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?
Good for you! :)
I yelled, HEY!
Asked hubs to stop that gardener.
The gardeners truck filled with tools drove by again. I jumped up from the chair I was sitting in, icing my lower back from the pain of pulling a 1 ft. x 1 ft. square area of weeds.
I yelled, HEY! HEY!
Hubs starts mumbling how the gardener won't stop, how the gardener won't understand, how I would need to tell him how much I am willing to pay, how I should speak more simply, how he would not understand if I asked for "an estimate".
Gardener starts tomorrow, $20 bucks per month to pull weeds!
A neighbor, who had called the gardener the day before, (reason he was i n the neighborhood) walks over to talk to him.
Yay!
Still snow in May, my avatar, we might finally be done.🌻🌺🍅🌲🌼🌸🐦
Glad wants us to plant goat heads?
My job is done here.
It was actually the bee whose image I was trying to capture. I am in two minds about whether to look it up because I am half afraid it will turn out to be called an orange-bottomed black bee, and I could kind of figure that out for myself.
(P.S. - the mustard greens were a mistake - thought I was getting leaf lettuce. What do you do with mustard greens?)
And then there are all the perennials I keep trying to cram in my borders: where can I fit some delphinium... lupine... ooo some campanula would be lovely... did you know there are purple day lilies?... I wonder where I could put some perennial alyssum... I definitely need more primroses ....
Also, today, I am unable to take bright sunshine( it really hurts my eyes and dries my skin) even with sunglasses and sun block. Getting old is not for the faint of heart.
Would love to send you some cactus CWillie. But I cannot get near without them biting me. Cannot repot them because of this, and hubs has refused.
There is a gallon ceramic pot, growing overboard in what should be a 24 inch planter. This is one of the bloomin ones! Maybe cactus like to suffer hardship.
Lol. They were removed from the side my neighbor is on-she gave permission to put them there. We are taking over her gardening in exchange for favors. But now, our gardening will suffer....hubs cannot do everything.
These are the ones I tried to give away.
All I did to "garden" was to move them out in the open for moving.
And cottonwood trees - there are several at sister's place, it's the worst when they drop all those sticky little flower caps all over your car😬. We generally don't get the cotton until around father's day.
Glad you are happy in your new neighborhood.
One of the stipulations of our moving into this 55 and over park, is that we have to make our gardens out front of our manufacturers home 50% "green". Currently the entire front, about 12'X50' is that red lava rock, with several raised planters made of cement pavers which look alright, but could definitely use some improvements. So now hubby will take out the majority of the red rock, move all that to the back of our home, and re-work the gardens using most of the existing plants (which are beautiful btw), and put in topsoil and mulch, and create a more acceptable garden.
I'm not are really sure why they want the 50% green, as the majority of the folks here are beyond the gardening stage of their lives, plus it certainly saves water having the individual planters, but we will fall in line with the rules, and do our part. My hubby does like to do a bit of gardening, so creating a gardenscape is right up his alley, and it will give him something to do so he will leave me alone to my tablet, lol! We just bought 4 beautiful hanging baskets to hang across our portch and they look lovely.
Hubby is also putting in a big stretch of grass across the back of our little "property", for my pup to do her business on (it's All red rock back there too), in case we don't wish to walk her to 1 of the 3 dog parks on the property. There is plenty of little things to do to keep him busy around here, and we are very pleased with our decision to buy this home. The people around here are Really Nice and Friendly, and not a day goes by where I haven't had a neighbor stop by and have a sit and a chat, just as hubby said would happen, he knows me so well, the Chatty-Cathy that I am.
Bonus, we have a Gorgeous Pink Dogwood tree just out front of my good sized deck, that just finished up flowering, Beautiful, and now the perfect shade tree, plus our home sits directly across from a sweet little sitting park, not a dog park but a cute little patch of grass with a couple of white Wooden Arbor benches and several parking spaces which is perfect if we have guests, so a win-win! Lots of folks walk around here, especially at mail time, so people stop and rest along their way, which drives my Charlie-girl Crazy, but she's getting used to all the activity! We are So glad we went this route, especially in this pretty little community, rather than a Condo as we originally intended to do. Our street is named Primsose Lane, and I feel like I'm living in the 60's here, which I Love! Color me Happy!