Louise @ Home Is Where the Heart Is chose me for a book tag. I decided to make mine garden themed. I like this book tag because of the randomness of it, and you all know how random I am. The rules are: Pick up a book of at least 123 pages Open the book to page 123 Find the fifth sentence Post the next three sentences Tag five people Because I enjoyed it, and I met the author at the Spring Fling, I am choosing People With Dirty Hands, by Robin Chotzinoff. It also appears that Robin has started her own blog under the same name. "Besides, I'd been told by then that you can't plant tomatoes from seed in Colorado, especially not in April, before the last frost. Imagine my surprise in late September when I discovered a massive crop of medium round tomatoes crowded under a mat...

Every morning, during the school year, I drive down a certain highway. From the road, for about a month every spring, I see the top of a large tree clothed in nothing but light, buttercup, yellow blossoms, the color and texture of the finest cream. This spring, I decided to see the tree up close. I wanted to touch those petals which looked so delicate, but were actually tough and thick. I took only my camera and cell phone, but I also brought some questions. 'Butterflies' magnolia What else remained on this property, which was, twenty years ago, a garden nursery? What happened if the closure were final and quick like a death, and the plants remained? When HH and I first married, I bought plants from this nursery. I was a garden neophyte, and I still remember the young woman who took me around, trying to help me find...

Bloom wise, not much happening here yet. The tulips are all faded, but they had a really good spring. With weather that's been cool and kind of rainy, they've thrived. Someone should tell these red tulips that their time is over. Standing tall in the bed amongst the fading purple ones, they don't seem to know. The daffodils are nearly done too, and we're in the in-between stage. The roses are storing up their energy for next month's GBBD, and they want you to be sure and come back then. Poor dears, they get their feelings hurt if no one comes to visit. In the meantime, here are the few things actually blooming at my house that I didn't buy already blooming from the nursery. On the left is the front garden from a different angle. When she moved to Anacortes, WA, Wanda gave me this sweet, Hypertufa birdbath she...

On this chilly April afternoon, the ingenues enter at stage left, their delicate blooms glistening in weak winter sunlight. These are the spring flowers which herald warmer temperatures, green grass and blue skies. Catch them now before summer fades them until their beauty is merely a memory. This woodland phlox (Phlox divaricata) was a passalong from Wanda. She had both the purple and blue varieties growing in the wooded garden behind her home. Hers were planted in drifts, and I'm working on a similar effect in my shade garden. They spread by seed. Next, for your viewing pleasure, is double-flowering Japanese kerria (Kerria japonica 'Pleniflora'.) Bright green stems grow well in dappled shade, and kerria maintains its bright green color throughout winter. It blooms prolifically in spring and sporadically throughout summer. Mine started flowering about one week ago. In the rear garden, I have the single flowering form, which hasn't...