The Garden is Alive!

Why hello!

Yes, I am still alive as is the garden...ish.

Where have I been all this time?!

Gaining a little gardening apprentice...

Beautifully, she has loved the outdoors basically from birth.

Baby's first cicada 😂
Yes, we survived the
"year of the cicadas"
Very disappointed that we saw a
grand total of like 5 in our yard.

Getting a little gardening tool set for her first birthday started the real indoctrination in motion.

And a 3' wooden and metal rakes, spade and hoe set and her own wheelbarrow the following year ensured the full immersion was complete.

Having an outdoor-loving toddler who occupies herself really well means being able to get into the dirt despite the busyness. 

Then along came apprentice #2 and let's just say 2022 wasn't the year of gardening.

What have the gardens been up to all this time?

I actually did quite a bit of gardening in 2020 in between baby-prepping projects. I hoped all the exertion, bending and squatting would help the baby come sooner. It didn't. 

But the gardens looked great!

I got my shade garden path back up to snuff in the summer of 2021 and oh how pretty it all looked! Husband had gifted me a bird bath that I need to pick out and said he would make me the bench I've been making room for out there.
Buuuuut I discovered that now that things are filling in I really didn't leave enough room, so need to move everything forward a couple feet and that just didn't happen that summer nor last. Could this be the year....?!

One of the most exciting things of 2021 was my butterfly weed finally bloomed!!!

And not only came back the next year in 2 of the places I'd put seeds, but sent out pods!!!

Also exciting was getting some native plants from my friend...he has vast gardens with mostly natives that are lovely to walk through when they're in bloom.

A brand new echinacea flower (my friend thinks probably magnus variety) between my black-eyed susans and white four 'o clocks gone wild!

And they all came back in 2022!!

⮝ My lilies in bloom with the gardenia (large white flower bush), butterfly weed (small orange flowers), fleabane (tiny white daisy-looking flowers), nigella (the ethereal-looking blue and a few pink flowers), and one of my newest prides: "Burning Heart" heliopsis (the yellow with red center flowers) 

⮜ My favorite is a lovely, wispy plant that's super unique looking aaaaand....it smells like licorice!! We actually made some tea and kefir water from it!
It's "Apache Sunset" agastache. 

I also got anise hyssop from him that puts out lovely little purple flowers and yup, just like the name suggests: it's got that lovely anise/licorice smell and flavor! I got a few bee's balm that have been slow to take off, but hoping soon.

I was in heaven with all the gorgeousness! And they're natives! (Well, apparently the agastache is not quite, but close.) I've been trying to focus on getting more natives in my garden and so it's very fun to see them come to fruition. Not to mention the growing amount of happy little insects I'm seeing. AND these plants in particular bloom forever! I cannot believe how long the flowers stay; rivaling many annuals!

The butterfly weed in particular is truly a magical plant. Loved by pollinators, blooms the entire summer, seeds itself pretty well once it gets established, grows in most sunlight conditions, needs little water....it's kind of my ideal plant! So very happy it's finally worked after all these years!

My tulip border has also come back nicely several years in a row...

And I finally bit the bullet, paid a fortune (because of course my yard would need very specific varieties), and bought my winterberries!!

I planted 3 'Red Sprite' varieties in fall of 2021 as well as their male counterpart, 'Jim Dandy' which I planted a few feet away near the fence so we can continue to build our enclosed yard jungle. (Big fella gonna get biiiiiig.)
I panicked when the leaves didn't come back as soon as other things started getting buds in the spring, but fear not, they did appear and grew wonderfully. So I crossed my fingers aaaaaand......the buggies did their job! Pollination! I got berries!!!
(Did I immediately run out and take a picture in the fall or winter? Of course not, why would I possibly have taken pictures of my dream-since-we-installed-the-shed-come-true of having gorgeous red in front of the bright blue all winter long?! 😑)
So just trust me that they were beautiful. And are already budding right now in early April!

The more discerning among the crowd will likely have thought, "huh...interesting that you planted a toxic berry plant when you have tiny children." I didn't KNOW it was toxic when I researched it, OKAY??!! (Well, ok, possibly I did and didn't care because children weren't necessarily in the future picture...the highest of priority clearly comes to my gardens. 😆) Whoops! Thankfully apprentice #1 is very compliant and knows not to eat anything in the yard without us telling her it's ok. (Or so we blissfully believe.) If apprentice #2 is anything like her second-born mother, we'll be fencing off the toxic berries pronto. Or having her stomach pumped regularly. Time will tell.

Well that's about all that's new in my 3 year silence. Here we are in a new spring and even in the busyness of a 9 month old and 2.5 year old, I'm ready!