Front Garden Photos

The wild geraniums have just started blooming.

So far I just have yellow and purple but am looking for at least one new color to add this year. They really brighten things up and fill in places until I find things that I like better.

Here are a few other views around the front yard where of course the hosta seems determined to take over the world no matter how much of it I give away every year.

Oh well, I love it and it was free so I just keep moving it.

What can I say? It's a shaggy mess but it's home.

Garden Gone Wild

This is the section of the garden where we sit for afternoon tea. We used to have a table and chairs in the center of that open area but I haven't been able to do that since the wheelchair so we sit over on the driveway beside it. 

As you can see there's always enough shade and breeze to keep it comfortable.
There aren't any flowering plants here except for a wild rose we dug up in the woods on the family farm where we were married, some lilies that were at the back of this house when we moved here and a lot of hosta gifted to me by a neighbor who didn't like it in their yard.

Over the last 15 years we've been dividing and moving them around until I managed to get a bit of a border around the area. It's a messy but starting to look a bit more like the garden I had planned.

Speaking of plants that have been divided and moved. This is the view out the kitchen window and Yes, those ARE some of the tallest black raspberry bushes I've ever seen and the DO cover most of the backyard.

Some 0f these bushes are actually taller than our 1 story house! We've been picking black raspberries for a week and freezing some while making jam with some as well. I've tried to give away or sell extra berries in years past but for some reason have had no luck in my neighborhood. it surprises me that some people have never even heard of black raspberries let alone have tasted them so I even offered small containers to sample.

Oh well, at least we like them and are grateful for the savings on groceries while we find more and more ways to use them.

Fresh Flowers,New Potatoes,Strawberries and Raspberries

There wasn't a lot to pick today but the weather was lovely and we had coffee in the garden while watching and listening to the birds.

The most amazing thing was watching a small bird chase a squirrel away from the nest. I'd never seen that before and laughed so hard I almost fell of my chair! It not only chased the squirrel out of the yard but across the street as well!

A big, yellow surprise!

Well, they're pretty but unexpected. I  thought this was where my pink stargazers had been planted last year.

I need to be shopping for a nice garden journal to help me keep track of the plants and the plans moving forward with my garden.

It makes a bright welcome as you come up the sidewalk here.

I'm looking forward to solving the mystery and finding out if the pink lilies were planted somewhere else or whether the garden place sent me the wrong bulbs. Meanwhile, I'll sit back and enjoy looking at these until I decide whether to draw or paint them.

A new addition to the garden

These lilies were a gift from my Mom and baby sister, aren't they great? (the family and the flowers)

The other great thing about these is that it will allow me to get back to that painting of lilies that I was working on last summer.

Work on the garden is going slower this year because I'll be working from a wheelchair instead of the walker so a lot of changes will have to be made.

My first purple Iris and a great view of roses against the house

This is the only one of these Iris to bloom this year so I'm reluctant to cut it and bring it in to draw or paint. I may do it tomorrow but haven't quite decided on it yet.

I did cut it and was headed to the house with it when a neighbor stopped by to visit. Yes, you guessed it. I gave it away instead of bringing it in.

This is my favorite picture of the roses so far this year.

I liked it so much that I put it on cards to write my letters on . ( both the homemade paper and tape ones and some professionally printed ones where I was also able to include one of my rose drawings done in colored pencil.) I also created matching postage stamps and stickers which can be found in PaperHugs (one of my stores on Zazzle.)

The Front Garden

There are birds living in 2 of the birdhouses on the arbor and there seem to be babies in one of them so it's fun to watch all of the activity there and listen to them.

One of the things the birds seen to like is having a pool by the house and an assortment of feeders a few feet away.

I transplanted some of the violets from the backyard and love the fact that they came from a grandma over 30 years ago and have been taken along wherever we go ever since.

 Here are a few of my new favorite tulips.

Quite a contrast to the old ones which remain tangled in the rosebushes. That's been going on for 12 years now and I never quite get them all dug up and sorted out.