Happy Baptism Mattie!

Jacqueline and I spent a beautiful after with her brothers family, for our niece's baptism. Congrats to the Urda's, and thanks for the ham!

Afterwards we booked it over to Lowe's, who were having a 3 for $10 perennial party. We grabbed 3 of each of the following:
Dragon's Blood Sedum
Rosish One Dianthus
East Friesland Salvia
Plus something else that I already lost the tags for. Jacqueline, tags are your job!

We added on to the mulched areas we added yesterday. We're planning a little path up to the street from the front door, since that is how everyone walks in anyway. Eventually we'll put some flag stone in there, and plant all the way up.

We also swapped our dying hydrangeas with our dying azalea's from last year. I'm hoping its a too much sun / too little sun situation, and they both grow big and healthy. Odds are they'll be toast tomorrow.

The entrance way is really coming along. This time last year we were frantically planting all sorts of random stuff, mostly in the wrong places, without amending the soil, and no forethought to layout. This year we are still doing mostly the same, but acting like we know what we're doing. Atleast we're playing with cow poop and soil conditioner.

We took a few pictures, hope you like!

Long day of work

Yesterday we spent most of the day working in the yard. Jacqueline made two trips to haul back 30 bags of pink bark mulch, and we picked up a few new perennials as well.

Splendens Common Thrift, Grace Ward Lithodora, and Silvermound Artemisia went in by the mailbox. Another silvermound artemisia went in on the walkway by the front door. Then we mulched *everything*.

Stuff from last year is finally coming up - Jack in the pulpits, lots of hostas, a couple oddly planted day lilies. Oh ya, I tried splitting our favorite hosta, by the new part i split off looks droppy and sad. We watered it well, I wonder if its going to make it. I hope so.

Finally, we started a small patch outside the kitchen window for our blueberry bushes. The ground was orange and rock solid, so we dumped in quite a bit of cow manure and soil conditioner. Hopefully they take well.

Hurray for window boxes!

Today Jacqueline and I put in our first window box. Well, rail next to the stairs leading up to the front door box. We shopped at Pikes - I can't figure out why, they're so expensive - and picked out a nice wrought iron trough box. Hope I spelled all that right. So we bought some unnamed Caladium for the thriller, 8 little 'Prelude Rose' Begonias for the filler, and something I have been lusting after for a year, 'Tahoe' Iberis sempervirens for the spiller. We used potting mix (not soil) plus a few pellets of slow release fertilizer for the dirt. Water gently after. I think the caladium will probably bite the dust, its nearly full sun there right now. It will be less harsh in a week or two when the big trees get some leaves out. Same torture the hydrangeas are going through - which are almost dead by the way. So much for the tent.

Oh ya, and Jacqueline actually had *fun* today! She told me I can even post that.

So Happy Gardening!

Weekend Work!

Sorry for the terrible layout, not sure how to get the images in the right locs.

Today Jacqueline and I got quite a bit done. We put in our two new 5g camellias, to keep our other camellia company. Three different varieties, but all have white flowers. Lets hope we can keep them alive. We kept the rootball exactly even with the surface, and mixed in some soil condition and composted cow manure. After we watered them, we added some root stimulator. Good luck plants!

We also built a little tent for our poor hydrangeas. Immediately after planting them they started shriveling. Hopefully this will keep the afternoon sun off them, until the trees above start leafing out. We built it out of landscaping weed control fabric, a few of the stakes intended for the fabric, and a couple 1x2's cut like vampire stakes.

We fed all the azaleas, roses, and flowers we have scattered about, as it is the first of the month.

I took a few photos of the blight(s) on the camellia we have. let me know if you can identify this, and propose a solution. Thanks!