began with the…

Last year I came up with a layout for our vegetable garden that I later decided wasn’t as effective as I hoped. This year I made a better raised bed layout that focused more on the convenience of the gardener and it is working great! The central path makes getting around a breeze and the smaller paths around each bed…

My lately planted vegetable garden is doing its best to get back on track!  It’s been a busy spring time and everything got delayed until the official “whenever I could manage a few minutes” time.  But one of the great things about gardening in Tennessee is the long growing season.  Even if you don’t get the vegetable garden planted within…

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…

I’m not sure how this snowfall counts. Would it be the first one in Middle Tennessee? Would it even be enough to count? I’m not sure, I only know that we did not receive what our northern neighbors have been gifted with this December!I know it disappointed my two year old daughter who asked me several times to make a…

I saw this story online at the Tennessean Newspaper’s website. Apparently a women was stealing decorations from grave sites and adding them to her landscape! How desperate must your landscape be to take fake flowers from the graves of the deceased then add them to your garden. The story also says that she took solar lights and benches. Maybe she…

The siding work on the two gables for the garden shed have been completed! It’s really starting to come together. I can’t wait to get in there and start working on something other than the building!

Here are few things happening in my garden that are worth a look at through the photos. No real theme for this post just a chance to look at some garden pictures! Beautyberry Bush Morning Glory Red Zinnia Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly

It’s a good thing I took several pictures toward the end of last week since the rain and dreary weather has dampened much of the garden. Sunny days are ahead but until then all we have are a few photos of flowers from the gardens. That will just have to do! Up first we have some achillea. Also called yarrow…

Last week I attended the Nashville Lawn and Garden Show.  I’ve been very busy planting seeds and getting the garden ready and I haven’t had a lot of time to post lately so I thought I would share a few short posts with your from the show that had some clever design ideas that you may want to consider for…

Rocks are a great landscape feature to add to your yard and garden. They come in all sizes and don’t need any real maintenance. You can put moss on the rocks or let them rest as silent monoliths watching over your garden. You can use them for edging, for paving stones, stepping stones, and retaining walls. There are just so…

Yesterday the weather was great so I went outside to tinker and putter around. Tinkering and puttering is just when you look for little things to do that don’t take a lot of time but you need or want to get done. Here’s what I did:I trimmed the ornamental grasses down. They were looking pretty ragged and since they never…

Most people look at plant foliage and admire the wonderful variegation of the leaves or the shapes, but have you ever stopped to admire the multibranched vein patterns? If not take a look sometime when you are out in the garden or hiking in the woods. The veins form very unique patterns that whether follow the variegation or simply highlight…