Went out and watered, but that’s all I could really do. Much too windy for planting any seedlings, building a new bed, or pretty much anything else on my To Do List.

Speaking of watering, have any of you ever tried those Aquaglobe things for your containers? My eldest grandson got me some for Christmas, and I use them in a few of my smaller pots. Surprisingly, they actually work quite well. Two of them are in pots of thyme; they really do keep the moisture level just right.

On Tuesday (I think) when it was comparatively cooler, I built a new lasagna bed. This one came about because there is a “volunteer” vine of some sort in my big lantana container. Could be a cuke or a watermelon, still can’t tell. Anyway, I decided to let it grow just to see what it is, but had to trellis it somehow. Wind already broke one of the vines, and that’s before it got really windy. I decided to loosely wrap some green-painted weed-eater string around the tree and let it grow up the tree. Then I said…yeah, you guessed it. Why not put a 5 gallon bucket with a couple cukes I plant on the other side of the tree, and let them grow up it, too? However, last year I realized that things in containers don’t do well, because the heat bakes the poor roots and dirt. I figured, if I put a little lasagna bed around the container, then plant it with bushy stuff, maybe it’ll mitigate the heat somewhat, and the poor things will have a chance. So I did!

I planted 3 of the bright yellow Swiss Chard, in between which I put a couple dill babies. I thought the bright yellow chard would look good with the yellow lantana, as well as the yellow cuke blossoms. On the sides of the bed, I put a couple divisions of Greek Oregano. The container really needs repotting, so I cut out a couple chunks and planted them. Will do one more piece after the oregano recovers from the first butchery. Between that, I planted several cilantro seedlings. I doubt very much that the cilantro or dill will do much more than bolt to flower, but that’s okay, too. Beneficial bugs love dill and cilantro flowers! I’ll stick some bush bean seeds in there, too, once it’s just normally windy out there again. Still thinking about what to start to fill the space once the heat kills the cilantro and dill completely.

Speaking of containers, here’s a look at the container garden from street-side. Pardon the skewers; as I’ve mentioned before, I use them to keep the horde of feral cats out of the beds. Works pretty good! Still need to plant a few things on the right side of the bed to replace the Lilac Beauty pepper that expired. I think my daughter’s dog lifted his leg on the poor thing one too many times…

Did you notice the Red Sage blooming? Hummingbirds and bees are supposed to really like this plant, so I put some all over the place!

In the Blue Moon rose bed, I have the lavender rose planted with some Red Rubin and Dark Opal purple basil, so naturally, the first green beans I planted were some purple bush beans. They are beginning to bloom, and the colors do look nice together…

Be nice if I actually get some beans out of the deal, too. I’ve tried these beans several times, with no luck at all. Something eats them, or they die!

Well, that’s enough for now. Time to go start dinner…

I guess I finally listened. LOL!

Things are settling in and starting to really grow now. This is the Blue Moon rose bed as of March 29.

Since then, the rose has bloomed again. They smell soooo good.

The alyssum, winecup, and blue salvia make a pretty combination, I think. You can also see a few of the Contender bush beans and one of the Swiss Chards I planted in there. No reason edible can’t be pretty, and vice versa.

This is the Tomato Lasagna bed as of April 2. It’s grown noticeably in just the past few days. The Roma tomato (in the tripod cage) has at least 4 baby tomatoes. Hubby is already tasting every one of them, too. Told him it’d be a while yet, but he still keeps drooling! The TripLCrop tomato by the trellis has shot up significantly in the past few days. Looks like it is getting ready to bloom soon.
In the mid-far-right of the pic, you can barely make out another small tomato plant. This is a Sungold cherry; it’s grown in the past few days, too. It already has one baby tomato, and more blooms.

In the pic above, you can see some of the other plants in that bed. There are some peppers, basil, and some peanuts in there. I went to the grocery store and bought a bag of raw peanuts. Shelled a few of them and planted the seeds, just to see if they would actually grow. Much to my surprise, they actually did! Peanuts are a good nitrogen fixer, like beans, and supposed to be pretty plants, too. So far, I like them! They are pretty.

Since I took these pics, I’ve planted pink Bright Lights Swiss chard around the sides of the bed, then planted some pink Laura bush petunias between the chard. Above that, and to the left of the Sungold tomato, I put a borage seedling. Borage attracts bees and beneficials; you can use the leaves as mulch material or compost fodder; its roots are very good at breaking up compacted clay soil like mine. And it’ll look pretty with the pink chard and petunias!

In the last little bit of space, I’m going to plant a tithonia in the bed, and some Carpet Cosmos in the sides of the bed below the tithonia. The bell peppers in the bed ripen to gold, crimson, and orange, so the tithonia will pick up those colors, attract beneficials, and look pretty! Hummingbirds love tithonia, too. Carpet Cosmos are like the yellow and orange shorter cosmos, but they are only supposed to get about a foot tall.

I’m hoping I picked the right plants to both help the tomatoes and peppers grow, and look pretty. Like I said, no reason edible can’t be pretty!

More to talk about, but now I’m closer to over – done! That heat just wears me right out, and makes me smell bad. I hate the icky sticky feeling it leaves on my skin, too. Have I mentioned I hate hot and humid? Anyway, it’s time for a shower and bed…
G’nite, y’all!!!

Don’t you just love the pretty blue color of this ageratum? I know the beneficial insects do. Planted this way last summer in a container, but it didn’t do much in the heat. Come fall, I cut it back real hard and fed it real well. Saved it from a few freezes, too; I had no idea if it would work or not. Apparently it did, as it’s been blooming for a long time already.

Love nasturtiums; unfortunately, they don’t love it down here too much once it really warms up. They usually fry and die in a month or so. This one is an Alaska nasturtium.

The gazania I divided from a container and planted in this bed is already blooming again. Love these guys; they take pretty much whatever you throw at them and just keep blooming.

Repotted pink jasmine vine I bought a week or so ago. Looks like it’s doing fine; has a few new buds on it. This smells so yummy when it’s blooming!

Another nasturtium. This one is “Moonlight,” I think.

Of course the Laura Bush petunias are blooming. Once they start, they really don’t stop for a very long time. Even in mid-summer, all you have to do is cut them back, feed them, then wait a few days for more blooms. And they smell wonderful!

Mums bloom twice a year down here; in spring and then again in the fall. These two are planted in the whiskey barrel with the night-blooming jasmine. It started getting windy again as I was taking pics; sorry about the blurriness.

Don’t know if the next few pictures exactly qualify, but here they are anyway. The night-blooming jasmine isn’t blooming yet, but is does have buds and will bloom soon. Ditto the zinnia.

And this is, of course, a tomato plant. This one volunteered in my compost pile way back in late January; I’ve babied it along all this time. It even has a baby tomato – looks like a Roma.

Phew! I think that’s finally it. I was going to post a pic of my new “lasagna” tomato bed, but that can wait till next time. I think enough is enough, already…

Yellow mums in the whiskey barrel

Love the bright blue ageratum blooms

Pink Laura Bush Petunia. Wish you could smell it…

Blue Moon Rose – another one I wish you could smell! Yummy!

Aren’t these pretty? Taste good, too! This is a Pinetree Seed lettuce mix.

Heritage Lettuce Mix from Renee’s Garden. Have already harvested about 2 gallon baggies from this container, but forgot to weigh them.

Yesterday, I started the lasagna bed for the volunteer tomato, and made a “tomato teepee” from PVC pipe painted green. Here’s a pic of the bed and teepee:

The beginnings of a lasagna bed and a tomato teepee.

I had no idea how to tie the poles together, but I found a handy link about lashing poles to make your own trellises and teepees. Very helpful, with good illustrations. Maybe it’ll help you, too.

And that’s all she wrote for tonight…

I did the Tipsy Pot thing this year with a chile pequin in a 5 gallon bucket on the bottom. The second container has sage, with some nasturtium that will most likely die when it gets really hot. The next container up has marjoram and more nasturtiums. The top container has thyme. Other containers hold cleome, rosemary, ageratum, and other things.

Container Garden

My hanging baskets this year have Laura Bush Petunias (love the fragrance), more nasturtiums with some sweet alyssum and thunbergia to take over when the nasturtium fries in the heat, and one with Blue Daze evolvulus and a few left-over strawberry plants that didn’t fit in the other bed.

Hanging Baskets

In this area, I built a bed between the two windows, mostly for the Blue Moon Rose I found at Lowe’s while shopping for potting soil and stuff. I had a Blue Moon Rose years ago, and one bloom would scent the entire yard with the most delicious spicy fragrance…

Blue Moon Rose Bed “Before”

In this bed, I also put parsley, Swiss Chard, chamomile, blue salvia, red sage(the native perennial, not the bright red annual), strawberries around the edge, and some salad crops. I tried Ten Week Stock for the first time this year; they are a cool-weather annual that are supposed to have a lovely fragrance. Hope they actually manage to bloom! And, no, I’m not trying to grow bamboo skewers; they’re my attempt to keep the herd of feral cats in the park from using my beds as a litter box. So far, it seems to be working.

Blue Moon Rose Bed
Oh yeah, I also repotted my night-blooming jasmine into the bigger barrel, along with some mums that have managed to survive thus far.

This is my “Baby Nursery.” All my seedlings are hanging out here, where they get afternoon shade, until I have their new homes ready for occupancy. I really do need to hurry up and do that…

Baby Nursery

This is as far as I’ve gotten so far; got to keep on keepin’ on to get the rest done in a timely fashion. Especially in this climate, it’s best to take advantage of the “cooler” weather before the heat kills the garden – and the gardener!

A growing cantaloupe

Can’t wait to eat this!
And some cukes



More tomato & cuke salad in the very near future.

The laundry hamper volunteer tomatoes keep chugging along. I’ve gotten more than 7 lbs. of tomatoes from these guys so far. Picked all of the almost ripe ones yesterday, as I knew it might rain and didn’t want the tomatoes to split.



And the tomatoes to go with the cukes…

This is a chile pequin (wild bird pepper) bush. These are really hot little buggers; you can see a ripe one if you look hard enough.



Hot stuff
This bush has quite a story. DH’s dad had a bush in front of his house that he babied for years. He used the peppers to make some wicked salsa, among other things. When he died, we dug up his bush and put it in a 5 gal bucket that we hauled around for years! I knew the bush would die when we moved back up north, so we gave it to hubby’s brother. He’s not what you’d call a gardener; he killed the poor thing!

Hubby’s been looking for a replacement ever since we moved back down here. A few months ago, we went to a family birthday in Hebbronville, and hubby found a bush in the yard. He says “We’re taking this home” as he grabs it and just yanks the poor thing out of the ground. He hands it to me and says “You can plant this, right?” I’m like “WTH am I supposed to do now?” So I wrapped it up in damp paper towels, put it in a baggie, and took it home. I cut it way back, put it in a gritty soil mix in a gallon pot, and covered the pot with a plastic bag. Kept it under my florescent lights and babied that sucker along. Much to my surprise, it didn’t die, and eventually started growing. Uncovered it gradually, and put it outside when it got warm. This spring I put it in the container, and it has done quite well, so far. It’s going to need a bigger container come fall, I think. Fascinating, right? LOL!

Had enough yet, or should I go on? Okay, you asked for it. This is my pitiful-looking Side-of-the-Stairs container garden. Looking pretty sad, aren’t they? The annual blanketflowers have just about had it, as have the bachelor’s buttons. I’m letting both go to seed so I can save some for next year. The jasmine is dropping leaves in self-defense (normal, I’m told), but there are still things growing.

Getting too hot for the Side-of the-Stairs flowers, I think.

These are cinnamon basil and a Mini-Rose morning glory I think I got from Johnny’s Selected Seeds. It’s supposed to trail to about 3′; I like the variegated leaves, too. Very pretty little plant.

Cinnamon basil and MG

This has gotten long enough. I’ll leave the butterfly garden and hanging baskets for another time. TTYL…

Before I get on with the flowers, got a quick question. I’ve mentioned previously that we were thinking of moving into a bigger home here in the park. We’ve decided that since it’s unlikely we’ll be getting out of this god-forsaken Valley any time soon, we might as well buy something. There are a bunch of foreclosed homes down here, so we can probably find something nice that we can still afford. So, the question becomes, am I a total garden geek for spending until 3 am this morning “daydreaming” about how I want my garden when we actually do get a house? I mean, really. I have no idea at all what kind of space I’ll have, and here I am planning a garden already. What kind of sense does that make? LOL!

Pics and more

Here’s a view from the top of the stairs.

Side-of-the-stairs from the top.
This little guy stayed still long enough to get a pic while I was out with the camera yesterday.

Butterflies love gaillardia.

Butterfly garden, beginnings…
Speaking of butterflies, here’s the humble beginnings of my butterfly garden. The pots with the pipes are cleome. As I’ve mentioned, it tends to be windy here, so I expect I’ll have to stake the cleome. The windowbox has Carpet Cosmos, which are only supposed to grow 6″ tall, and in the middle, 3 red penta. Two of the seeds have sprouted, but the babies are really small, about the size of thyme when it first sprouts. Hope they make it. The black container has just-transplanted blue salvia and some Cosmos Bright Lights seeds. The round pot has blue ageratum seeds, just planted today. The seeds are so tiny, and it was so windy, that I was afraid to try to plant them until the wind died down a bit. Also want to try zinnia, Cosmos Sonata mix, and maybe even a tithonia. Don’t tell me it won’t do well in a container; I refuse to accept that until I try! More on that as it evolves. Need more potting soil first; hoping to go get it tomorrow.

One last pic and I’m done for now.

Mums and gazania
A while ago, I posted about dividing mums and gazania. Here’s a pic of the windowbox, blooming like crazy. I swear, I cut off all the buds when I divided the mums, but they would not be denied. They wanted to bloom, so I’m letting them. I think we probably have a long enough growing season to let them bloom again in fall. Seen it happen before with my mums.

I guess that’s about all she wrote, for now. Tired after staying up too late tomorrow, so g’nite, y’all.

Pics and more

Mouseover the thumb to see the big picture.
Click for the really big pic.


The first ripe tomato this year.

First ripe tomato from my volunteer tomatoes

The Scarlet Runner beans are running, and blooming. And they are definitely scarlet!

Scarlet Runner Beans

And so are the Hestia half-runner beans.

Hestia half-runner beans

Saw today that one of my cucumber vines is flowering, but it’s only a few male flowers. Be a while, I’m sure, before I get any beans or cucumbers. Probably be another few days until I have another ripe tomato, too. The cantaloupe and Gold Bar melons I planted are starting to run, too, though just barely. And my zucchini looks a whole lot better than any I planted last year. They just stayed sickly and puny, and expired very rapidly. This year, they look like zucchini are supposed to look, growing like weeds! Now if I can just keep the squash vine borers off, I should actually get a zucchini or two. I check the leaves every day…kind of obsessive compulsive about it, even…Do not want to see those eggs anywhere near my zucchini!


The baby peppers I planted out the other day are doing fine so far. I put the two Fruit Basket sweet peppers in their baskets, and 4 jalapenos in the garden. All are hanging in there, despite the heat. Better than me, probably! I hate hot.


Anyway, on to the U(nidentified) F(lowering) O(bject). What, you thought I saw aliens? Not lately, anyway! Well, except the illegal kind; hard to live down here and not see those kind. Ok, flowers. I had a bunch of different packages of wildflower seeds, and have no idea what I planted where. Once I started clearing out the dying California Poppies, I found this guy growing in the pot. It’s a pretty little plant, stands about 2′ tall, basically a single stem with the thin leaves, until it gets to the top. As soon as it started budding out, the flower heads grew out from the central stalk. And the blooms are about the size of a half dollar, more or less. So here’s pics. If you know what this is, drop me a comment. please…and thank you!

Unidentified Flowering Object

EDIT: Thanks to the Texas Gardening forum on Gardenweb, my UFO has been identified as Helenium amarum, common name Yellow Sneezeweed. Thanks, ladies!

On to the blanketflowers. Pics and more
I found a few blanketflower seeds (I hoped) in a wildflower mix from Wildseed Farms (see link on left bottom), and threw them in the container with my Ruttya shrub I bought last spring. Obviously, I was right, since I have blooming blanketflowers. Here’s a couple pics:

Mouseover the thumb to see the big picture. Click for the really big pic.

Always loved these colors.

Like the way the blanketflower picks up the yellow of the lantana, and contrasts with the salvia.

And last, but certainly not least, my red mini-rose is blooming. The others all have buds, but not quite blooming yet.

Such a pretty little thing.

Today I turned over the part of my raised bed into which I am going to plant all my nicely growing baby hot peppers. I’ve got jalapenos (Hubby’s fav), Joe Parker Numex peppers, Ancho chiles, and an heirloom called Pasilla Bajo. The babies are filling up the yogurt cups with roots, so in another day or two, into the garden they go.

Since you’re not really supposed to plant sweet peppers too close to hot peppers, I’m planting two sweet peppers called Fruit Basket, that are bred to grow in hanging baskets. The baskets are all ready, just waiting for the babies to get big enough. They are going to hang from my tree; we’ll see how they do.

Well, that covers blanketflowers and babies; all that’s left are the weird ideas. A while ago, on GardenGirlTV, I saw a vid about a 30 minute flower garden. She used these things called “Garden Socks” into which she planted her 30-minute flower garden. If you’re curious, I found it on her resources page. Anyway, it occurred to me that I might be able to make a “sock” out of landscape fabric, and try to plant something in it. I finally figured out how to work it; am almost done with it. When it’s done, I’ll show you what I did, and if it actually works. Figured, what the heck, it could be fun to try!

Well, that’s annoying. All day I’ve been thinking about things to blog about, and now that I’m in front of the computer, can’t remember what I wanted to say. Oh, well. That’s the way it goes. Ta-ta for now…

Pics and More

Here’s a pic of all my babies so far. Not much to see, yet, but they are growing.

So, after all the rain and cloudiness, I did a baking soda spray (1 Tbsp baking soda, 1 Tbsp Murphy’s Oil Soap in a gallon of water) just to be on the safe side. I’d prefer to prevent the diseases instead of treat them. After remembering all the aphids and spider mites last year, I have also decided to try a water spray-off of everything in the garden every 3 or 4 days, just to wash off as many potential problems as possible. If I keep it up, and the weather doesn’t get too miserable, I may actually get something this year.

Planting a bunch of flower seeds, as well, mostly annuals. I saw a butterfly/bird garden plan in the garden mag I bought, and decided to see what I could do in containers. If it works, cool! If not, oh well, live and learn. Not losing much but a few seeds and some sweat equity…

Meanwhile, here are some pics of the current state of the garden.

Time to let the California Poppies go to seed, I think. Been religiously deadheading so far, but they are looking a bit the worse for wear, so I’ll let them make seed to collect, then pull them out to make room for something else.

The Laura Bush petunias, on the other hand, are doing great. Love these plants!

The beans I planted a while ago are growing nicely. The pole beans are starting to run, and the half-runners are stretching out as well.

The baby beans I planted a couple weeks after that are up and growing, too. These are bush beans. There are melons planted around the trellis thing. The bottles are buried to provide efficient watering when summer really kicks in. Which it seems to have done today…

And last, but certainly not least, the tomatoes keep on keeping on, which makes me very happy…

So that’s what I’ve been up to this week…