It's become clear to me through posts and PMs that there are some gardeners here just waiting for the chance to discuss gardening!
So, I was thinking... how do you use gardening, or how does it affect you if you need a break, need some respite, need to relax, need inspiration....how do you use it as a therapy tool in caregiving?
What are your activities: Do you go out and pull weeds, read a magazine, design new beds? Look through garden catalogues? Go to garden stores?
And what interests have you added to your gardening? Visit estate or garden displays? Do you go to garden shows?
Does anyone design and plant Knot Gardens? Raised bed planters? Assistive gardens? Pollinator gardens (and have you thought of ways to help the bees and butterflies?)
Are your gardens primarily for pleasure or food, or a mix of both? Do you grow plants for medicinal purposes? Which ones, how do you harvest and process them? Any suggestions?
Do you grow plants that can be used in crafts, such as grapevines for wreaths and lavender for lavender wands? Do you make herbal products such as creams, lotions, chapstick?
What else can you share about gardening and the means in which it nurtures your soul?
Yep! They keep coming back. I adore them.
Daughter,
Yes, we had pink, blue and white hydrangeas.
Such beautiful showstopper flowers!
Remember if they were transplanted, sometimes they were both colors?! This happened to my mom one time.
I love the burst of color in fall!
Spring and fall are my favorite seasons. Summer is too humid and hot and I am not fond of the damp cold in winter.
Daughterof1930, I'm interested in hydrangea color change with the use of bricks. I know that pH affects color, so I'm wondering if the components of bricks include some pH that causes the color change. Using bricks is a whole lot easier than changing the content of the soil.
I see that you grow Angel Trumpets. They're stunning; I love the flowers! Have you had any problems with critters nibbling on them, since they're poisonous? I suspect that critters have senses which detect components that are bad for them. The flowers are soooo dramatic.
NHWM, you asked about herbs. I grew a lot of them outside, and b/c of that I rarely grew them inside.
I grew basil, parsley, dill, rosemary, sage, lemon balm, tricolor sage (beautiful!), borage, lavender, thyme, orange thyme, artemisia, mint, apple mint, and others less well known, the names of which I can't remember right now.
I can't resist this: I warn you that it's quite a temptation, but this is a list of herbs from one of my sources:
https://www.richters.com/Web_store/web_store.cgi?show=list&prodclass=Herb_Seeds
Botanical Interests also has a decent selection of herb seeds.
Milkweed is one that I need to begin growing.
I love herbs! They make great "kitchen wreaths"; I added basil, sage, thyme and something else which I can't remember right now, just snipping off what I needed periodically. The big disadvantage though is that if they begin collecting dirt, you might end up losing some of the leaves as they do dry and crack more easily on a wreath.
Thyme makes an especially pretty wreath because the tiny branches spread widely, and create "fluff" in the wreath.
It is similar to a rose. I love camellias. They are a common flower seen in southern landscapes.
Wow...you really did grow tons of herbs.
Do you grow poinsettias? I have Savannah holly shrubs growing in my yard. I love the red berries.
My angel trumpet has been gorgeous! No issues with anything trying to munch on it. This year it was over 6-7 feet tall. Now cut back and hoping it’ll overwinter.
I’ve not tried to make a natural wreath but do remember my mother doing with the bottom branches from live Christmas trees.
The easiest herb to grow here is rosemary, it turn into a small shrub and is always handy to grab a bit off of to cook. I need to try garlic since we eat a lot of it.
NHWM, I agree, your camellia is beautiful!
My grandmother used to plant poinsettias that she was given in her yard. They aren’t winter hardy, but it seemed she had a perfect spot on a protected tall wall. They were amazing, growing to about 8 feet tall and blooming beautifully. I’ve never had success trying it. I’ll accept that it was one of her many special talents, like biscuits that will never be replicated! 🤗
I have this "thing" about growing plants from bits and pieces. Sometimes it works, something it doesn't but it is fun trying.
Paperwhite Narcissus are a late winter blooming flower.
But to me, it is a special sign of spring.
he rutabaga leaves are growing but very slowly. I am not sure that this is going to work. You never know. A branch of a dracena broken off a year or so ago, I stuck it in water and then later dirt and it's growing fine. I've rooted and planted bits of my anthurium and they are doing fine. It was getting too leggy so I cut it back and planted more to fill out the pot. I can grow pothos in water like crazy but when I plant them in dirt they don't do as well. Guess I should try better dirt. I need a regular dose of those friendly microbes in the soil that make you feel better.
Anthuriums were featured; we both loved them, so I decided to check out their growing conditions and realized that we didn't have the necessary conditions to grow them, at that time.
Do you have yours in any kind of greenhouse setting? If I recall, they're tropical flowers, and from the description of your apparent frigid weather, I'm wondering if you have any suggestions on creating the right atmosphere?
I'm remembering now that I planted and grew some plants when I was living in an apartment. Geraniums were some that I started from seed. I was so excited, and proud, until I came home from work one day and saw that my cats had rearranged the geranium containers, relegating most of the dirt to the floor. I don't recall if I was able to save the plants, but I didn't try that again. Hopefully my cats enjoyed themselves though.
Plants that are said to like indirect light like violets or anthuriums do well in our climate in direct south light.
I finally have ivy (needlepoint) growing like mad in my north bay window. They really like it there. as does a sanseveria (go figure).
Several years of success with this now easy to care for vine/plant/bush/tree!
It is growing in front of our front porch, and provides much needed privacy from the street. 🌳 And it attracts hummingbirds.
We used to have a flower shop at the mall where there was indoor parking and that was the only place I felt sort of safe buying flowers in the winter.
Cape honeysuckle looks like what we call trumpet vine which is very invasive if you can get it started.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFZFjoX2cGg&feature=emb_logo
I've ordered about a dozen catalogues, including from some from which I've bought before and others that I haven't used. Getting the mail is more interesting now.
And I recycle the catalogues by clipping photos of favorite and lovely plants to glue onto paper and slip inside the plastic covers of 3 ring binder notebooks . There's nothing like picking up tax binders and seeing masses of flowers before even considering the droll and often upsetting tax issues.
The azaleas 🌺 are blooming like crazy all around the city.
They are so beautiful!
I was just getting ready to tell you all that the bulbs I mentioned earlier won't be held back so I went ahead and put them out in my planters, the crocus opened up today.
Yes! Our spring is quite different from yours! Louisiana is a swamp! 😆 LOL
We are already feeling the muggy weather here.
My daughter that moved to Colorado says that she doesn’t miss the humidity here. She does say that she is using more lotion because her skin feels a lot drier.
I used to plant bulbs with my grandpa. Grandma loved her flower garden. He planted lilies. They were so pretty.
I received my David Austin rose catalogue this morning! I'll spend the rest of the day soaring in Rose Heaven, planning all sorts of new gardens, pricing trellises and tuteurs, or designing some from sturdy saplings I'll cut down.
What else could be so as inspirational as pages and pages of David Austin's stunning roses?
Today is a good day to dream, paraphrasing Klingon Worf: "today is a good day to dream of roses and gardens."