PATIO HERBS

Who doesn’t love to step outside and snip some fresh herbs for cooking?  I had a lot of them at our old home but they were out in the garden and that was down a flight of stairs and across the yard. Not really convenient. The back patio was all shade so the option of a pot closer to the kitchen wouldn’t work.

Now I have a nice big pot of herbs on my very sunny deck where we live now. Very convenient. Lots of sun. I had chives, sage and rosemary available all winter long and now see even the French tarragon survived the cold temperatures and has made a comeback.

The sage is taking over and will need to be trimmed back. It is hiding a rosemary plant. I threw in some marigolds and a primrose while waiting for the weather to be warm enough to put out the cilantro and basil plants I bought. It is still getting a little chilly here at night so I will have to hold off for another week.

Sage flowers look rather like snapdragons I think.

I love blackish plants especially with a punch of lime green next to them. This planter should fill in beautifully.

I will plant up a few more pots out there. I have some petunias, miniature roses, purple fountain grass. I will also move my bougainvillea back outside from my dining room. I am hoping for more color from that this year. It was beautiful the first year but last year had very little color.

I bring in an Angel Wings begonia every year and drag it back out for the summer too. I blooms all winter long in my entryway and then when I cut it back and put it back outside it just fills back in and is beautiful.

We moved somewhere that I wasn’t going to garden in but it is in my bones and I keep adding more stuff. I have some bigger plans for the small but wide back yard area that includes a pergola to start. Once that gets done then I will plan some garden beds around that. You can take the girl out of the garden but……

NEW OCCUPANTS IN AN OLD HOUSE

This birdhouse used to sit to the side of our porch in the old house. Birds used it most years to nest in. They were used to us going in and out of the front door and they were far enough away that they were not too concerned.

 
Now it is on my front step, up against the house right at the front door. We came out the other day to a big mess on the porch of garden debris and pieces of raffia.

 
The old birds nests have been turfed out the hole on to the ground and a new family has moved in. They are not very happy with me using the front door and were really concerned this morning as I watered some plants out there.
I feel bad for them but I can't move the bird house as it is too big and also needs to be sheltered so it doesn't rot any further.

 

I want to arrange some nice plants around it but I don’t want to distress them. I know the plants would give them more privacy and a more natural habitat but every time I water they will again freak out. What to do, what to do?

ONE BED AT A TIME

It is a beautiful day in the neighbourhood. The sun is shining and it was a perfect morning to go out into the garden.

I have not been active in the garden for some time and it really shows.  Too busy, too tired, too frustrated with the enormity of the whole job.

No good excuses.

I am taking it one small area at a time.

I went out this morning with the goal of cleaning out one small garden bed next to my front porch.
 The remains of my Sedum Autumn Joy, a perennial sweet pea, a lavender, geraniums, Lucifer Crocosmias, a lovely pink Gaura that deposits its pink petals on our legs when we go down the steps to the driveway.

Looks stark now, I know, but soon it will fill back in. For two years now we have had little chickadees nesting in that decorative bird house. We hear them peeping when we come in and out of the front door.

These shots are from previous years. There is hope and promise in gardening.

We have a ways to go before summer. I hope I have the rest of the garden beds cleaned up by then. Sigh.

YOUR FAVORITE PLACE

A friend of mine who sells real estate (shout out....hey Michael) asked his friends to send him pictures of their favorite place in their home. I thought that was a brilliant idea and wanted to share it with you.

Do you have a favorite spot in your home or garden? Someplace where you read or enjoy your coffee or tea? A hallway that has amazing shadows when the sun hits it? Your dryer because you warm up your clothes on a cold winter morning? Hey this is subjective, it could be the dryer.

It can be as big as the whole room or as small as a picture on a table.

My favorite place is my dining room. It is where we sit with family and friends and laugh and love. I painted the area below the ceiling between the kitchen and dining room. It is my motto.

Link up and show us all your favorite place in your home environment and tell us why. 

Please link back to this page on your blog.

POPPIES FOR THE FIRST DAY OF SUMMER!!

Linda over at Stitch Lines inspired me today with one of her photos to post some of my poppy pictures from the past.

I love poppies and have been on a quest to find a true blue hued red one for years with no luck.

Every time someone says they have one it turns out to be the orangey red variety.

In the mean time here are poppies all from my garden.

This one below is my favourite. I shared some with one of my sisters one year and the morning it bloomed she called me so excited about them. She couldn’t get over how beautiful they were. Did I mention it was 5:00 am on Saturday morning when she called. Just a little excited lol.

Today is the first day of summer and it is sunny here in Beautiful British Columbia. June has not been very pleasant here and we hope this is the day it all turns around.

I GOT SUNSHINE ON A CLOUDY DAY

I wish. Raining here again but I need to post something sunny to keep my spirits up so I am going with these pictures from nicer days.

I am joining in with Mosaic Monday over at Little Red House.

A LITTLE LAND AND A LITTLE WATER

While sitting on the deck the other evening waiting for dinner to cook on the barbecue I noticed the sun shining on my bronze fennel. This sucker is about 6 feet tall and perennial.

The one below is more from the trip to Vancouver Island and the Wooden Boat Museum.

I am joining in with Mosaic Monday and Outdoor Wednesday. Thanks to these lovely ladies for always hosting us. Stop by to see them.



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FUNKY JUNK - GARDEN FEATURE FAIL

I

am joining in with Donna at Funky Junk Interiors for the first time. Her blog is so fabulous. And hey, she is from my area. Yay Canadian bloggers. Stop by and see what is going on over there. 

We bought this sun/moon face in Mexico and it hung here for a few years. Every year the fuchsia or begonias would fill in around it and it would look fabulous. 

 Of course I had to show it in my blog last year. I took pictures and posted them and received lots of comments. The next day I went out to the back deck and here is what I found.

I could have cried. The strap that was holding it on to the wall had snapped. No Humpty Dumpty here. I couldn't put him back together. I now have a piece of white picket fence behind the yearly planting of fuchsias. Nice but not the same.

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METAMORPHOSIS MONDAY-RACOONS-6 LORI-0

Metamorphosis Monday is hosted by Susan at Between Naps on the Porch. Stop in and see all the changes and metamorphosis taking place over there. 

 Well once again I came out to the deck in the morning to find this. This is my little water feature that is in an old laundry tub. There is only about 3 inches of water in it there. There were 6 little goldfish in there two weeks ago and then I was down to 4 of them. Friday morning there were none. ZERO. NADA, ZIP. 
The water spout had been pulled back enough so that the water poured out of the watering can instead of back into the tub. Sigh. 
The raccoons ate all my little fishies but luckily the pump is still working even though it ran all night without any water. I give up. No more goldfish.

Time for a metamorphosis.

I pulled out all the stuff that was in there. Some reddish water grass, a pot with a little pond lily in it. Some quartz pieces and some water hyacinths. 

I made a shelf with the flat quartz pieces resting on overturned pots and covered it with river rock that I already had.  

The wooden duck is a fun piece. There is a man who fashions these out of pieces of driftwood and leaves them on picnic tables in campgrounds throughout B.C. for people to take home. We "found" ours many years ago.
No more fish for me. The plants will grow in a bit more and the lovely sound of trickling water will run through the summer. 

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