Taming the Jungle

I spent the day yesterday gardening with my son. My son was looking for jobs to earn money (because we make him earn the money he gets from us) so I told him that he could tear out all the weeds from the area under the lilac facing the back alley. It has been a trouble spot for years, but I just never had the time to get around to it. He hopped right in and got it all done. He got it done so fast that I forgot to grab the camera for a before picture, so you will just have to imagine this area over-run with elm seedings, several different kind of vines, lilac suckers, burrdock, and several unidentified weeds.

Everything's Coming Up Roses

I have always tried to convince myself and others that I didn't want to grow roses because they were so fussy, but I have been so inspired by my success with the two climbing roses that I have been purchasing more roses and adding a bunch to my wish list.

I have noticed that many of the gardeners around here have roses that are already four feet tall and full of blooms. I want some of those. In fact, one house looks like half their garden is roses. I never see them covering these roses in the fall, so they must be hardy shrub roses. I have thought about going to their house and asking about them, but maybe I will just wing it, as usual.

This year so far I have bought four roses, all from Menards (an upper Midwest mega-hardware store - the original Home Depot). I got all four roses for a mere $9! Can't beat a price like that. It makes it a lot easier to try out plants.

I bought a Tiffany tea rose. I had seen this in bloom at Shopko, but decided that even at $10 I wouldn't get it since I didn't know exactly where I would put it. But when I saw it bareroot at Menards for $2 I knew I could find a spot for it. It is a beautiful pink rose with a wonderful scent. It is doing well and I look forward to seeing it in bloom.

This of course is not my picture since my rose has about 4 inches of growth. I got this picture from roses-roses.com, but soon, soon.

I like the hint of yellow in the center and the large silky petals. I planted this next to my gazebo so that I could enjoy it while relaxing under the canopy of the future morning glories drinking iced tea.

A few weeks later my husband and I went to Menards to get gravel for his zen garden and saw the bareroot roses were now only $1! Well, I had to get more! I picked up two: Irish Gold and Granada. I didn't really know much about either of them. I mostly bought them based on the quality of the stock available and the description on the packages.

Irish Gold was described as having "very large, fragrant blooms of butter yellow with a touch of blush in cool weather. Dark glossy foliage. Vigorous. Everblooming Hybrid Tea Rose".

I got this picture from roses-roses.com too since my rootstock is basically just a stick in the ground. I like the closed, full blooms. This is also called "Grandpa Dickson" since it was hybridized by Dickson in Northern Ireland in 1966. It is the winner of many awards and is said to have a light fragrance.

I planted this in a bed by the road that had a large open spot. It will look lovely in front of the airy pink Queen of the Prairie and along side my sea of echinacea.

The other rootstock that I bought for $1 was Granada. I got the image from roses-roses.com also.

This one is said to have a spicy scent but is not reliably winter hardy. :(
We will see. If it does not do well, at least it was only $1. Most fancy annuals are more expensive that that!

All the roses-roses photos were taken by Bob Bauer. Isn't he a great photographer? He also has a great sense of humor. I suggest a visit to that website. It is really lovely and informative!



My last rose purchase, Carefree Delight, was also one that I had seen at Shopko but decided that at $15 I could wait until I found a really good place to put it. Then I went to Menards and found it in a smaller pot for $5. Sure, why not?

This picture is of the actual rose that I bought. It is light and airy. The petals are dark pink on the underside and light pink on top. The dual tone gives them great dimension and interest. It is VERY THORNY though, so this wouldn't be good for an area that gets a lot of traffic. I haven't noticed too much of a scent yet, I mostly got it to fill in an area that needed flowers.

Among the Living

One of the things that I love about spring is watching my plants come up and seeing what made it through the winter. Some I have no doubt will survive, while there are others that I am just crossing my fingers for. A few of the plants that didn't make it:

Butterfly weed: I think I accidentally buried it.

Butterfly Blue and Pink Scabiosa: This is the third time that I have tried to grow it. In it's defense, I was trying to over-winter it in a big patio pot. Maybe fourth time is a charm?

Loosestrife: Once again, did not take it out of it's pot.

Lady Fern: It looked like it might make it earlier this spring and now it is gone.

Buckler Fern: No idea what happened to it! Late riser?

And *sniff* BOTH of my beloved Guinevere delphinum! BOTH! I'm actually ready to give up on them. I have other delphinum that although they are not quite as pretty as Guinevere are much less fragile.


But the ones that made it I think more than make up for the ones that did not:

Plum Crazy hardy hibiscus: this one is coming back even stronger with lots of shoots. The shoot that I broke off and stared last year was doing OK, but I think I killed it - oh well. At least I have the main plant and that one is already almost 2 feet tall! And they are supposed to be notorious for coming up late!

Tatting fern: this one I bought for SSB and since he already lost one fern, I was glad to see this one thriving.

Desdemona ligularia: I have had trouble with these plants in the past, but I think that I have them mastered now. This variety I even planted in what last year was part shade but what is this year full sun and they are doing great!! In fact, on the days when my other ligularia are wilting in the heat and I need to go water them, this one didn't even seem to notice - EVEN IN FULL SUN!!

Climbing roses: both of them came back just fine this year. In fact, the success has inspired me to buy more roses. I did discover that the paper cones are better than the styrofoam. They don't trap moisture in them which means that the roses won't get moldy.

Alba Rose gas plant: I love this plant and was so glad to see it come back. I think that I will be getting more of these.

Edelweiss: I have tried these twice before and have finally got it down. I put it in a rock garden in full sun. The soil is highly organic, but is raised so there is lots of drainage. It is full and fabulous!

And of course, Astilboides tabularis: Yes! this one made it through with flying colors! I will eventually have to move at least 7 plants to give it room, but I couldn't be happier!


Oh, and I spoke too quickly on the lady fern. I decided to get what I could find of it in a pot and put it in the shade - it is coming up! YAY!

And I thought you might like to know that I really started writing this May 31. That's how far behind I am getting with everything!

Columbine Munchers

I have had a bumper crop of columbine this year. The four double "Barlow" columbine that I planted five years ago have propagated nicely (the columbine pictured is actually the common columbine - not the double). They are coming in nice and plush. At least they were until a few days ago when my husband and I noticed that some of the leaves were stripped. I didn't give it much thought until yesterday when I noticed that a few of the plants had been stripped of all their leaves. I took a closer look and found tiny green caterpillars greedily munching away. In fact, some of the leaves were nearly covered in them.

I called my husband over to help me pluck them off. As I figured, this was a treat for him. Together we must have picked several hundred caterpillars. This bunch in the cup came from the one columbine plant pictured above. Holy Caterpillars, Batman!!

I think we were just in time for some, maybe a little too late for others, but I am definitely putting this on my spring-time TO DO list!!

MN Landscape Arboretum Part 3

Here is another waterfall. This one you can see a little of the plantings that are around it. I think that they use mostly shrubs and such around waterfalls because of the scale.



Rock gardens rock! This picture does not do this garden justice. I have started a rock garden of my own and took a few notes from this one.



Here's my honey in the Japanese garden. He is creating his own Japanese garden this year. Too bad we don't have room for a waterfall!



Here is the waterfall in the Japanese garden. Well, OK, this actually just looks like a bonsai on an island, but in the upper right you can see the waterfall. But that bonsai is fabulous too!

MN Landscape Arboretum Part 2

This was one of the very natural areas. They have planted these daffodils among the grasses next to the pond. I just thought this was very lovely.



I really like pergolas. I would very much like a pergola off the back of my house, but it is not in the budget, so I will live vicariously.



I thought that this was a very good grouping and I like this color yellow.

MN Landscape Arboretum

A couple of weekends ago my family and I visited the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum for the first time. We had lived just twenty minutes away from it for two years and never went. That was probably for the best because we were apartment dwellers and it would have just made me sad that I couldn't have my own garden. In other words, if you live near the Twin Cities I highly recommend a visit.

I took a ton of pictures , but I will only put a few here. I have picked out what I thought were the most interesting.


This was one of the first sights as we entered the arboretum.



This is the front tulip display. I loved the amount of tulips that they had packed together. If I had enough money, I think I might do this too.



There were several water falls. This was one of my better pictures of one.


These pictures will have to serve as an appetizer. Due to the fact that I had a very busy weekend doing home repair and I desperately need some sleep, I will post some more pictures throughout the week.

From the Street

It's Looking Like a Real Live Garden

I have never been really happy with the look of my garden. It has always seemed a little sparse, disjointed, thrown together. But this year may just be the year that it all pulls together. Other than the truckload of weeds that need to come out (I have major problems with grass and creeping charlie that seems to keep growing over the winter), I am feeling it this spring. When I look out at my garden, I now feel pretty good.

Potatoes and Parsnips in Four Cheese Herb Sauce

OH.MY.GOSH!!

I made the most delicious sauce today!
Seriously, I almost cried.

It was getting late and I needed to make something for dinner. I didn't have time to look for a recipe, so I just decided to totally wing it.

I needed to use up some sweet onions. I've been compulsively buying them every time I go to the store. I even bought some when I went up to my parents - it is THAT bad.

I chopped up and sauteed a whole medium size onion in olive oil. While it was cooking I thought a little garlic would be good so I added three minced cloves.

I thought potatoes would go good with it, so I sliced a bunch of potatoes into 1/2" slices and put them in a baking dish.

I remembered that I had bought some parsnips a while back meaning to try them, so I peeled one and tried it. It was kind of like a spicy carrot. Yeah, that will go with potatoes, so I chopped up two and threw them in with the potatoes.

For the sauce, I threw 3TBS butter into the onions over medium heat. Once it was melted, I mixed in about 1/8-1/4 cup flour. Once the flour was thoroughly mixed in with the butter, I mixed in about a pint of half and half. I added 2TBS thyme and sea salt and pepper. Then I remembered that I had bought an Italian four cheese mix and sprinkled some of that in too.

O.M.G!! It was YUMMMMMY!!! I wanted to eat it right then.

But I poured it over the potatoes and parsnips instead, mixed it in, and baked the whole thing at 350 degrees for an hour.
It was delicious!! I will definitely make this again. My son and husband weren't so sure about the parsnips (although they each had two huge servings), so I may omit them in the future. I think they just weren't expecting them.

In any case, I definitely have big plans for that sauce!