So what? Sew buttons!

It’s unfortunate that today is Garden Bloggers Bloom Day because I’m in a bit of a funk about our garden and yard. We simply have not had enough rain at all this summer and everything is hot and dried up. Everyone’s yards are just flat out brown and the grass is so crispy it hurts to walk on. The coneflowers which I see other people proclaiming as drought resistant are completely burnt up. We went to a friends house this weekend and their brand new garden was so ridiculously perfect it hurt to look at. Our raised beds, which Paul worked so hard on, are only just now yielding a few beans. I think we just didn’t water everything well enough.

My shasta daisies are a thing of beauty for approximately a week. I’ve been deadheading them and still they seem to turn all brown and burnt and when deadheaded nothing grows back. I stepped outside this morning and this is what I saw!What am I doing wrong!? I see everyone else’s yard with gorgeous clumps of daisies and coneflowers and I can’t seem to get it. Boooooo…. OK, enough being down on myself. Let’s see what we do have (and I’m doing fewer photos because I already posted a whole bunch of the black eyed susans).

Clematis is blooming again.

Here is one of apparently two seeds that grew from a giant container of wildflower seed mix. Two? Really? Yes, just this and it looks like one cosmo. And sadly, this in the mint area and there is not nearly as much mint as usual.

I’m really regretting not doing a big zinnia bed like I had last year. The pretty impatiens I put in its place are just too small and dainty for the area.

Another sad story. What’s with this coreopsis? I planted it two or three years ago and it’s just this lame little thing. I’m really thinking that we might have to turn to Miracle Gro and also our neighbor’s horse manure. At least I’ve been keeping up with weeding, but I’m really discouraged by how stunted and puny everything is.

This is not puny and is vibrant and lovely (it’s new).

The speedwell is doing well by the pond and in the front flower bed. In this pic it’s by the pond (which really has an astonishing amount of greenery around it. So far, though, only the one lily bloomed.)

A little chrysanthemum from autumns past is continuing to return (smaller and smaller each year.) Check out its lovely buds.

So, although I’m feeling pretty sad about my garden I think I need to end the pity party. We do have two big sunflowers which are going to be really cool when they bloom and we do have lovely outdoor space with every so many trees and our bluebird visits us every day (yesterday it hovered like a hummingbird causing much excitement in the kitchen) and we’ve been having fun in the river:

and there were all these tiny little toads hopping around on the ground. Here is one:

And then it got scared and pooped.

p.s. So it’s a few hours later and I’m feeling more optimistic about everything. I was just outside on the front porch having a popsicle with Clark and using my brand new clippers to deadhead the daisies. I was thrilled to see that in fact on stems where I’d earlier deadheaded there were some teeny tiny buds. So it looks like I will have some more!
And, then I admired my hanging basket of pink geraniums which I’ve been extremely conscientiously deadheading since I got it and I noticed that it is just so lush and full with lots of lovely foliage and incoming buds.

I love this idea of seeing what is blooming in people’s gardens all around the country on a single given day. Within my own town I know there is quite a bit of variety (we joke that we live in a micro-climate), so I’m curious to see what everyone else posts today. I found out about Garden Bloggers Bloom Day last month a few days too late to participate in April’s day and I’ve been looking forward to May’s day ever since. So, here’s what blooming at our house today, May 15, 2008, an overcast day with a predicted high of 72.

Our rhododendron is coming into bloom, with about 1/3 of the buds opened. Last year it was stricken with something that made quite a bit of it die, so we had to do some pruning and its shape is not as full as one might like, but it is still quite large.

This is the iris which is in the pond. There are just a few buds this far along and I can’t wait to see them blue. There is also a large clump of iris (I think “water iris”) next to the pond, but planted in the soil. It has many buds but is probably still several days away from blooming. The Siberian iris has several buds (which I think look like fish) but definitely not every plant is going to flower. That’s ok–I like the foliage and the bulbs (bulbs?) were gotten from free from a wheelbarrow at our down the road farm and garden center.

This is a big beautiful white azalea. We have some smaller spindly azaleas in pink and red that I suppose the previous owner thought were good foundation plantings, but they really didn’t do well. I can’t bring myself to remove them though because no matter how spindly it’s still nice to see the color.

This is, I think, a weed. But I don’t pull it up because I love the orange color. I have no idea what it is.

This is the columbine I planted last year. I’m not sure, but it may have spread because there is a smaller non-blooming plant with the same leaves next to it. I hope it spreads because that would be a very nice thing to see under my birch tree.

Here is a planter of pansies, doing very nicely.

Here is a close-up of a bright pink dianthus. I believe I originally planted quite a bit of this our first or second year here, but now there is this one lone plant. Again, I won’t pull it up because I like the color. Instead I am going to work on adding more perennials to this front bed.

One of our pine trees has these beautiful baby pine cones “blooming” on the ends of its branches.

And here is the allium finally in full bloom.