A collage for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day hosted each month by Carol of May Dreams Garden.  From left to right, top row:  Hamamelis x intermedia 'Arnold Promise,' Helleborus 'Blue Lady,' Ilex x mondo 'Little Rascal' with a lichen covered rock, and a blue pansy; bottom row and middle:  the first crocus growing in the lawn, Helloborus 'Red Lady', a sprout and an orange viola. Just the beginning, a taste of what's to come.

After I posted about my landscaping adventure, several people wrote in and asked for better and larger photos.  I had some time today to take a few.  I hope you enjoy them. A shot from the driveway. In the foreground is the deciduous 'Jane' Magnolia.  It will soon have large purple flowers.   Behind it are the Ilex x 'Patriot' (hollies) which will eventually cover up the heat and air unit.  That was one of our primary goals.  You can also see in this photo the Cornus florida 'Cherokee Brave' (dogwood's) bare branches and several Nandinas both 'Gulfstream' and 'Firepower' along with Prunus laurocerasus 'Otto Luyken' (English laurels).  The laurels will have white flower spikes in the spring.  I can't wait to see all those blooms. Same garden, different angle This is another shot of the same garden from the front sidewalk.  Although she isn't a natural feature like the boulders,...

It began innocently enough.  I was out in the lower garden trying to find a spot or two to incorporate the spring vegetables.   HH offered to simply make me a new spot, but I know my limitations.  That would mean new soil, new fencing, a new raised bed.  Someday I will be old, and I won't want to take care of all this "new."  So, I was standing in the middle of one of the rectangular beds next to Rosa 'New Dawn'.  Her rampant growth looked pretty, but it had eaten the entire back fence causing it to lean.  Because of her tremendous size, she was also shading the very beds I want for my spinach, lettuce, beets, carrots, potatoes, pole beans, etc.  I took a step, and she snagged my ankle with one of her long canes making it bleed. That tore it.  I thought "Wench, you're going down."...

And, like the song goes, "to reminisce with my old friends."  When I heard about VP from Veg Plotting's meme asking for our top three to five dinner party choices, I simply had to join in. For mine, I perused my bookshelves, and I believe I've assembled an interesting list. First, I choose Russell Page.  He wrote The Education Of A Gardener (New York Review Books Classics) the year I was born, 1962, but the writing is as fresh as yesterday. We could all discuss the great country gardens he designed and all of the famous people he met over his long life. Second, how could any garden party, especially one situated in my rose garden, be complete without Graham Stuart Thomas?  Although he is best known as a rosarian, Thomas was so much more.  In my opinion, one of his best books is Colour in the winter garden, written...