Spring Flowers #3

Memorial Day weekend was cool, damp, and not a very pleasant weekend for camping or working outdoors. I had a mission to get all my flowers in pots, the flower beds cleaned, and the outdoor furniture and decor cleaned and in place before we left on June 1 for a couple of weeks of camping.

This was most of what needed to be potted or planted. I had a theme in mind when I made these purchases. Can you guess what I had in mind? There were some vegetable plants tucked amongst all the flowers.

 The Lily of the Valley were in full bloom the end of May. The other lilies will probably bloom while we are gone. One of the 3 poppy plants survived the winter and I will most likely miss it's flowering. I'm just excited to know it survived. I planted several other Icelandics and one other poppy. We'll see if the heat destroys them. I had planted 3 Icelandic poppies last summer and one of them was growing nicely when we left.

the prolific Anemone

Columbine variety

more traditionalColumbine

 I had a very good crop of alfalfa going in the flower beds. I had to work rather hard to get it all pulled before I could apply weed protection. Not certain if the Preen would kill the alfalfa.

 I may have more to pull when I get home later this month. I could not believe how long the root system was on some of the plants!

The weeds are gone. Preen applied. My body required a chiropractic adjustment and a massage the following day. Digging in the dirt is very therapeutic, but my body also craves the massage afterwards. 

Funny story about the bird bath: the bowl was setting on my work bench, but I could NOT find the base. I was so certain the base was tall, blue, and ceramic like the very heavy bowl. I looked in both garages, the shed, in every corner where it might have been. I figured it must have gotten broken so began the hunt for a new bird bath. I looked in several stores and was willing to spend whatever I needed to get what I really wanted. As I was pursuing the aisles in one of the stores, I realized the bird baths had collapsable bases. AH HA! I bet that is what my bird bath had and I know just where I placed it last fall. Sure enough. It was folded and in the storage location it was supposed to be placed.

 

For the first time ever, I placed mulch (wood chips with weed protection) in the large flower bed. I don't know if it will help with the weeds, and I am not certain I LOVE the look, but it is worth the try...all 7 bags of it!

We quit watering the lawn in the summer time about 10 years ago when we started doing more summer travel. The lawn looked so tough when we got back this spring, we had it over-seeded and are required to water it daily. Luckily, we have a wonderful neighbor who was willing to take over that duty while we are gone. (Poor timing, but you do it when the company can come and do the job.)  The birds have been thrilled with all the watering, as we have a great crop of night crawlers living in the lawn.

So this is my themed pots. A pot of red flowers, one of purple flowers, and one of yellow colored flowers. Different plants in every pot, no two of the same plants in each pot. All plants said full sun, but after 5 days, all sun was too much. I moved them for easy watering (for the wonderful neighbor) and less sunshine.  We'll see what they look like when we get home...