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Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

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Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

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Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

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Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

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Garden Chats

You are here: Home / Archives for Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 3: Textures/Shapes and Personal Touches

by Anne Laurie|  April 12, 20265:55 am| 31 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 3: Textures/Shapes and Personal Touches

And a final fillip from delphinium:

This is the last set of garden tour photos, exploring miscellaneous items. Some gardens had a great blend of textures, shapes, and colors with one garden even including a cat patrol.

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Besides the beautiful plants, I always enjoy seeing what personal touches gardeners add to their space to make it their own.

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I need more photos, fellow gardeners! Surely there’s new growth coming up, freshly started beds, or new ornaments that you want to share?

What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 3: Textures/Shapes and Personal TouchesPost + Comments (31)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 2: Up Close

by Anne Laurie|  April 5, 20265:19 am| 32 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 2: Up Close

More inspirational photos from delphinium:

Some folks on the tour had been reworking and reshaping their gardens for well over 30 years. It made me feel a little better that after 13 years here, I too am still rearranging my gardens.

Included are some close ups of everyone’s hard work.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 2: Up Close 2

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At one house, the official tour guide was a kid who happily showed off his small garden space that included his painted rock collection (unfortunately it was in a very shady area so couldn’t get any decent photos). It was great to see such enthusiasm, and I hope he continues to garden.

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The first mail-order plants have arrived at our new house — nine dwarf & five intermediate irises, plus a six-pack of Blue Butterflies columbines, all looking quite prosperous. Ergo, yesterday we made the year’s first trip to our favorite garden center, for more planters & bags of potting mix.

I was pleased to discover that at least a *few* of the potted irises, columbines, and even daylilies rescued from our old house survived the winter, too. Now comes six weeks of waiting to see how many more green shoots emerge… not to mention finding out whether any of the existing rhododendrons et al are worth keeping.

What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Garden Tour Part 2: Up ClosePost + Comments (32)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring Inspiration

by Anne Laurie|  March 29, 20264:45 am| 13 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring Inspiration 5

Many thanks to commentor delphinium:

The local library sponsored a Garden Tour last June as a fundraiser. It was a great chance to not only support my library but also check out my neighbors’ gardens.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring Inspiration

This first part provides an overview of the various gardens. Will then get a closer look in Part 2, and lastly in Part 3, will share some miscellaneous photos of textures/shapes and personalization in these garden spaces.

The tour was a nice mix of larger properties on the outskirts and smaller homes within the city limits. It was amazing what these folks did with their garden spaces, and each one was a beautiful oasis in its own way.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring Inspiration 1

For example, one gardener created koi ponds surrounded by statues and rocks that enhanced their garden views.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring Inspiration 2

Another gardener with a very small yard made the most of it by creating some fairy gardens alongside their regular gardens.

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Included on the tour was a community garden where folks were in the process of planting items. These trees were on the way to the entrance.

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What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Touring InspirationPost + Comments (13)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: California Dreaming

by Anne Laurie|  March 22, 20265:02 am| 24 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: California Dreaming 3

This week’s lifeline, courtesy of Scout211:

Top photo: Our daisy bush is in bloom. I’m never sure which type of daisy bush this is. I’ve tried to research it and so far I can’t find one that looks exactly like this one. But I suspect it is one of the California bush daisies.

A field of Blue Dicks, one of our most plentiful early Spring native wildlfowers (Dipterostemon capitatus, also called Wild Hyacinth, Purplehead and Brodiaea (alternate spellings, Brodiea, Brodeia)
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: California Dreaming

We planted these rosemary shrubs about 17 years ago. They seems to thrive and the bees love them (Salvia rosmarinus, synonym Rosmarinus officinalis)
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One of our small Western Red Bud Trees (Cercis occidentalis)
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The blueberry bushes are blooming.
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The navel oranges are also in bloom, and the scent is amazing. The bees are busy today enjoying the nectar.
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Serendipitous discovery at our ‘new’ house: The sprawling clump of untidy sticks at the far corner of the pool fencing is forsythia, beloved New England harbinger of Spring. (Why the former occupants put it in that particular spot is unknown, but I do love seeing those bright yellow flares after a hard winter!)

In related news, Schreiner Irises just let me know that the potted dwarf irises we reserved are in the mail… and the Spousal Unit reports he can’t find the planters that were *supposed* to be waiting at the new house. (“They may be in a box”, somewhere among the several hundred boxes in three separate locations.) So, if it doesn’t rain, we’ll be making our first garden shop run of the season later today…

What’s going on in your gardens, this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: California DreamingPost + Comments (24)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Cyclamen in the Pacific Northwest

by Anne Laurie|  March 15, 20265:12 am| 24 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Cyclamen in the Pacific Northwest
 
Thank you, Mike in Oly:

We currently have cyclamen blooming in the garden due to our early onset of spring so I thought I’d send you a selection of photos I’ve taken over the years of them.

Being Mediterranean plants they are ideally suited to our PNW climate and need no care at all. They grow from corms that like to remain undisturbed, and easily cross with each other to make new leaf patterns and flower colors, though all in a shade of pink or white.

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I’ve no idea what pollinates them as they bloom before the bees wake up, but I have heard it is ants that spread their seeds about.

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The ones I grow are descendants of C. coum and C. hederifolium (‘ivy leaved’) and are native to the lands around the Mediterranean Sea. The two cross easily giving a wide variety of shape and patterns on the leaves. The flowers look like butterflies floating above the clumps. If you look closely at some of the clump shots you can see smaller babies coming up among them.

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A friend gave me a dozen or so corms from her garden some years ago and they have naturalized in our ‘shade’ garden under two large Douglas firs in the front yard. Other than some occasional summer water from a sprinkler in the area they get no care and are left to their own devices.

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The flowers come and go over the year as conditions trigger them to pop up and bloom. They are such a delight.

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I love cyclamens, but unfortunately they’re very toxic to cats — the realtor who sold us our ‘new’ house gave me a lovely 6″ potted specimen, which I had to quietly pass on to a friend who doesn’t have pets. Looking forward to planting some in the yard, since our cats (especially Rocket of the Depraved Appetites) are strictly indoor companions… but probably not until 2027, since there’s so many other more immediate plant projects already waiting.

What’s going on in your garden (planning / prep / opening), this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Cyclamen in the Pacific NorthwestPost + Comments (24)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Spring Returns to North Central Florida

by Anne Laurie|  March 8, 20264:25 am| 17 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Spring Returns to North Central Florida 5
 
Thank you, master gardener & commentor Pondwoman:

Here are some signs of Spring from a garden in north central Florida.

Top photo: Our first saucer magnolia blossom of the year.

Life is returning to the koi pond. The pickerel weed is leafing out and the iris may bloom in about a month. The braced tree is a cypress that fell over in a windstorm.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Spring Returns to North Central Florida

Our azaleas began to bloom this week.

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These violets look white but are actually the palest purple you can imagine. They are popping up everywhere.

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This purple oxalis makes a nice contrast to the surrounding green.

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Closeup of a blueberry flower. We’re glad to have these flowers for the emerging bees.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Spring Returns to North Central Florida 4

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Daylight savings starts today, and here in New England we’re supposed to reach temperatures approaching 60 (a/k/a, False Spring)…

What’s going on in your garden (returning / planning / prep), this week?

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Spring Returns to North Central FloridaPost + Comments (17)

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: All Gardening Is Local

by Anne Laurie|  March 1, 20264:43 am| 25 Comments

This post is in: Garden Chats

Sunday Morning Garden Chat 169

In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.

In the midst of my interminable winter, I have summoned some invincible summer by ordering a bunch of potted irises from Schreiners’ Iris sale. (I think it was Satby who introduced me to their catalog, which is amazing, and their plants are every bit as wonderful.)

If y’all want garden pics every Sunday, you need to step up & send me photos!

Sunday Morning Garden Chat 170

I would like to have a garden like the apartment patio the NYTimes describes here:

… Mr. de Mornay, a horticulturist at Flora Grubb Gardens nursery, has assembled a diverse plant collection and as distinctive a range of containers to showcase them in. He put several large potted palms to work to create a kind of canopy for bromeliads and orchids that appreciate relief from the sun, which the cacti and succulents arranged in the patio’s more open areas relish.

His garden may all be staged on level hardscape, but the sense of terrain Mr. de Mornay has conjured with 300 tightly packed vessels seems anything but flat, thanks to their varied heights, and clever positioning.

“The way he has some staggered at different heights kind of creates a stadium-like look,” said Ms. Woodard, who also noted details like a collection of tiny pots raised on a table for closer inspection, and others hanging on a wall…

… but IRL, I’m what one reviewer gleefully described as a cramscaper.

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On the other hand, I think I can avoid the lure of the Washington Post‘s “perennial vegetable garden”…

… “The general reason so many of these varieties have kind of been forgotten is that our food system transitioned towards industrialized agriculture,” Hunter says. Most edible perennials are harvested a little at a time, leaving roots or parts of the plant behind to continue growing. That’s difficult or impossible to do with machines, “so a lot of these perennials can’t be grown industrially,” she says. “But they’re great for backyard gardeners.”

One reason to embrace perennials: They are eco-friendly. Plants that grow over many years increase soil health and biodiversity and sequester carbon. “Just not basically nuking your garden every year is a way to get a little closer to a natural ecosystem,” says Ashley Adamant, founder of the gardening and DIY site Practical Self Reliance…

Skirret. One of Hunter’s best-selling seeds is this root vegetable that was popular in medieval Europe “before potatoes came over from the Americas,” she says. “I tell people it’s like a stand-in for carrots or parsnips, but it could also be a substitute for potatoes because it’s a starchy root vegetable.” Once the seeds are established, “they’re really easy to grow,” she adds. “They make masses of white roots that are long and skinnier than a carrot. You can eat them raw or cooked. My favorite way to eat them is just to roast them in the oven with olive oil and salt. The leaves can be eaten, too. They kind of taste a little bit like celery leaf or parsley leaf.”

Potato onion. “Regular onions are biennial; the plants live for two years,” Hunter says. Potato onion varieties, on the other hand, reproduce indefinitely if some of the crop is left in the ground to seed the next year’s growth. The name comes from the onion’s long period of freshness once it’s harvested. “They have amazing storage,” she says. “They’ll keep in the fridge for, like, a year.”…

Dandelions. “People pay a lot of money for dandelion greens in the grocery store,” Adamant says. “They grow these huge, carrot-like tap roots that get even bigger if they’re in a garden bed rather than a lawn.”

Sunday Morning Garden Chat 168

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: All Gardening Is LocalPost + Comments (25)

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