the garden and life...

Decided I would do a separate post about the garden this week instead of adding all these photos to my WOYWW offering this week.  I spend a lot of time outside in the summer and it is always nice to be able to share it with everyone!  Today I went out and took a bunch of picture of what is growing and blooming around here!
I have taken a whillion...yes whillion photos so I probably won't talk about each one...this first group is from the front wildflower garden Chuck has planted in front of the wall...the big bush behind the wall is my flowering and fruitless almond bush!

Looks like a jumble of stuff and it is at this stage.  He plants the perennials and they come up helter skelter in the spring.

Cosmos...love the purple and white ones.

Shasta Daisies

Yellow?

blue spider wort

purple spider wort

June 13, 2017
What the flower garden looks like today!  Just month later it is really in its glory!  There are so many flowers in here that I just didn't take enough photos...ahaha!

Galardia

A huge sunflower that came up on its own!  6-7ft

These Shasta daisies and cosmos have been blooming continuously since March...Beautiful and prolific.  The sunflower was almost pulled out but Chuck decided to leave it in to make me happy.  It tends to take over but it is so pretty and just one isn't a big hassle!

How about bee balm?  A really pretty purple!

Mexican hat!  I love it the way he has the rudbeckia, marigolds, and the Mexican hat all together here!








By the front door it is a little more restrained and contained.

A welcome pot of flowers!

A mixed flower pot. 

by the front door...I got these pots years ago.

The backyard is more prolific!  The vegetable garden is really going strong...

Chuck is the mastermind behind the garden this year!  In past years I did a lot more but being not to well at times has dumped it all on his lap.  Luckily he really enjoys doing it.  A few years ago we put in these raised beds and we found we could plant earlier and later in the year and alternate what was put where.  The corn as you can see is coming along nicely despite its strange growth rate this year!

A couple of different views of the garden...

We have a total of 6 raised beds that vary in size from 6'x6' to 8'x8'!  You would be surprised what all you can grow in a garden that size.  A lot of good stuff!

Artichoke

Two of our favorites we are watching right now is an artichoke that is beginning to produce and some tomatillo plants.  Tomatillos are a funny plant...we have 3 in garden and only one is starting to produce...Tiffany a friend of ours said that hers hadn't started production and she read that you had to have more then one plant to pollinate correctly...she only has one plant but will get another soon.

We have scattered some veggies among the flower planters on the patio and deck...check this out...

the flower planter on the back patio...

a wooden deck that is falling apart but an integral part of our outdoor life...the big pot on the right end has two artichokes but they are alot smaller then the one in the raised bed and not sending up a flower!

This is a view walking from the overhang of the house past the gazebo.  We have tomatoes and peppers scattered all along the walk...

a sweet pepper plant

tomato

bell pepper

tomato

               

The tree in the corner is a Bradford pear...We are now being told not to plant them cause they are a soft wood trash tree that takes over if left to grow.  When I bought it I was told the things didn't fruit but guess what...They do...just fruit we can't eat but the birds do.   I guess the best I can compare it to is Kudsu in the southern states.  Their fruit looks like this...

The birds really seem to love these things...the flower is a beautiful white flower that comes before the plant leaves out!

Okay the last pictures are of the swimming pool...I love my pool and spend a lot of time out here in the summer evenings...  The swimming pool was put in 30 years ago and has always been a place the family and friends hang out!

My deck chair...so relaxing with a margarita and a beautiful sunset...

This is Homer JR...he is the second pool sweep we have had since the pool was put in.  His only job is to whip around the pool and keep everything in suspension so the pool pump can filter it out.  He has a little bag that picks up leaves.

 My daughter Heather surprised me with a couple gifts this week...she knows how tender hearted...and grossed out I am by finding dead critters in my pool so she sent me a couple gizmos that help them out...
This little gizmo has a ramp that the smaller critters can crawl up and out of the skimmer to safety...hopefully I will see less spiders and bugs...

This is a frog pad where the frogs jump up on the floating pad and can climb to safety on the mesh ladder!

 Okay enough of this...will bring updates as things evolve!