" A Pocket Full of Produce"

"Ring around the rosies, a pocket full of posies (produce), ashes, ashes..... This is one of my favorite nursery rhymes and game to play with little ones.

I always head out to the garden first thing in the morning (or afternoon) depending on when I wake up for the second time (I confess that I get Davis off to school and mostly go back to bed for awhile). Anyhoo, I love to wear my vintage housedresses as they are cooler and as you can see from the picture (quite handy). The pockets work great for carrying various and assorted produce harvested from my garden! If I remember, I do carry out my vintage looking trug to gather the veggies in also as sometimes my pockets are too small! This has been a strange year for gardening - almost everyone has complained of lack of tomatoes (both green and red). My vines don't even have very many tomatoes (the tomatoes that are there are just beginning to ripen)! It has been an unusual year for flowers also - lots of greenery not as many blooms! The petunias form little buds that dry up before they bloom! The good thing about gardening - it is always an adventure and if something doesn't work one year you can try something else the next year! Happy Harvest everyone!

More Garden Pics

These are some pics of my early garden - it has grown up much more now and we have had peas, swiss chard, beet greens, lettuce and radishes! Can't beat the taste of vittles fresh from your own garden!

Garden Beauties

Am I Insane or Just Plain Crazy?

I can't decide if I am a crazy gardenhead bordering on insane or an insane gardener bordering on crazy! Yesterday I planted the rest of my three vegetable gardens and then Hal and I tilled up our back area around our raised vegetable beds - put down weed barrier - hauled in 1 1/2 yards of shredded bark and spread it all out - we were doing this in the dark until 11:00 p.m. at night! We ran out of wire stakes so I bent wire and made my own. I then got up today and after mopping my kitchen and bathroom floors and doing two loads of laundry and watching my cute great nephew Benjamin for an hour and a half or so.... I then decided to tackle my corner front flowerbed - I completely dug and weeded the whole thing and bought some marked down perennials - I am going to plant a peony and two roses to add to the 3 roses, valerian and lavender already in there and then I have a bunch of other plants to put in! I am dog tired and hopefully will have the energy to complete my project tomorrow! I gardened my little head off so now you can just call me Lissagarden! Get it! ROFL!!! This is a picture of the largest tallest hollyhock I have ever seen - it was at my base house in California - that is one thing I miss about California - the weather is so awesome you can have a full grown garden in one year!

More Smiling Faces

What is it?

I


Is it a bird.....Is it a plane.....is it an alien.....no, it's just a little allium having fun in the sun! I think it looks like a big purple firework! Happy Gardening Everyone!

Top 10 Signs

Top 10 Signs You Have Gone Over the Garden Edge.....

10. Your favorite poem is "Roses are Red, Violets are Blue"

9. Your kids are named Rose, Violet, Daisy and Zucchini.

8. You have 8X10 family pictures of your Tomatoes and Peppers on your office shelf.

7. Your idea of Saturday Date Night is going out in the garden and hand pollinating the plants.

6. You think a "cocktail" is liquid fertilizer.

5. You rush home from work and go straight to the garden and hug your roses. (Ouch!) Then you go into your house and see your family.

4. On Christmas Eve, visions of "Sugar Peas" dance in your head.

3. After the first frost, you are seen holding funeral services in your garden.

2. You take your kid's multiple vitamins away from them to use as a supplement to your plants fertilizer.

AND THE NUMBER ONE SIGN THAT YOU HAVE GONE OVER THE EDGE IS...

1. Every spring, your family files a "Missing Person's" report. You remain missing all summer and mysteriously reappear in the fall.

This was taken from The Gardener's Network website.

Blooming Idiots In My Garden

Here is a pic of my pansies! They are soooo happy this year! They be loving this cool wet spring. They are a bit confused though as they think they are residing in Oregon! This is one of my favorite spring flowers - they always have such happy faces!

Top Flower Colors for 2010

I attended my garden club in Nampa a few weeks ago and wore a new bright orange red Ann Klein jacket that I had scored at the thrift store for $4. I received several compliments on it from my Garden Club friends. I then visited a new garden center and the lady there raved about my jacket and the color of it - she said that the latest fashion colors and the latest flower colors of the season go hand in hand and that my jacket was one of the hot colors for flowers this spring! I walked out to the car and passed by a lady who commented to me, "Nice Jacket!" Wow did I feel like a hot flower child! Four or five compliments within a couple hours! I am attending a container planting class tomorrow on flowers that attract butterflies - I think I'll wear my new jacket again and see if I blend in with the colors used in the pot (whoever heard of red orange camouflage) or see if a Monarch butterfly lands on me looking for something to eat! I'll let you know what happens........

In A Garden

This is one of my favorite poems and also this is why I chose the name of my blog:

IN A GARDEN

The kiss of the sun
for pardon,
The song of the birds
for mirth, -
One is nearer God's heart
in a garden
Than anywhere else
on earth

Dorothy F. B. Gurney

I have always enjoyed this poem and the miracle of watching the little seeds grow - it is amazing how you put a dried up old seed in the ground and in a couple of weeks it becomes a living growing thing! I have attended two container gardening classes this year and am going to another one on Weds. I will share what I have learned in the next couple of blogs.

Yesterday I had the most beautiful bird in my garden - it was bright yellow with a large orange spot on the top of its head and it had black and white striped wings! It was as large as a big fat Robin! It must be some kind of a wild canary! I also have had several hummingbirds come to my feeder! I also hung up two finchfeeders and another hummingbird feeder! I am determined to get birds back in my garden despite the presence of my two cats, Sis and Budgie. I also have not had birds due to the ominous presence of all the squirrels raiding my supposedly squirrelproof birdfeeder! I have thus far captured and humanely (of course) released 11 squirrels. They especailly like to be turned loose next to a large tree - one squirrel ran clear across the newer park (with little trees) into a guy's yard before he found a large tree!

Back to Sis, the cat! She has always been my garden cat and always comes and hangs out with me when I am outside gardening! She just sits there and then follows me as I move from garden to garden! She was my garden cat in California and even though I once gave her to the neighbors (they would let her sleep in the house), she still would come over and help me garden! When the neighbors divorced, I asked them what they were going to do with my cat? They said they had found a home for her but I told them I would like her back! Other, then the time Sis leaped five feet into the air and actually caught and killed a hummingbird , I have really enjoyed her hanging around!

"Some Say Tomato - Some Say Tamato"

I am not a master gardener but I know a few tips and can grow a mean vegetable and flower garden. I have lots of people of all ages ask me gardening questions so I thought I would start a blog and try to present some new ideas as I learn new things myself! The new thing I learned this year is that tomatoes like Epsom salt (adds needed potassium) and bone meal (fertilizer).

Dig a hole deep enough so that when you plant the tomatoes the dirt will cover the plant up to the first set of leaves, put 1 T. epsom salt and 1 c. bonemeal into each hole, then put in tomato plant and cover with dirt up to the first set of leaves. Water, pray for sun and warmth, and watch them grow! My awesome husband built me cool white trellises to trellis my tomatoes on and it worked awesome last year. I love heirloom tomato varieties, and alway grow pink Brandywine tomatoes and am trying one this year called longkeeper (which lasts a long time). I also am going to grow a tomato called Whopper ( this one is supposed to weigh in at 2 lbs.) I am also going to grow several kinds of basil to enjoy with my tomatoes! Happy Gardening!