Spring Flingin' It!

Garden bloggers are some of the nicest and most fun people there are. Ask me how I know!

Answer: I'm spending the next three days in Chicago with 50 other garden bloggers. :-)

LOL Eagles

Photos by me...captions by Cheesy.

Photos of bald eagle taken at one of two known eagles' nests in nearby Defiance County, OH on May 24, 2009.

Schedel Arboretum and Gardens - 2009 Style

My new favorite hotel is Residence Inn. When we arrived at the Westlake location at the end of the first day of our Cleveland trip, they were in the middle of Social Hour. Cheeses and crackers, fresh veggies and dip, two kinds of tortilla chips with guacamole and spinach dips, cookies and brownies, with beer, wine and soft drinks - all free. Wii Tennis was offered in the lobby.

Shortly after we got to our room, we received a phone call from the front desk, asking if we needed anything. Our room was like a little apartment, complete with a full galley-style kitchen with granite counters, a sitting area with a fireplace and very comfortable queen-sized beds. In the morning, a full hot buffet breakfast was included. All for about $118, including taxes! Divide it by four and you have one fabulous stay on the cheap. Oh, and Crocker Park is five minutes away ― shopping!

Petitti Garden Center was five minutes away and after checking out of our hotel, we spent about two hours shopping this fabulous place, which is now a regular stop anytime we're in the Cleveland area. My purchases here were an orange tree peony (Paeonia suffruticosa, likely 'Kinkaku'), Corydalis 'Blackberry Wine', Oriental Poppy (Papaver orientale 'Carnaeum') and two things I have already and wanted to add to - Edelweiss (Leontopodium alpinum) and Centaurea montana 'Gold Bullion.'

We packed our purchases in the car and moved on down the road to Elmore, home of the fabulous Schedel Arboretum and Gardens. Mom and I had been there before, but Patty and Carol (the other two in our group) had not. It had been about a year and a half since Mom and I last visited and it was in the fall, so things looked markedly different here in the middle of May.

Schedel Arboretum and Gardens are truly an Ohio treasure. Not many people that I speak with have heard of them, even though they aren't all that far away and I never fail to impress upon them that they really must make a special effort to visit the gardens.

When we entered the beautiful new visitor's center, we got to meet the personable Events Coordinator of the gardens, Veronica Sheets. Veronica and I had exchanged e-mails after I first blogged about our previous visit, but we'd never met in person. She showed us around the visitor's center a little bit, pointing out the art exhibit. Fine art and sculpture are an important part of Schedel's displays.

We began our tour at the top of the steps leading down into the plateau beside a bend in the Portage River. This unique terrain allows Schedel to be home to some species of plants and trees that might not otherwise survive typical zone 5 conditions.


Everywhere you look, there are sweeping vistas of beauty...

You don't know which way to go next...


Being this early in the season, the annuals were not all planted yet and most of them were small. A return visit in a month or two will make a big difference.
But the perennials were already putting on a show, if not with their flowers, then with their foliage.

A lone yellow iris holds court among the lavenders.

Forget-me-nots and I can't remember what the golden groundcover was. (Ironic, isn't that?)

The Pasque Flowers (Pulsatilla vulgaris) were finished with their blooms and were gracing the landscape with their unique and feathery seed heads.

Many of the peonies were in bloom, and Schedel has some that are their own unnamed hybrids.

The bees in this white single were collecting pollen in a way that reminded me of a pinwheel.

This one seemed to know right where the good stuff was.

This Itoh hybrid, 'Golden Emperor,' first introduced in the U.S. in 1974 and one of the very first intersectional peonies, was simply stunning.

Schedel is also home to a few Bristlecone Pine trees, thought to be the oldest living organism on the earth. Being an arboretum, there are many different kinds of trees, most all of them labeled, situated throughout the 17-acre property.

There are always some plants for sale at unbeatable prices. I brought home two large pots of an autumn anemone for three dollars each. I tried to talk the Head Gardener, Susan, out of some of their Korean violets (Viola koreana 'Syletta'), but she smiled sweetly and shook her head no. Maybe some other time I'll get lucky!

The gardens and arboretum are located at 19255 W. Portage River South Road, Elmore, OH 43416. Visit their website for more information about the hours they are open to the public.

On Veronica's recommendation, we traveled a little ways up the road to Genoa, where we had a delicious lunch at Muggz's Tea Nook & Cafe. This is also home to The Most Unusual Garden & Gift Shop. There were many wonderful items for sale throughout the store/tea room and I couldn't resist a ceramic hanging bird bath. I also don't think I'll be able to eat Campbell's® Tomato Soup ever again. Maybe I can make something resembling the outstanding and exceptional Tomato-Basil soup I had there with tomatoes from my own garden!

About a block away, we paid a visit to Packer Creek Pottery, the home of Majolica pottery by Jan Pugh. What gorgeous, creative, and whimsical things we found there! No purchases, but we all wanted to.

One more stop before home was at Hoen Greenhouse & Garden Center, located in greater metropolitan Toledo. What a zoo! They were having a special sale that started at 6:00 and we arrived just in time to pick a few things out, then put them back when we saw the line winding from the front to the back of the large greenhouse and only two cash registers. We'll have to visit at another time when we're in the area. Nice things though, and I hated putting back the Campanula glomerata and Epimedium 'Lilafee' that I'd picked out for purchase.

We finally made it home around 8:00, exhausted, but with great memories of our Road Trip to Cleveland - 2009 version.

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Our first visit to Schedel Arboretum & Gardens in 2007 can be found here.

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Road Trip to Cleveland

Mom and her friends were going to Cleveland and one of the friends couldn't go. She asked me if I wanted to go, and since Mom has great friends and I know they always have a good time, of course I said yes. We were headed to the Cleveland Botanical Gardens for the flower show that's held there every two years, and since we'd be staying overnight, we planned some other activities as well.

The night before we were to leave, I checked CBG's website, just to confirm hours for the show and I saw this:

Cleveland Botanical Garden Flower Show 2009 has been postponed. Please check back in early 2010 for updates.

What?!?!? I guess if you don't live in the Cleveland area, you might not get the memo. A quick call to Mom, a little discussion, and the trip was still on. The gardens are always a good time - flower show or no flower show - and we were looking forward to visiting Petitti's Garden Center and Schedel Arboretum and Gardens on Day Two.

Herb Garden

We arrived at the gardens around 1:00 p.m. and spent the next four hours meandering through the individual garden areas. This was my fourth time visiting, but I don't think I'll ever tire of them. I did limit my photo-taking this time, because of previous visits, but still found new and wonderful things to capture:



The alliums were in full bloom, in three colors - purple, magenta, and white. The white ones were stunning, when contrasted with surrounding foliage. The bees were loving them as much as we did.




One of the great things about CBG, or any botanical gardens for that matter, is that not only are the colorful blooms outstanding, but the textures and colors of the foliage don't have to take a back seat to anything.

Milk Thistle (Silybum marianum) foliage

Sempervivum and Sedum balls

When the foliage textures and colors work in combination with those of the blooms, the visual effect is stunning. CBG's design staff is brilliant.

Salvia echoes the ferns nicely.

The pink blooms of the 'Firewitch' Dianthus spark up the glaucous foliage of itself and the spruce above it.

The last time we visited Cleveland Botanical Gardens for the flower show was in May 2007, and the theme that year was "Rhythm and Hues." Several of the displays became semi-permanent, remaining until the next flower show, such as the "Opera Hortensia" shown below.

This one was tiered like an amphitheater. If you look closely (click on the photo to enlarge it), you'll notice the shrubs that are planted at an angle. I would never have thought to do that, and the effect is lyrical.

Opera Hortensia

By far, my favorite part of the gardens is the Japanese Garden. The Japanese Maples, the asian structures, the waterfalls, the wooded setting...it's all perfect for reflection and calming the soul.

Waterfall detail in the Japanese Garden.

The azaleas were in bloom and as usually happens when I see a beautiful display of them, I want to go home and plant more than I care to kill. Yes, I've planted them and killed them, and except for one that is barely existing, I'll have to admire them in gardens such as these.




We'd spent so much time wending our way through the rest of the gardens that we didn't allow enough time to do the Glass House justice before they closed at 5:00. We had just enough time to run through quickly and ooh and ahh over the butterflies.



The waterfall is visually refreshing, as well as physically, because you can walk behind it and enjoy the fine mist of its spray.



Inside the welcome center, the metal wall sculptures are planted with ivies and other live plants.



We had a late lunch here, if you can call what I ate, lunch. I had the most delicious "brownie" in all the history of mankind. Imagine the best pecan pie you've ever eaten, in portable form. I'd just about give my right arm for the recipe.

Since we had to be "swept" from the grounds at closing, we couldn't make a return visit to their fabulous gift shop and I had to leave the green t-shirt I wanted (Eat. Sleep. Garden.). I suppose I can live without it. Either that, or I'll just have to go back.

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Our previous visits to Cleveland Botanical Gardens can be found here:

Cleveland Botanical Garden Flower Show 2007
Cleveland - Petitti's, Botanical Gardens & Environmental Awards

Bluebirds!

When Lisa of Greenbow and her husband were visiting here on Sunday, the guys mentioned that they'd seen a bluebird. I've only ever seen a bluebird one other time in my entire life and that was about three years ago, while working in the vegetable garden. When they casually and unexcitedly stated they'd seen one, I almost didn't believe them.

I'm a believer now.

Last night, while Romie and I were out working in the yard, we saw a bluebird fluttering at the opening of the bluebird house we'd put up when we saw that first one years ago. Romie kept an eye on him while I ran to the house for my camera. He was still there when I returned and I snapped a couple of nice photos of him.


We had another bluebird house that my dad had made, but we'd not put it up yet, because we weren't sure where to locate it. Having a bluebird right before our eyes forced the decision and we immediately hung it at the far end of the grape arbor.

This morning, as I was eating my bagel and doing my morning walk-through back in Max's Garden, I kept my eye out for the bluebirds. In a matter of minutes, there he was, and his mate, too! They both entered the older house, then came out a few minutes later.

Not long after, the male flew over to the grape arbor and entered the house we'd just put up. So it's looking rather favorable that we'll have baby bluebirds one day!

Though we haven't followed all the rules for luring bluebirds to our property, I wanted to share a few of them, just in case you're hoping for bluebirds, too.

How To Attract Bluebirds

• Bluebirds like open spaces, so place your bluebird house away from trees and vegetation as much as possible.
• Place the house no more that 4-5 feet off the ground.
• Face the opening of the house towards the east or south, so that it's warmed by the sun.
• The opening needs to be away from prevailing winds, so if the wind is generally from the west where you live, face the house east.
• Other birds, such as wrens and swallows, also like to use bluebird houses, so erecting two houses increases your chances of having a bluebird take up residence.

The bluebird carries the sky on his back.

~ Henry David Thoreau

A Visit From a Garden Blogger

I'd been waiting for this day for several weeks, looking forward to a very special visitor that I'd only known via her garden blog. She and her husband had been vacationing in Michigan and they made a slight detour on the way home to southwestern Indiana on Sunday so we could meet and "talk shop" for a little bit.

Those of you who have gotten to know Lisa through her Greenbow gardening blog, know what a treat she is. Let me tell you here and now that she is just like you thought. Down to earth and full of joy!


We talked our way through the garden, discussing how she could grow this and I couldn't, how she couldn't grow that and I could, and how both of us had problems with variegated Jacob's Ladder.

The tree peony 'Sahohime' was nearly in full bloom (42 of them!) just in time for Lisa's visit.

Before we knew it, three hours had passed and our guests had to get moving, because home was more than five hours away. I sent Lisa home with some pink Lily-of-the-Valley and Lady's Mantle that my mom had shared with me from her garden and from here at Our Little Acre, several bulbs of the ugliest daffodil I've ever grown. Oops, I told Lisa I was going to stop talking that way about them since she likes them. Maybe they'll look better in her garden.

Lisa and I are both going to be attending Spring Fling in Chicago in two weeks, so this meeting only served to give us both one more thing to look forward to - a familiar face!



Lisa, thank you for taking the time and going out of your way to visit us here at Our Little Acre. The time we spent with you and your husband was a delight and I look forward to seeing you again at Spring Fling!

May I Show You Some May Flowers?

It's Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day for May and we're transitioning into summer. How did that happen so quickly? The garden is bursting at the seams with color. Not quite like it does in June and July, but it's kind of amazing how many things are blooming when you consider how comparatively few we had last month.

So let me show you some of what I saw when strolling through the gardens yesterday:

Yes, there are still some tulips looking good in the garden. These were a purple and white mix I'd purchased at Lowe's last fall.

This Passiflora (cultivar unknown) spent the winter in the basement greenhouse, doing nothing but losing its leaves. Then about a month or so ago, it started putting out leaves again. How did it know that spring was going on outside, when it was inside?

May is Lilac season and my very favorite is this Syringa vulgaris "Sensation." I've got two of them, by accident. I'd gotten one in 2007, purchased after its bloom period was over. In 2008, I purchased another one and planted it before bloom time. When they both bloomed, I realized they were the same. Sometimes accidents turn out well!

Most of my peonies don't bloom until the first of June, but the Fern Leaf 'Rubra Flora Plena' (Paeonia tenufolia) starts off peony season in May. Next will come the tree peonies (Paeonia suffruticosa), then the herbaceous (Paeonia lactiflora).

The quirky, fluffy blooms of the Dwarf Fothergilla (Fothergilla gardenii).

I have never had the best of luck growing herbal rosemary, but this bog rosemary (Andromeda polifolia) does just fine for me. It's actually a heath, hardy to zone 3 and as you might guess, likes moist conditions.


My favorite of the annuals I'm growing this year is this Marguerite Daisy (Argyranthemum frutescens) in Madeira™ cherry shades. They're very much an attention-getter.

I learned about this Chinese Primrose (Primula capitata) from my mom and promptly went to Laurie's Naturescapes to get some for my own garden. I love the glaucous foliage and the lollipop flower form. It's hardy to zone 5.

The Pasque flower (Pulsatilla vulgaris) has been blooming in purple and burgundy for a month and is still going strong, but now it has some of its characteristic fluffy seed heads. I like these as much as the blooms.

Known as Silver Bells or Star of Nature (Ornithogalum nutans), this late spring bulb flowers with gray-green blooms.

Dianthus superbus 'Kawara Mix' self-seeds and its first bloom this season is from one of the results of self-seeding from last year, nearly two feet from the original clump.


I planted Anemone coronaria 'Harmony Mix' last year because the red, blue and white were so pretty. I knew they could survive our winters here in zone 5, but I wasn't counting on it. The white one made it, but the blue and red ones didn't. I purchased a new red one and blue one a few weeks ago, to give them another try.

Allium 'Gladiator' is in its third year here.

While it can spread vigorously, this Ajuga really glows in the spring garden. Its runners and resulting new plants are easy enough to tear out if they get out of bounds.

I've grown Centaurea montana for years, as well as the 'Gold Bullion' cultivar. This year, I added this 'Amethyst in Snow.'

Columbine is one plant that I never hear Romie complain about when I buy more - it's one of his favorites. This is 'Origami Red & White.'

There are many other things blooming, too numerous to mention. Let's just say that when I'm doing a walkthrough in the gardens, I'm humming, "Happy days are here again!"



Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day is hosted each month by Carol of May Dreams Gardens. Visit her website to see who else participates by posting photos of what's blooming on the 15th of the month in their gardens.

Spot Me a Five?

Five! Five dollar! Five dollar foot looooong...

Okay, now you hate me for putting that jingle into your head, don't you? I figure I might as well have company while I "enjoy" that ear worm. As I walked about the garden yesterday, it was that annoying little tune that kept popping into my head. What prompted it?

This:

Five Spot (Nemophila maculata)

Here's the story about my Five Spot: It took two tries in two separate years for me to get this to grow from seed. Last year, it finally decided our amended clay soil was good enough to grow in. We had lovely blooms, each with five spots, except for the ones that had seven. Maybe the ones with seven spots are akin to finding a four-leaf clover?

The weird thing about Five Spot is that it's growing and blooming right now, in spite of not planting it this year. It's an annual and I didn't save any of last year's seed, but it turns out that I really didn't need to. It self-seeded and I have just as many plants this year as I did last year. And I didn't have to do a thing!

Now, if I can just get Baby Blue Eyes (Nemophila menziesii) to do the same thing.

On the "five" theme, here's another:

Five-leaved Akebia (Akebia quinata)

This vine would be cool to do time-lapse photography with. As it grows, it twines around the trellis, then when it reaches the top, it seems to twirl around itself, looking for something to grab onto. It has that "wild hair" look to it.

There are five leaves on each stem and when it blooms, there are five individual flowers in a group. Notice the little stripes on part of the bloom? I'll bet there are five of those, too. Just guessing though - I didn't take the time to count.

Another quirky thing about this Akebia is that I found it a couple of years ago at Home Depot at the end of the season for guess how much? FIVE dollars.

Have you had enough of the five stuff? There's more! One of my roses is called 'Cinco de Mayo.' Oh, it's not blooming yet, but it's got vigorous new growth and promises to look fabulous when bloom time comes. In case you didn't know, "cinco" is the Spanish word for "five." And May is the fifth month. And this starts my fifth year of gardening.

This blog post is brought to you by the Number 5.

Grass Be Trimmed! (Weeds, Too)

The folks over at Troy-Bilt asked me to test their new lithium-ion battery-powered string trimmer (Model TB57). Now I am not the one who does the grass stuff around here, so I had Romie put it through its paces. His first reaction? "Hey, you should come try this. I think you'll like it."

Hmmm...like trimming grass? Me? Well, there's a first time for everything, I guess.

I have never used a grass trimmer in my life, but this thing was fun. It worked well, too. I tried to temper my reaction so as to not seem too willing to take on the task of doing the trim work around here. But I'll let you in on a secret: If I'm pressed into service, I want to use this trimmer.

The trimmer we've Romie's used for years is a gas one and I can tell you it's very noisy and smelly. The Troy-Bilt Lithium Ion Battery String Trimmer, on the other hand, is relatively quiet and all you smell is the freshly cut grass. Mmmm...

If I were to critique a string trimmer, I'd judge it on the following points:

• Weight - is it heavy to carry around?
  The TB57 is lighter than the gas trimmer, but not a whole lot. The battery is fairly heavy and is only a little lighter than the gas-powered motor on our other one. Still, I'd much rather carry this one around because somehow the weight feels more balanced.
  
  
• Comfort - is it something that you can hold in position for a long time, as you make your way around the yard?
  Even though the TB57 has a telescoping handle and adjustable support, Romie and I both felt that if the upper part of the trimmer were positioned at more of an angle, it would be more comfortable to use for a longer period of time. As you can see in the photo above, the battery compartment hits Romie's arm, causing him to shift his shoulder to keep his arm out of the way. Angling the cutting head a little more might eliminate the problem, too.
  
  
• Battery life - does it last as long "in the field" as a gas-powered trimmer?
  For us, yes. Romie did the entire yard on one charge and it was still going strong. That's saying something, because we live on an acre that has LOTS of trimming (thanks to me and my gardening endeavors). If you do run it down in one use (not likely), the battery takes only four hours to recharge.
  
  
• Power level - can it cut thick grass or weeds and can it maintain that power until the job is done?
  It takes a licking and keeps on ticking. Errrr...trimming.
  
  

There's one more thing. The button/lever mechanism is a bit awkward. You have to push in a button before you can squeeze the trigger to engage the trimmer. I'm not sure how this could be improved upon, but there must be a better way.

In spite of the problems we encountered, the TB57 is a great trimmer. It's light enough and easy enough to use, I just might be convinced to help out with the trimming now and then.

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Check out the Troy-Bilt Lithium Ion Battery String Trimmer TB57 on Troy-Bilt's website.

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The product or merchandise being reviewed in this blog post was the sole compensation for testing and reviewing the product. All opinions expressed here are mine, with no suggestions whatsoever by the manufacturer or distributor. If I like it, I'll say so. If I don't, I'll say that, too.

A Longer Lasting Tulip

I recently was contacted by Teak Wicker and More about reviewing one of their products. I'd not heard of the store, so I went to their website to see what they had to offer and found a lot of attractive things.

They sell outdoor furniture, and many items for lawn and garden. I browsed through the large garden section and found something that I think could be quite attractive for my hanging Hoya houseplant.

Tulip Hanging Accent Light by Kichler

I'm anxious to see if this is as nice as I think it will be. Kichler is a leading name in lighting and we have a Kichler light fixture in our master bathroom that I love. When this light gets here, I'll let you know what I think of it!

Wildflower Way

Two years ago, I finally got tired of seeing the water lay in the grassy area between our trellis and the neighbor's hedge. Rain would fall, and the water would pool in this low area and even overflow into the trellis garden. The Heucheras were floating for their lives and I knew this just couldn't be good.

So I grabbed my shovel and the wheelbarrow, and began skimming grass and soil from the narrow path. When I got it graded to the point where any extra rainwater would run to the valley I'd created, I shoveled in some small rocks we had in a pile out by the garden. I'd been wanting to get rid of those rocks anyway and they were perfect for my purpose here.

A couple of days after I'd completed the dry bed, we got a torrential rain. I wondered how well my design would work and the results couldn't have been better! The water still pooled in the same area, but it was more evenly distributed and no more muddy, soppy grass. The heucheras no longer had to tread water! The rocks and stepping stones allowed the water to drain away while still enabling us to walk through without being ankle-deep in it.

Creating this area somehow gave me an idea for planting something on the neighbor's side of the strip. A quick question to Neighbor Tom secured the permission I needed and I began to ponder just what I wanted to plant there. Let's see...shady...moist...woodsy...

And Wildflower Way was born.


Over the months and couple of years since then, we've collected and purchased wildflowers of all types - all native to Ohio (and other states). Mostly they have come from our forays to the woods around us, but a few have arrived from friends who want to share their treasures with us, as well as nurseries that carry natives.

Though Giant White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) is Ohio's official wildflower, our nearby woods only has the T. sessile, or Toadshade Trillium, which is burgundy. My friend Alison, who lives and gardens in New York, shared a few plants with me last year.


Hated by some because of their invasive nature, I love Common Blue Wood Violets (Viola sororia).

A recent acquisition is this lone White Violet (Viola sp.).

Ohio's woods contain native Foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia) , and this one was found in southeastern Ohio. I thought it was a native Heuchera until it bloomed this spring. Its flower gave its ID away.

Woodland Phlox (Phlox divaricata) is plentiful, in both lavender and white forms. The fragrance this gives off is unbelievable and one of the strongest floral scents in the woods.

I had to look this one up, because the foliage had me stumped. It had the shiny yellow flower petals of a Lesser Celandine and the Marsh Marigold, but the foliage told me it was a Hispid Buttercup (Ranunculus hispidus).

Lots of natives here: Mayapples (Podophyllum peltatum), Toadshade Trillium (Trillium sessile), Wild geraniums (Geranium maculatum), Dutchman's Breeches (Dicentra culcullaria), and Star of Bethelehem (Ornithogalum umbellatum).

Last year, Romie and I went to my hometown and walked the abandoned railroad bed, where we found this beautiful Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum). We dug some and brought it back home. A short time later, I broke out with the worst case of poison ivy I've ever had. Oops! Didn't see that when I was digging!


Dwarf Crested Iris (Iris cristata), acquired in the mountains of Arkansas on a vacation several years ago. This has multiplied well.


Dog's Tooth Violet a.k.a. Trout Lily a.k.a. Adder's Tongue (Erythronium americanum) grows in abundance in a nearby woods. Rarely, we will see a yellow one.

Spring Beauty is everywhere. Claytonia virginica, too.

Dutchman's Breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)


Though it is native to Ohio, Robert Henn in Wildflowers of Ohio says Virginia Bluebells are mostly absent in the northwestern counties of the state. I'd agree, if our woods-walking experience can be considered normal, although we found a huge drift of them growing along a riverbank near Ottawa.

One of my very favorite wildflowers is Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis). The blooms are gorgeous, the foliage is quirky, and the red roots even moreso.

You've probably seen Wild Ginger (Asarum canadense) growing in the woods, but have you bothered to lift its velvety heart-shaped leaves to look at the blooms? They're one of the woodland wildflower's best-kept beauty secrets!

I'm growing some Jack-in-the-Pulpits (Arisaema triphyllum) from seeds that came from my mom's, but it will be a couple of years before those bloom. I purchased one a few years ago that comes up every year and blooms, just to make me get on my hands and knees to take a look and bow in awe.


As much as I love all my hybrid perennials, nothing thrills me more than watching my woodland wildflowers grow, bloom, and naturalize in my garden - unless it would be seeing them in nature, where God planted them.

Helen's Flower

Last summer, as I was working in the garden, I decided to thin out the Heleniums, commonly known as Helen's Flower. When I bought them the year before from Michigan Bulb, they were nice-sized plants in their little pots, but I had no idea how very large they would get!

As I dug and divided, I thought to myself how cool it would be to give some to my next-door-neighbor. Neither she nor her husband do gardening as any kind of hobby and aren't even remotely obsessed with it like I am, but they do plant the flower beds around their house and a few veggies in a small plot out back. I knew they'd find a spot for this one.

My neighbor's name is Helen.

When you live next to a gardening nut like me, you have to listen to me blather on about such intricacies about flowers like how you shouldn't plant two types of basil next to each other because they'll cross-pollinate. But I listen sometimes, too. I know neither one of them wanted to grow anything that didn't pretty much take care of itself. So not only did I find it amusing that I was giving Helen's Flower to Helen, I knew both she and Tom would embrace its minimal care requirements.

Helen, at times, worked three jobs. Goodness, that woman worked hard and you rarely saw her sitting still. One of her jobs for awhile was working at Dairy Queen and sometimes she would bring a cup or two of ice cream over to share with us. Chocolate for me, vanilla for Romie, because she knew what we liked. And her cookies! She knew I rarely baked cookies but I love to eat them, so when she was baking some for her kids and grandkids, she shared with us.

I'm having trouble writing this and getting my verb tenses to agree. You see, Helen lost her fight with cancer last night. It hasn't yet sunk in that I won't see her smiling face ever again. No more walks down the road, sharing life stories and solving the world's problems as we walked. No more sitting with her under the stars around the fire in the back yard, wondering if that bright star in the southern sky is really Jupiter. Life here in this little corner of northwest Ohio just made a major shift.

On Saturday, Romie and I worked in their front flower beds, cleaning out the weeds that had popped up in recent weeks. It seemed like such an irrelevant task, but it was something we could do and they couldn't, just now. No doubt it was something that didn't matter to them, in light of what was happening inside the house, but selfishly, it made us feel better to be able to do something.

As I crawled around the corner of the house on my hands and knees, I saw three small plants growing by the front door. It took me a second, but when I realized what they were, I sat back and said to Romie, "Oh my gosh. Look at that."

Last year, Helen and I were talking about the orange poppies that always grew and bloomed along the ditch bank at the end of our road, and how we both wanted to go dig some up to plant at our own houses. I'd dug some when we first moved here nearly 32 years ago, but not a single one survived. Poppies don't like to be moved. But we decided to try again.

Romie and I dug a few clumps, noticing that someone else had done the same thing before we got there. We brought them home, planted some, and gave the rest to Helen. She planted them right by her front door, in what looked like some of the worst soil that Paulding County has to offer.

Spring is now here, and not a single one of the poppies I planted has come up. Helen's poppies, however, are growing and no doubt will bloom. I just love this, but I would love it more if she'd be here to see them when they burst forth with their orangey goodness.

Helen shared some of her irises with me last year, too. At the time, I couldn't know that when they bloom in my garden this summer, I won't be able to run over to get her so she can come look. But I will offer up a prayer of thanks for her life and that I had the privilege of being her neighbor and her friend. I know she'll hear me. I believe she'll smile as she looks down upon not only the irises, but those orange poppies, blooming by her front step.

I will look at them too, and smile back. Helen, you live on in our hearts and in the flowers.


___________________
Iris photo by Debbie G.
Poppies photo by Richard North of Due North Photography

How To Kill a Plant

Just in case you have a plant that needs killing, and want someone to tell you how to do it, I'm your girl. Oh, I'm sure you already have the skills, but maybe you aren't quite sure about the method to use that will put that plant out of its misery in one fell swoop, short of chopping it up in the blender.

I try to stay mostly organic here, except where dandelions are concerned and then, bring on the Weed-B-Gone. That's only in the lawn though. In the gardens, I take my transplanter and dig 'em out. The method I'm about to disclose to you won't work on dandelions, mainly because I've never seen a dandelion for sale in a nursery pot.

I stumbled upon this technique quite by accident. But that's how a lot of great inventions were...uh...invented, isn't it? Penicillin, the Slinky, Post-It Notes... I don't think I'll be famous or make any money with this though. But you never know.


So here's what you do:

• Go to the garden center and purchase a plant in a pot. (Can't kill it if you don't own it.)
  
  
• When you bring it home, put it in a sunny window for safekeeping until you can plant it in the garden.
  
  
• Ignore it.
  
  
• Keep ignoring it until you forget you have it.
  
  
• Several weeks later, when you come across a little black pot of something, you're very thankful for the tag in it, because it's unrecognizable to you in its present form.

Task completed!

Now wasn't that easy? And it only cost $2.49 total. Can't beat that with a stick.

What's a Person To Do?

Here's the deal ... I love dandelions, really I do. Just not in my yard in vast quantities. But when there's a two-acre crop of them growing right next to you, it's really tough to keep them out of your yard and gardens.

I dig them out of the gardens, but how do you keep them under control in your yard without resorting to drastic means? Romie treats them individually with chemicals (:-O), but when you have an acre of property, that takes quite some time to do, especially when many of them need a second treatment.

So what's a person to do?

The Remains of the Day

We ate pancakes for breakfast, cleaned out the neighbors' front flower beds, planted sunflower and other seeds, planted annuals and perennials, transplanted the 'Blue Satin' hardy hibiscus, prepared a new bed for the rhubarb, planted the new rhubarb in its new bed, deadheaded more daffodils, ate lunch, tweeted on Twitter, hoed between the rows of peas, loved up a kitty or two, looked at the other neighbor's mourning dove that was nesting, planted a peony, enjoyed the feel of the sun on my back, finished planting the front railing flower boxes, made plant labels, observed the Jack-in-the-Pulpit coming up from seeds planted last fall, transplanted sedum from my garden to the neighbor's pond hill, took a few photographs, chatted with the neighbors, did some dishes, changed the bed sheets, took a bath, ate supper, and ...

... collapsed.

Boo

Once Upon a Day in May

It's the first of May and already the daffodils are mostly gone. 'Pink Charm' is still looking charming and pink, and the 'Delibes' are hanging on, but the unseasonably warm temperatures and strong, hot winds have just about done the rest of them in.

As I was cutting off the heads of the spent ones today, I realized that we have put yet another phase of spring behind us. Where does the time go?

Where does it go indeed...

May 1st is always a day of reminiscing for me and this year, I'm taken back even one more year than I was last year. Twenty-nine years, to be exact. At 6:45 in the evening on this date in 1980, Romie and I became parents for the first time. Happy birthday, Kara!

I remember her first birthday, too. The weather had been nice for several weeks and because we were having a big whoop-de-do at our house, where we would all sit around and grin while Kara decorated her face with her birthday cake, I wanted the outside of the house to look a little bit nicer. I went to town and bought several annuals and proceeded to plant them around.

Those were the days when I knew next-to-nothing about plants, flowers, and last frost dates. When Mom and Dad got here, Mom sounded a bit alarmed as she told me it really was a bit early to plant annuals. Our average last frost date isn't until the middle of May. "But why did the store have them for sale then?" I asked.

The party was fun and our house looked festive, all decorated outside with I-don't-remember-what-but-it-probably-involved-petunias. Luckily, the days went by and the temperatures stayed high and nary a plant was lost, but that was an early lesson in gardening before I even cared about gardening.

I'm taking chances again this year, probably because I like to live on the edge a little, when it comes to my garden. I planted my tomato plants today - 'Brandywine' and 'Red Cherokee' - both heirlooms. If you walked around a bit, you'd find quite a few annuals that made it into the ground today, too. Over a week ago, our weatherman said he didn't expect us to see night time temperatures into the 30s again for a very long time. I took him at his word, because you know how accurate those weathermen are at predicting the weather.