For the first time in my life, this year, I realize there is not enough time. One of the sunflowers I grew from Sunflower Steve's Van Gogh mix. It is small but mighty. Not enough time to grow everything I want to grow. Not enough time to garden. If I’m lucky, healthwise, I’ll live and garden into my 80s, but that’s only twenty years away. There’s also a strange phenomenon that as you grow older, time moves faster, so twenty years to a thirty-year-old is completely different than to a 60-year-old. Lower back garden with my signature purple chairs. Pretty soon, the crapemyrtles in front will be covered in red flowers. I turn 61 in September. We replaced the split rail fence, but we'll need a bulldozer to take down the charred trees across the street. Not enough time to fix everything that is broken. After the wildfire in March,...

We opened our garden a week ago Saturday, and people had lots of garden questions. I figured my internet friends do too. And I have answers. A special thanks to everyone who came out. We enjoyed the visit. We put a lot of love and work into the garden, and it's nice to share it. Blue larkspur in the kitchen border. It was a glorious day. We even had a rain shower that lasted about ten minutes. People huddled in the garage until it was over. I wish I had taken photos of the visitors, but I forgot. I was busy answering garden questions. If you plant it, they will come. This beautiful artwork is from my good friend, Dana George. I love everything about it, especially the bluebird. As I'm writing, I hear a male Eastern bluebird singing in the trees. Male bluebirds have a very distinctive song. When...

Have you ever had a color crush? I know I have. Some years it's using complementary colors on the color wheel, like purple and gold (my high school colors, actually), or purple and orange. Zowie! Complementary color combinations give you action in the garden and create tension. The best kind of tension I think. Here's a good example of purple or red leafed cannas with purple and orange daylilies from 2021. See what I mean? Hemerocallis 'The Band Played On' (Stamile, 2006) with 'Orange Rocket' barberry and 'Australia' cannas. This year's color crush is harmonious. I'm having a romance with coral, which is a fabulous shading between pink and orange. I fill my wardrobe with it every chance I get, and I'm using pink and orange throughout the garden. It plays so nicely with my other crushes, too, like red and purple foliage and blue Salvia farinacea flowers. Salvia farinacea...

While these flowers aren't true ephemeral spring beauties in that they don't bloom and then go underground for summer, they don't last long, either. Because we had a very long, cool, wet, and verdant spring, I'm getting better flowers out of all the plants that are somewhat to very difficult to grow in my climate. I'm taking full advantage too. Sweet Peas When I posted the ultimate spring beauties, sweet peas, on my Instagram story, so many Oklahoma gardeners were stunned. Why? Because sweet peas are so difficult to grow in our climate. That bouquet in my hand spells victory! If you want to see the spring beauties in the galleries in a larger format, click on the photos. My other sweet peas on a trellis I received from Gardener's Supply. Isn't it pretty. 'Janet Scott' sweet peas. A bunch of sweet peas. Be sure to deadhead them and bring...