Middle of the Week

 A perfect sculptural form in the garden. The striking red and white makes it a beautiful specimen.

 The hosta are at their best this year with the heavy rainfall for the mont. The leaves are bigger and there are really more of them. I like how they will grow in and among what ever I challenge them to do to do. 

 My newest purchase has grown large now after the two years that I have planted it. 

 I gave away one part of this purchase and kept two for myself. It is one of my favorites in the collection of hosta.

 I was frustrated with my tray feeder. Today I went into the shop and made a new one from all my scrap lumber. It is better and sits straight on the rail now. I am going to throw the old one away and not try to reuse that wood. I am getting to the point that I like to throw things away. I need to get back to doing more creating in wood. I can move my saw outside now and keep the sawdust down in the basement. 

It was a cooler day today and it only sprinkled once for a very short time. Rain forecasted for tonight again.  Thanks for stopping by today. 

Things for Tuesday......

The red and white stripes are getting to be weathered but these four seem to be looking good. The are semi closed because they are still cold and they haven't warmed up yet from the night air.  I noticed in the picture that a lily is really getting large as it grows up to make buds. I hadn't seen it until I saw this photo. 

 It is like a hidden objects in a puzzle, but can you see the peony buds in the flush of green. I expect that it will be a week before they actually bloom.

 My fernleaf peony still has not put out a good bloom that hasn't been messed up from the rains and hail. This bud may actually give me a good bloom. I hate to see the season to go buy so fast for it and never get some good blooms. I mentioned earlier that two of my friends have these blooming and they look untouched from the weather. 

 

My vining honeysuckle has its first real bloom. I know there is another name for this vine but I am not able to pull it out right now. The whole shrub still looks mostly dead. I don't want to cut it all back because I am not sure that it will restart and grow. 

 I am really happy with this hosta. I am dreading figuring out how to dig away the tulip bulbs that are too close to it. I have another hosta that has this same problem. I dront really want to dig all of it up and then replace the hosta but that may be what I will do. It would be nice if the gardener, me, didn't do such a planting in the first place. 

I spent my morning at the endocrinologist getting things checked out. I am doing better that ever before and was told to keep up the good work monitoring and working with my blood numbers. It isn't easy to do that but I will keep up the effort.  The parking ramp, which is four stories high, is finally repaired. The one thing that is disturbing is that while I am parked at the very top of the ramp, my parked car vibrated and shook as cars drove by.  I am sure they know it is safe but the swaying of it seems to be a problem.  I am sure I was in more danger when people kept trying to pull in front of me in intersections. They were trying to sneak through. I guess that is typical in downtown driving. Again, thanks for checking in today. 

 

First Day of the Week

 All of our rainfall for the month has cause trees and grass to look so healthy. We have had over 7 inches of rain in this month. Our last night's rain was over nd inch. I could hear a little bit of hail mixed in with it as I could hear it on the roof in the middle of the night. The spruce is in a race with the maple in their height gains. I did not plant either on of these but they do seem to be too close together. 

 My fern leafed peony suffers from all of the rain when it comes to have good blooms. The colors are there but the blooms really look beat up. I have seen friends of mine who I gave this peony and their blooms are looking so great. I assume they are planted in a sheltered location. 

 

It was a spur of the moment to put this hosta here but I think it was a good idea. I do tend to garden like a crazy person when I place things willy nilly. 

 

I won't be around to see this be a good tree. It is a Japanese Maple Bloodgood.  I am thinking I will go to a nursery and buy a three or four foot tree like this and move this to some other location. Mail order supplies are not such great ideas in this situation. 

It has been a cloudy day most of the time today. We have just enough wind to make the 72 degree F. temp feel very cold. I went for meds and pizza this afternoon and I got chilled.  I guess I can stand next to the oven as we warm it up for cooking of the pizza.

Thanks for stopping by today.  

Sunday

 It is an old fashion variety with the medium sized blooms. It is and older type as the whole bulk of plants starts blooming all at once. The newer varieties have a long blooming time. I am not sure where I got thie start of this but it may have been a cemetery find. 

 

The blooming of these may seem early but I am sure in southerin Iowa they started a couple of weeks earlier.  

The creeping phlox also is fading as its seasons of bloom is short. It does keep spreading and I will try to stop that. 

 

The privet leafs out again with the great yellow green colors. I moved this shrub from my old place and it has done well planted on the south west corner of the house. 

 We have a pair of cardinals in out neighborhood. The male sneaks in once in a while for seeds. My wife likes to record videos of him in the top of the tree and record its calls. I rarely see it at the feeder as it lands, grabs a seed, and flees for its life. 

We are having a cloudy day today with moderate warm  temperatures.  Rain is predicted again tonight. Maybe we can add enough rain to break over into 7 inch totals for the month. Thanks for stopping by today.

 

Saturday With Sun

 

 

 

I mowed the front and back yards today. The grass was so lush that it had to be done in the backyard. It has been reported that we have had a total of over 6 inches of rain this past month. We may add to that total this coming week.  The weather is such that we still heat the house up in the morning and cool it in the afternoon. Pretty soon we will be hot all the time but for now it is something different each day. I spent the time to get a few groceries  this afternoon. I can tell my 76 year old body will need to rest from mowing as I still am not in shape for it. Tomorrow I will rest.

Thanks for checking in.  

Friday's Report

 

The tulips are starting to fade as the rain and winds have beat them up for the last few days.  We had tornado warnings for a couple of hours last evening and went to the basement for the evening.  We have been through one tornado a few years ago at the old place and we now don't hesitate getting to the shelter space. Back then we had to deal with getting a semi blind 90 year old man down narrow bad steps. I also had to drag the border collie across the dining room wood floor and take him down while the sound of a freight train was roaring our way. We had houses and barns destroyed just across the way. 

 One lone iris bloomed this morning that is on the northern side of the house. There are three or four more buds on it so we will have more color.

 In the front yard gardens these two plantings responded to the heavy rain. I was surprised to see them all opening at about the same time. There too are plenty of buds on these two plants for longer times of blooms.

 

I have plant wars going on here. I guess I will pull or dig out the tulips as the hosta is special and I want it to grow larger.  With them crowded the tulips didn't bloom anyway. I don't know who the crazy gardener was that put the hosta in late in the summer with the tulips not in sight at that time. 

We have a cool 52 degrees F. this morning. I bought and spread some more top soil this morning. I also bought grass seed and have it down in the needed places. Others are out pulling weeds in their yard and a commercial company is busy mowing a neighbor's yard with big equipment. The one other neighbor is out with his new puppy and talking across the fence to another neighbor. The other newest neighbors have bought a new refrigerator and it is being delivered. It is like the whole of the world is out and about after the big long lasting storm.  It is an active place today.

Thanks for stopping by today.  

First Iris....More To Come

 The first iris bloom is out this morning. I have been watching the buds in the front yard but not in the back.  When I saw that one spot of color while working in the backyard I immediately went to see what it was all about. It is one of my cemetery iris.

 

I was out this morning laying  out bags of soil in the back corner of the lot. The grass isn't growing there and now that the tree was removed it is getting good sunlight. I spread the dirt out and looked up to see the crimson king maple leaves from underneath the tree. They actually do look red from the underneath when the sun shines through but all in all the leaves look brown as a whole. 

This is another view of the locust tree in the front. The colors are little different than a regular tree with a green yellowish tint on them. The leaves on the tree are different also by the way that they resemble fern leaves.  

The yellow tulips are a nice addition to the front garden.  the creeping phlox looks good up against their colors. 

 I mentioned these iris in the front yard planter and we will see which one bud will bloom first. With working in the yard this morning with dirt I realized that I didn't buy enough. After the many trips to the hardware to fix the supply water valve yesterday I just didn't want to go back today. I need about two more bags of the treated top soil and also I am out of grass seed. I really could use a new flower pot for the a fern that I bought the other day.  Maybe tomorrow I will go. It is less than a mile up our hill.  Thanks for stopping by today.