The Good, Bad and Ugly of Gardening

Starting with the good. The new white clematis is flourishing. Huge white flowers! Wow. So happy. I am kinda crazy about clematis and now that we have four, I am pretty darn excited. My sister's new husband just sold his old house and moved all the garden supports and trellises to their new house where they might have languished were it not for me swooping in to 'borrow' them for the duration. Nearby is the opening peony. Sweet! The first of many to open in the coming weeks. I am so glad this is not a super multi-petaled version. No caging for this one. 

 On the north side of the house, which is supposedly the shade garden, except for strong morning sun, are two more light lavender clematis. One was half price because it had some broken stems, but the majority was doing fine I so I bought it. In this bright sunlight it is difficult to see the subtle light purple of these blooms. In this bed we have just started to mulch, so it's looks will improve by the end of the day if my managerial skills hold up. I am having Dave do the mulch spreading. 

 The Bad. My darling new Ostrich Fern was bitten by our recent frost, which also hurt a lot of the new annuals I have planted. Pooh! Still, this will survive, alto it may look awful for some time. 

 The north side bed with bags o'mulch ready to spread. Lotsa Hosta, and heuchera, one brunnera, the fern and the clematis is at the end. I really love shade gardens, and hope this one will fill in over the coming years. I had to make myself space the hosta far enough apart so that there won't be crowding and I won't have to transplant them for a long while. 

More Bad. I am losing confidence with the baggy garden, or maybe the pools, I can't decide. Actually it is the cold nights and uneven watering that may have killed off some of my tomatoes and peppers. Some, but not all. In fact one pepper is doing amazingly well, but the frost may be why my bean seeds rotted in the bag. O well. I have many more. But the slope of the yard means all the water runs to one edge and the bags get either too much or not enough water. Grrr. So...I am moving the whole thing in the coming days. And I may just fill the pools with soil and use the bags only for tomatoes, garlic, onions and peppers. Well two big bags have potatoes in them, so maybe I will keep using those too. O I just don't know...but suddenly it got hot, even at night so it's a toss up what may work now. 

 

In the meantime, I made another bed from landscape bricks and will plant my green beans in this one. It is less deep than the pools but sits on the ground so the roots may have a place to grow. We can only hope. 

So if you sense a bit of disappointment, yes, I am. Plus my front porch/deck was supposed to be started yesterday and nothing happened. No one showed up and no one called to say why. Typical. So I took out my feelings on the inside of the house and really cleaned, washed floors, vacuumed and even washed the slip covers on the couch. Satisfying!

OK off to buy more dirt! Yay!