Under a Blue Moon

Goodness we went from cold and windy on Saturday to the 90’s today.   It feels like we just fell headlong into Summer.  Which, truth be told, I am not quite ready for.

I thought I better bring in some roses before they got all wilty and sad.  I also gathered up some viburnum and even sacrificed some lilacs for the cause.

This pretty rose is an odd one to try to use in bouquets.  It almost has a silvery grey cast to it that doesn’t play well with the other roses.  It is a classic tea rose with nice stems and reliably shaped blossoms.  I think I need to pair it with some dusty miller and maybe some darker salvia.  Play up its strengths.

I know I really need to get out into the garden and fertilize and weed but I’m having the hardest time drumming up the enthusiasm.  Particularly when it is this hot out.

Next week I’ll have some crafty projects to share with you.  I’ve been feeling rather creative.  Probably because it is an indoor sport.  🙂   Next week it is supposed to drop back down into the 70s so I’ll try get outside and catch up on my gardening chores.

Two years ago Rick and I went on a lilac bender and bought something like eight lilac bushes.  They have finally settled in and are providing the most heavenly scent and color to the garden.

I think in general lilacs prefer a colder winter climate than we can give them but we have planted varieties that do well in our mild winters.

When we bought them I envisioned bringing in armloads into the house and having bouquets in every room.  However we can’t bring ourselves to cut any off the bushes.  They look too pretty!

We still have some work to do out here.  Like replanting a lot of our pots with annuals.  That bacopa in the urn has seen better days.  I need to spend a day pulling out all the old and taking inventory.  Then a trip to the nursery is in order.

The roses are all in full bloom despite me not doing a hard prune like I normally do every winter.

Here we have two Rosa Banks that have been trained to climb up the fence.  They are doing so much better since we took out a couple of overgrown shrubs that were planted in front of them.  Very reliable bloomers but they really only do the one fabulous flush of blooms with maybe a sporadic bloom here and there for the rest of the season.  But the hydrangeas will start blooming and we won’t notice as much.

That camellia that you see blooming away is the “In the Pink” I showed in a previous post.

The Cecille Brunner is another really reliable bloomer and looks gorgeous covering the shed.  There is another lilac too.  And a bucket I forgot to move out of the shot…

I’ll leave you with one last shot of the lilac.  I do with they would hurry up and perfect Smell-O-Vision so you could experience how gorgeous it smells around here.