Buy bulbs now for spring flowers, but wait to plant them. In Oklahoma, I wait until around Thanksgiving or maybe even a little afterward to plant my bulbs. Pink tulips and white daffodils in the front border. Yes, we live in a log home. In fact, I pick the coldest day I can find and shiver as I plant. Suffering is essential to bulb success. Just kidding. If I plant bulbs when soil temperatures are between 55° and 60°F, I know the bulbs will put down roots and not use a lot of their energy growing above ground. Root growth is why you continue to water in winter when air temperatures are above 40°F. This is also true for shrubs and trees. Keep them watered about once a week when temperatures are above 40°F. Pink tulips and white daffodils from 2015. I'd almost given up on tulips because of voles....

Carol Michel and I have a little old podcast we call the Gardenangelists. I'm linking to Apple Podcasts if you want to listen. To celebrate fall gardening, we're giving away a garden of easy-to-start seeds with Botanical Interests Seeds.  Botanical Interests Seeds in the Fall Seed Giveaway! Don't those look yummy?!? To enter, comment on the Gardenangelists Instagram Page on the giveaway post.  Here is what the post looks like.  The Gardenangelists' Seed Giveaway with Botanical Interests. Now for the other pesky details to enter and possibly win one of five sets of seeds. 1. Follow  @botanical_interests and @thegardenangelists on Instagram if you haven't already! 2. "Like" the photo on the Instagram feed. It looks like the one above. 3. Tag a friend on the post to let them in on the giveaway! Remember, we have five sets of seeds so you and your friends have more chances to win. Feel free to share...

It's been a week of harvesting ideas at GardenComm along with tomatoes and peppers from my late summer veggie garden. These might seem like disparate topics but read on. I promise to tie them together. Some of the beautiful smaller hills in Utah. They also have huge mountains like in the background. Utah was dry, but beautiful. As my friend, Mary Ann Newcomer says, "You just have to put on your desert glasses." I just returned from GardenComm's annual meeting in Salt Lake City, and I so enjoyed the conference this year. The educational sessions were enlightening. I met four new-to-me homestead bloggers. They do a lot more crafts and canning than I do. I admire them because I do not like to can in the heat of summer. I did it as a teen with my mom, and it was hot. As my friend, Carol, of May Dreams Gardens...

The borrowed view is a great design concept, and the two gardeners who designed their own garden at East Ruston used this element frequently to great effect. The tree in the large pot is a Brugmansia. I spent most of my summer traveling. After the difficulties and sadnesses of last year, I felt an urgency to get moving, and boy did I! Along with the Garden Bloggers' Fling in Denver, I also journeyed with Bill and some of our friends to Great Britain in East Anglia for another garden tour. Then, Bill, Claire and I went to Philadelphia and Boston to soak up a little Colonial history. I'll be sharing our stops in East Anglia in the coming weeks, and I hope you'll come along. We also received happy news last night. Our daughter, Megan, and her husband, Robert, are going to have another baby! We're all so grateful and...