Green to Gold

It's September already and I realize I never got around to sharing our beautiful garden!  

  This is our first Spring and Summer here so we had very little idea of what would appear in the flower beds.  We brought quite a few plants from the old house and dug them in here and there late last fall, but what would happen in Spring was a mystery!  

  And there was COVID19 to consider.  Because of COVID19 we ended up with a super LOVELY garden, not only due to all the time we spent working on it but also money.  Since we couldn't go on vacation, we splurged on the garden.

  In the Spring we planted Clematis along the fence.  They were a little too far along for Spring plants, so hopefully next year they'll be more in step with the seasons and fill out.

All around the deck and gazebo, we have a collection of hostas, many we brought with us from the old house.  

I needed a place for my memorial stones, and so here is the dog's memory garden.  This was where the former owners had their compost bins and was very neglected.  Starting from scratch after cleaning that all up (we now have compost pick-up once a week),  I wanted a flowering dogwood but learned they do not tolerate Black Walnut trees, so we selected a Cypress, a Staghorn Sumac and a Lemony Lace Elderberry.

Beside the doggy garden we were surprised by poppies, poppies, poppies!  We enjoyed clusters of poppies in early Summer all along part of the back fence!

I'd brought along the Evening Primrose and they survived the move, looking good!

There's this patch under one of the walnut trees that made a good spot for a faery garden.  I found these blue shiny stones BURIED in the front lawn... how they got there we'll never know.   But obviously they wanted to sparkle and shine again so here they are.

A friend gave us this exotic plant with lovely leaves and strange, intricate flowers... they look fragile but they are hardy and lasted a long time.  At the old house the plant was beneath a maple tree where it didn't get what it needed but here it came forth with this lovely crown of blooms!  (Thank you Olga!)

Over the course of the season, we watched the garlic grow.  The scapes developed into curled dragon heads which then opened and looked entirely alien!  The "garlic pearls" are now being eaten, but we planted a few too.

Another treat was this lovely phlox!  It's right on our driveway and smelt wonderful for a good long while.

And our vacation money?  It brought home for us this incredible garden rock.  Mom always wanted one, and here it is, all 1522 pounds!  It's not going anywhere.  

And we have Black-Eyed Susans, big clusters of them!  This was also a lovely surprise, and a glorious finish to Summer.  (Don't look at the lawn... it's all crab grass and weeds!  We're furiously pulling it out by clumps before the seeds spread!)