Saturday, August 31, 2013

It has been a long while since I have last posted, and there has been much that has happened on a personal level, but it is now time to get on with it.

I am still a passionate gardener, but with the gardens full and needing plants divided instead of adding plants, my searches for just the right additions here and there has certainly lessened and I am now working with what I have, re-arranging here and there, dispensing with non-performers and adding gifted plants from a treasured friend.  That is not to say that I will pass up something that really catches my interest, as I can always make the room for just one more, somewhere.

Last year I really got the daylily bug, thanks to aforementioned  treasured friend, and filled the gardens with early, mid and late blooming types.   It was well worth the investment and their blooms filled in so many spaces where I didn't know colour was lacking.  I still have five that have blooms...Swallowtail Kite (taken at dusk with a flash), Jo Barbre, Lilting Belle, Royal Frosting and First Knight with Sandra Elizabeth yet to bloom!







Starting last Friday we had a good number of people here for garden tours and ending on Tuesday, we had a wonderful couple here who have retired to an area around North Bay with an acreage in full sun.  They had been here in 2006 when our gardens were four years old and so had seen it when the trees were small and there was no shade.  It was so great to have them back and they could see the possibilities available to them in a relatively short period of time.  DH and I were more than happy to share our tips and tricks for maintaining the gardens in dry spells, how to push the Zone up a notch or two among other things that cropped up in conversation.  That is the best part of gardening...sharing your knowledge and always, always learning. 





So, again on the days that were too hot to work outside, I pressed flowers and ferns and made cards, but have also taken up two different types of card making, one of which can compliment the pressed flower cards, gift card holders and bottle tags - embossing and stamping.










 This takes my cards to a whole new level, and then I was told about Iris Folding by a wonderful woman who came to tour the gardens.  I'm hooked on this as well and am using Japanese papers, origami paper, tissue paper and wrapping paper.