My Hydranga Bush

My hydranga is bloming.  It's kinda purple/lavender/blue.  I love the blue color and that is what I am aiming for.  I always forget what they need to make them blue.  I think it is an acidic soil.

Some of the blooms are drooping because they are so heavy.  I cut them and   put them in a vase on my table.

This is the bed where my hydranga  is planted.  Actually, I  stuck it there just until I found the 'right' place for it. That was 4 years ago and it's doing so well I will leave it there.  This space was going to be my herb garden.  And I do have Rosemary, Parsley and Basil along with Mint (what was I thinking there?).  And some plants that attract butterflys.   Along the back are several Passion Flower vines.

I love this plant.  It is very old fashioned!

This is my Flaunt Your Flowers post for this week. 

Thank you Tootsie.  Visit her for lots of lovely flowers.

Life Is Good!

My cute little tuber Morning Glory!

And a very cute Award from Lona  at A Hocking Hills Garden.

Thank you Lona, for liking my blog!

Six questions asked by Lona.

1. What makes Life Good for you? 

Peace in my day. Creating something and being wowed by Gods creations.

2. What is your favorite pass time or hobby other than gardening? 

I love to design, embroider and stitch old fashioned  baby clothes.

3. What was your worst gardening experience or disaster? 

Forgetting to bring my tuber morning glory with me to my new house (not to worry, I knocked on my old door , shovel in hand and the new owner let me dig it up - I had prepared tears for this event but they were not needed after all.)

4. What is your favorite flower (show picture) and why? 

  I can't answer that or my flowers will get their feelings hurt.

Picture of a Flower I made with stained  glass.  I like it alot!

5. Where is the one  place you would love to visit and why? 

I bet I don't even know the ONE place I want to go yet!  A wonderful English Rose garden (in England) where the roses are in magnificent bloom!  Tea would be nice, in that garden.  David Austins English Rose Garden is at the top as of now.

6. What flower or nature picture is your favorite and show it?

A picture of mine?

Love this picture of roses with the sun streaming in the window.  Taken in the winter....I rustled these Roses from the local grocers!  

I will tag 5 blogs that seem to say "Life is Good" and here are my questions.

1.  How many Roses do you have in your garden?

2.  Where is the one place you would love to visit and why?

3.  What is one of your favorite garden/flower photos and show it.

4.  How do you control pests in your garden?

5.  What is your favorite thing to do other than gardening?

6.  What is the favorite garden place you have already visited?


I  will  Tag: (and if you don't have time to play, just know I am enjoying your blog!)
 * Living With Plants
* A Gardener in Progress
* My Bella Rose
* A Chef In The Garden
* Trials and Tribulations of A Southern Garden

Sweetheart Rose on Flaunt your Flowers Friday.

This is the Sweetheart Rose.

It came from a cutting that my neighbor gave me before we moved across town about 5 years ago.

It's tiny, about the size of a finger or thumb.  But perfect.

Sweetheart Rose bush.  

My neighbor had the rose growing in her yard for about twenty years.  She said it came from a cutting from her Mothers rose bush.

That's my favorite kind of rose.   One that came from a friends own rose bush.

This is my Flaunt your Flowers Friday from Tootsie.

Visit her for lots of pretty Flaunted Flowers!

Ladybugs, Blog Awards and Dead Heading

To my delight, I discovered they sell Lady bugs at my local Nursery.

They can feast on my Aphids!!

Remember all the blooms on my Fairy Rose?

One of the drawbacks is there are lots of blooms that need to be sniped off when they are finished blooming!

The Fairy Rose is unlike most roses.  The blooms just dry right on the bush and don't fall off.  So you really have to Dead Head them.  I love that term, it sounds like a Rock band from the 60's or 70's.  Anyway, I also LOVE to Dead Head my roses.  It is like I get to spend personal time with each Rose bush.  But I will say that the Fairy Rose is rather a hog for attention as far as Dead Heading goes!

I was so excited to receive this blog award from Angel at My Garden Cottage.   She has a very nifty and interesting blog.  It is fun to visit her.

These are the blogs that I am passing the Award to and I hope you  visit them and see their wonderful pictures and information.  Of course there are so many more than these that I love.  I guess I would tell you to visit my  Blog Roll for the complete list of Blogs I love (and have discovered so far).

Sandy at Aging Disgracefully
She is soooo funny.  And pretty flowers. Her blog Title got me to go there the first time.

Connie at Hartwood Roses
Roses, Beautiful Roses!!

Carolyn at Rose Notes
Her Roses are lovely and her photography is stunning.

Lona at Hocking Hills Garden
Beautiful flowers.  I love her pictures of her garden in different seasons running along the side of her blog.

Becca at A Southern Garden by Becca
Something pretty is always blooming here.

Tootsie at Tootsie Time
I join her for on Fridays for Flaunt your Flowers and it's a fun time.  I always look forward to Fridays.

A Happy Day In My Garden

It Lives!!

Oh Happy Day!!

I thought the extreme cold winter had killed this Morning Glory. I have never seen it before finding it 7 or 8 years ago in an out of the way nursery and can not find it again.  And I love it!  I grows from a tuber.  Under the ground the tuber is ugly and huge.  No one has been able to get a cutting so far and the nursery it came from went out of business 2 years ago.

My cat Reilly. Picture from last summer.

Vine along the fence with purple morning glory!

AND  I received my first ever Blog Award.  I am thrilled someone liked my blog enough to send me this!!

Angel from My Garden Cottage sent me this

"I Love Your Blog" award.

Now I need to tell 10 things I love!

That's easy!

I Love:

Picture from last summer.

I Love my Mutant Tuber Morning Glory!

I love Tea Parties with my Friends!

I love reading the Word of My God.

Me in the Mirror

I love my camera - Nikon D-40

I love Daffodils.

Pot of Roses from my Garden last year.

I Love Roses!

I Love a  Bubble Bath!

I Love my job!

I Love Little jars of Flowers!

I Love My Family (not all pictured!)

That was fun.

I  am to pass on the award to a few of the blogs I like.

Will do that in the next post.

Thank you Angel!

Easter Lilly

My Easter Lilly is blooming in the middle of May!!

Is that odd?

I hate to willingly be the cause of  the demise of any living thing!  So  three years ago after  the Easter Lilly (gift from my Daughter)   quit blooming,  I dug a hole in the back corner of my garden. Behind everything.  So it wouldn't get in my way.  And plopped the plant in it.  I never expected it to live, much less bloom again.  But every year it does bloom,  back in that corner, almost hidden.

  It's beautiful and smells so nice.

My Maggie Rose

Maggie has been planted here for maybe 4 years.

If I had a favorite Rose, it might be Maggie.  She seems to always have at least one rose blooming.  A description from The Antique Rose Emporium " Collected by Dr. William C. Welch in Louisiana, "Maggie" has very full flowers that are large, of rich carmine rose that can darken to crimson in cool weather. They are freely produced on a vigorous, healthy bush that makes a nice hedge, specimen plant or even pillar rose. The true "rose" scent is even headier when the flowers are carried indoors."

The pretty color  shows up from a distance.

The rose shape is kind of old fashioned and smells good.  I love the color. 

It is beginning to seem like every plant I bring home is the same color!

The verbena came back from last year even better than before!

Frog and Toad like to play in the roses!

I like this rose so much I bought another one.

I planted this one in the front. Not sure yet how it will like this spot!

See more beautiful flowers from Flaunt Your Flowers at Tootsies!

Birdhouse In The Fairy Rose

Birdhouse in my Fairy Rose Arbor

Wouldn't this be a grand place to live??

Fairy Rose on my Arbor

Fairy Rose as seen from my back window.

It is going into full bloom and it's lovely.

View from the yard.

Notice  the rose on the right side  is bushier.  That's because the Fairy Rose bush on the right is NOT a climber.  The Fairy Rose bush on the left is a climber.  And I need to attach some of the branches so it will grow upright.  It grows so fast.

The branches are coming off the main canes and are blooming profusely.

It grows with wild abandon so I am going to see if it evens out with time.  I mean it is only May!

Frog and Toad like the Fairy Rose.  They hide in it.

I cut them all the time.  There are so many flowers all summer that you hardly notice they're gone.  And they last forever in a vase!

Fairy Roses in an old Vase

This picture was taken last year in the cool of winter.  The flowers are darker when it's cool and the fade with the heat and sun.

I am being stern about keeping them trimmed at the bottom.  The thorns are so many that you can not weed  around the canes.  And  they make runners!  You should never have to buy this rose.  Just find someone who owns one.  It could be called The Rose Weed.  

I love this rose.

I love the name.  I guess the Fairies are safe in this rose because of the thorns!

For more beautiful flowers visit Tootsie for Flaunt your Flowers Friday!

My Valentine Rose

My Valentine Rose.

It isn't really called a Valentine Rose officially.  I don't know the name of this rose.  This is why I need a garden journal.

It always has several roses blooming in a cluster.

My husband gave it to me for Valentines Day about 4 years ago. So I always think of it as my Valentine Rose.   He probably got it from Home Depot.

Peeking through the fence.

It is a very hardy sort of rose.  I have moved it a jillion  times. And bugs don't bother it. It rarely gets blackspot.

This is after it has been open awhile. 

It stays on the bush forever!  The petals seem to almost never fall off.

You can cut the cluster and stick them in a vase and they last.

This is the bush.  It never gets very tall.  I'm not sure if it makes 2 feet.  

I will have to measure it this year to see how big it gets.  It will stay here because the area is too small and too wet for my fussier roses.

It really is a pretty rose!  Too bad it doesn't  have that rose scent.

I love it because my husband gave it to me.  But I  have never been that fond of red roses as regards a single rose.  I love the effect of the red roses in the yard and especially a red climbing rose.  But I gravitate  toward the soft pinks.  Plus I love, love, love a rose that smells.

Frog and Toad like the Red Roses and the deep shade of green.

For more pretty plants, visit Jean at Blooming Tuesdays!