Photo of the Week

The Garden Spot in Bellingham has been having a weekly photo contest on their Facebook page.  I've entered twice, and won twice because I've been the only entrant that week.  The best part is how they describe my picture and my garden.

September 13, 2013:  We enjoyed this photo because it captured the connection to the natural world that gardening gives all of us. We were pretty impressed with the lush perennials and ferns in the background as well!

August 10, 2013:  Karen Glenn Mason’s shade garden really wowed us. We enjoyed the subtle use of texture and color in creating this serene space, the broad-leaved hostas in harmonious counterpoint to the spiky sword ferns. The use of boulders really gave it a true ‘Northwest’ feel. And we thought the garden art added just the right touch of whimsy to this shady retreat.

May Color

 A little tour of the blooming colors in my yard right now.

 Mail order lilac from about 10 years ago that arrived as just a twig.  It's been moved several times but I think I've found the right place for it now.

 Lipstick Strawberry, very prolific spreader.  Anyone want some?

Out with the Old

It's time for new Garden shoes, notice the duct tape covering the holes.  Hopefully this more expensive brand, Boggs, will last longer.

 I'm crocheting these flowers and putting them together, not sure what the end result will be, but I'm loving the colors.  I ordered 15 different ones from Knit Picks.

 Spring has been slow to arrive to the Northwest, but we've had a few sunny weekends.  These are plants in the bog that are showing life, in the background there is a rhododendron, candy tuff and heather.

 Wild bleeding hearts, always a lovely surprise

 I have lots of flower buds on my various lilacs, looks like this could be a banner year for the blooms.

And the dandelions are blooming too!

Leaves

Leaves in the pond

Leaves on the gravel

Piles of leaves everywhere

This Feverfew decided to bloom again, it hasn’t frosted yet so lots of plants are still hanging on.

Oak Leaf Hydrangea (there is a huge bee on the dahlia at the top of the picture, he wasn’t inclined to pose properly for me)

And of course Milo….

Walk about the Yard

Time to update on some of the yard projects from this summer.  The bog filters are operational, though we haven’t finished prettying them up.  This is the waterfall area from the small ponds into the big pond, it makes a lovely sound.

Now that the pond is clearer we are starting to see the goldfish – a lot.  Yes, we did start feeding them again, and now whenever you walk around the pond they follow you.  Maybe they can see us better now too.  A friend of Dave’s gave us some Koi, but we haven’t seen them.  I guess they are being coy, and hope they are doing OK.  The other morning a Heron was on Ducky Island, and I could tell he was watching the goldfish, but I never saw him go for one.

Dave decided it was finally time for the shop that he has wanted forever.  This is just the pole building, the next step will be the concrete floor. 

This is the way our “compound” now looks from up towards the garden.  House on the left, shop on the right, with the view down the driveway.

A few late flowers blooming to show some color.

The boys worked hard to get a supply of firewood put up.  Those weather people  keep saying we are going to have a cold/wet/snowy winter. 

 

I’m in a mood to try and finish projects that have been languishing.  Finally completed my fingerless gloves from last year.  My friend Debi is modeling them at our Starbucks knitting meeting.

The Green Post

Originally I was going to title this post “Vegetable Garden Wrap-up” but as I was putting in all my pictures, all I saw was a lot of green.  I wonder how many people will think this is about being ecologically green?

 

Apple crop looks good, we’ve picked a few.

This year we finally had grapes on the vines, but this is as big as they got.  I think they need to be in a sunnier/warmer spot.

 

Green beans – bush style did OK.

 

Leeks were successful, some have already been harvested.  The blank area behind the leeks had potatoes that I dug up a couple of weeks ago.  It was like finding buried treasure.

 

Squash overload, at least of their leaves.  This mass includes several varieties, the Patty Pan did OK, got a few off the Delica, and the ornamental gourds are spreading all over.  There is a yellow zucchini a little to the left, I’ve harvested a few from it, but not the usual bonanza.  It just was a weird summer.

 

Artichoke left to flower.

 

Pond “Remodel”

 

The time has come for a major revamp of our pond to add more filtering, which will eventually give us clearer water.  We will then be able to see the goldfish, and maybe even use it for summertime recreation – floating on the pond.

The first step was some excavating, I guess I forgot to take pictures of that process.  Dave dug out area to create 2 bog filters, plus a ditch for the pipes to run.

On the far end of the pond 2 skimmer boxes have been installed.  The pumps will pull water in through these boxes, then the water goes through the pipe up to the bogs.

This is the felt liner in the holes, that’s Matt with his back to us and Kevin the guy who designed it and sold us all the equipment.

The liner was then unfolded and tucked into the bogs.  Glad I was just taking the pictures, very hot in the sun on black rubber.

The excess liner on this side was cut off.

Next these culvert pieces, that have slits in the top, were arranged in the holes.  The water gets pumped into these culverts, then will flow up through the slits.

The next step is to cover these culverts with gravel.  In the “best laid plans” manner, Dave braced the culverts thinking that the truck could dump the gravel into the bog and it would flow around the culvert.

Instead the gravel pushed the culvert out of the way. 

        

Now all the gravel in this bog will have to be shoveled out so that the culvert can be put back in position.

That’s where it stands of this morning.  Dave is actually going to have some fun for 2 days of his vacation, going on a golf road trip with a bunch of guys to watch the Senior Open down near Seattle.  A well deserved break!

Wet Yard

The Pacific Northwest has had a lot of rain this spring.  We had some lovely sunshine early on, which gave me high hopes for my flower garden, but many of my annuals, zinnias and cosmos, have literally melted away.  Today is suppose to be a brief break with a record setting high for the year of 75 degrees, but while I’m waiting for the sun to warm the yard, I thought I’d show some pictures I took yesterday afternoon when the rain finally stopped.

Iris with raindrops, they’ve put on a great show and are about done.

My first Peony to fully open.  I should have lots more from today’s sunshine, the plants are heavy with buds. 

Blue Delphinium at it’s best.

Perennial Sweet Williams, a consistent early spring bloomer.  Thank you!

Milky Way Dogwood, this is our first bloom.  When I purchased and planted the tree last year I posted a picture that I found on the internet of what it would look like, and that post is the most looked at one of my blog for some reason.  These blooms are really on our small tree, they are all on the top so I held the camera over the tree and snapped.

Another regular volunteer this lovely columbine.

They are pink!  Who knew.  I planted this perennial 4 years ago, it comes up early and is a favorite of slugs, so I never have seen blooms before.  The plant managed to get big enough this year before the slugs came out in force, to bloom.  A storm caused the plant to lay over against the deck, but I’m thrilled to just see flowers on it.

        Lovely texture in the natural vegetation.  Although I was using the close up setting on my camera, I didn’t get good detail in this shot, I’ll have to learn how to do that better.  On the far left you see some jagged nettle leaves.  Peeking out from the leaves on the upper left are some interesting berries.  The wild Queen Annes Lace is thriving in the yard this year, there is one that is probably 10 feet tall, it will be a nuisance soon but I’ll enjoy it for now.  And Ferns, gotta love the ferns.