Gardening in the Summer

Wild flowers I seeded in the fall when I added the bulbs out front.

Wayne and I have spent an awful lot of weekend mornings this summer planting more and more plants in our yard.  We are turning more of it into gardens and not grass.

Lambs ear and lily right after they were planted (before the deer got to the lily).

Almost all of the trees from Maryland DNR that we planted in the spring are still alive and some are thriving and over 6 ft tall already.  They were definitely a good buy and we are planning on ordering more for next spring.

Another import from Iowa.

 We have focused our gardening efforts mostly on the front and side yards where they are more visible to the neighbors and in case of the long ditch on the west side of the house where it is a pain to mow.

One of the hostas I planted last year.

Some of our newer additions, all clearance plants from Lowes.

 We have been working to take areas in the ditch and join them together so that now more than half of the side ditch has been started with plants.  We have also dug up areas in between where we planted some of the baby trees making them into larger garden area.  The plan is to continue joining areas between the trees so that it is easier to mow and less to mow.

Ditch along the side largely planted.

Red Sedum, we'd almost given up on them.

Side yard by ditch, more and more plants slowly filling it in.

I didn't originally plan to plant as much as we have or to plant all through the summer but as we discovered if you visit on a regular basis and are patient Lowes has wonderful clearances on plants as they get past their prime or are done blooming.  Buying plants at 50-75% off sure lets us plant more than we could have otherwise and has also let us try different plants to see which ones do well for us.  We have lost a few but we also have some that are thriving for us.

Many of the plants have been clearance plants from Lowes.

Gardenia for only $5.  What a deal!

Front ditch with periwinkle getting going.

Another view of the side ditch, it keeps changing.

I also ordered  a bunch of plants in the late spring that were very small and slow to get started but seem to finally be getting established.

Some of our 50+ baby trees.

One of our very happy black locust trees.

Another new area, this one with a ground rose, and daylilies.

Another picture of the side dich.

Beside the driveway, a challenging area that gets wet and hot.

With a lot of the plants I have been buying at $1-$3 we have been able to get much further than I expected to this year.  I have bought almost exclusively perennials so as they get more established they will get bigger and fill in the areas more.  We have slowly been adding plants here and there so we have a nice biodiversity.  We haven't gone with much of a plan other than we want a lot less grass but this has allowed us to make really good use of the clearance plants as we can get whatever looks good that is on sale.

It has almost become like a sickness for me and I even bought clearance plant the day before Hurricane Irene came barreling in.  I am getting ready to order Iris, daylilies and more bulbs to plant this fall and we will continue to add Lowes clearance plants.