In the Garden: May 2003 Archives

Gardening. I spent five hours on my hands and knees today, weeding and planting my herb garden. When I have pictures, I'll nag Red Eagle to show me how to post some of them.

The herb garden is my special garden. My mother has had a hand in most of the other gardens, so this one is mine to design and direct. Last year I joined an on-line herb group and under their influence I dedicated a wing of the garden to lemon scented plants.

Last fall they encouraged me to store the scented geraniums bare rooted, in the garage. I planted them today, and I don't have terribly high hopes that it worked, but the attempt to revive them is interesting. If I don't see some evidence of growth by the end of June, I'll get some new plants.

So...in the lemon garden, I'm growing verbena, grass, balm, savory, thyme and scented geraniums. If I come across a lemon basil, I'll add that later. I also planted a citronella plant. I had some lemon colored marigolds left over from another section of the garden, so I tucked them in, too.

I figure I have about 75-80% of the garden done. I still have to weed part of the chat walkway, and I plan to renovate one five foot wing. The garden is almost ready for the wedding now.

Tomorrow I have to pick up weeds that have been pulled, plant the tomatoes and a shrub, three roses and a couple of buddleia bushes, and that will be the last of my gardening for the week. I've been longing to be out in the gardens all spring, and in the past week, I figure I've put in about 20 hours.

I HOPE the iris will last until Saturday! They are stunning this year.

Okay.....if you've gotten this far you know just how dull I can be.....but I sure enjoyed my day in the gardens. :-)

For the past month, every other word out of my mouth has been "wedding." It's not even MY wedding, and I'm overloaded with chores in preparation. Thank GOD for my sister, who kindly invited my mother to visit her for a week. We've been busy doing fourteen years of Spring cleaning while she was away.

My stepdaughter is getting married in ten days. Her wedding is at noon and the reception is not until 5:00, so we are opening our home to out of town guests for the afternoon. There is NOTHING like having strangers coming to your home to make you look at it critically. I made a three page list of chores to do, have added most of a fourth page, and have slowly been working through them. I got to the gardens yesterday and today.

You know, before you go out and weed and plant your gardens, you really should exercise for a few months! I weeded yesterday for almost three hours and another two hours today, and I can feel muscles I never knew existed! The up side of all this work is that where I've worked it looks beautiful! The iris are just starting to open, and they should make quite a display for the wedding. I've mulched and planted about a third of the new plants, and most of the containers have been filled. I have the rest of the plants to set in, and a lot of mulching to do.

I finally realized today that I could only do so much. If I don't get everything on my list done, that's okay. I don't want to go to the wedding worrying about what people will think of my home, but enough is enough!

By next week, I should be in great shape, but I need my bed.......NOW! I hope you all have a great week. I'll catch you later.