Every June her trellis was loaded with purple flowers that enveloped the porch.  I always admired their beauty and she would beam about them. I remember her telling me they liked their “feet” cool and their “heads” in the sun.  Which translated means, keep their roots in shade but make sure they get enough sun.  Good advice ~ I always put them in sunny spots but I keep pachysandra or hostas  planted at their base so those roots keep cool.

 When we sold her house, I took her clematis that she had been so proud of and brought it to my house.  I enjoyed it there for years to spite kids and dogs.  Every year when that vine would bloom I would think of her and how pretty that purple waterfall on the side of her porch was.   But then one day which I will never forget, my luck ran out in the clematis department. 

I was standing on my deck while my son and his friends played in the yard throwing the ball for our dog. Keep in mind that she was obscessed with tennis balls.  Relentless chasing of them was her most favorite thing to do in life.  As one of the bos threw the ball, like lightening, she quickly retrieved it right underneath my full blooming clematis.  Needless to say, her reverse wasn’t quite as graceful as her dive in and she ripped the entire thing out of the ground because she got herself tangled in it. 

 I could only watch in horror as she struggled free dragging the vine and it’s flowers in her wake. She never dropped the ball and emerged triumphantly.  My husband stood there watching me, thinking he would have to stop me from strangling her.  All I could do was cry.  Like a crazy person I just started crying.

 But then I remembered one of the other pieces of gardening advice Mom had given me….” You can always grow grass and flowers but not children or dogs”.  I repeated this over and over until I decided she was right.  I gathered the pieces but it was beyond hope.  The truth is, she was right, I do miss my dog, Scooter, brat that she was, and I would gladly give a hundred clematis to see her again, but I also miss that vine. 

 A lot.

 “The love of gardening is a seed once sown that never dies.” — Gertrude Jekyll

Visit  A Southern Daydreamer for Outdoor WednesdayVisit ABC Wednesday to see other “C” photos.  

If all the beasts were gone, men would die from a great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beasts also happens to the man.  All things are connected.  Whatever befalls the Earth befalls the sons of the Earth.  ~Chief Seattle of the Suquamish Tribe, letter to President Franklin Pierce

Visit Camera Critters to see many great photos!

It’s the fifteenth again! September has quickly arrived and is half over already.  My gardens are definitely looking less full but there are still plenty of blooms around. 

Some of the flowers are giving their last hurrah as if they know this is it and they are finding the strength to be seen and remembered over the long long winter. 

Summer may be ending, but a gardener’s spirit can not be subdued.  I have been preparing for next year, by moving a few things to better locations and getting plants from friends who are dividing theirs.

 I hope each of you enjoy your last few days of summer and the official beginning of Autumn. 

 Visit the other Garden Bloggers that participate in Blooms Day which is hosted byCarol at May Dreams Gardens.  There are plenty of great garden links there to visit! 

Thanks for stopping by!

No spring nor summer beauty hath such grace
As I have seen in one autumnal face.
~John Donne

1.  You want to dead head other people’s flowers ~like at the Dr.’s office.

2. Your receive potatoes for your birthday~ and they are in a gift bag!

3. You need to work in your yard all day….and you are happy about it.

4. The  Gardening department is your first stop at the home improvement store. 

5.  Mosquito netting over your hat sounds like a good idea to you~ Damn gnats!

6.  You don’t care how you look while wearing that mosquito netting over your head.

7.  In addition to the mosquito netting, acquiring gardening apparel of any kind feels like a wardrobe boost.

8.  When it hasn’t rained in a while,  and you finally get a good soaking rain ~ you imagine your plants just sighing with relief….. and you are so thankful for not having to water.

9.  Your teenagers and/or their friends actually notice your garden AND remark at how nice your yard looks. 

10.  Strangers stop to ask questions about your different plants ~ and you know the answers. 

11.  Your favorite shoes are waterproof.

12.  You are nodding your head because you can relate to most of these reasons… 

Have any others?  Let me know!  I will be sending out a Waistie Garden Pouch from Garden Shoes Online to one of you who comments with a good one! I will have the staff at gardenshoesonline.com pick the winner from your comments.

Weather means more when you have a garden.  There’s nothing like listening to a shower and thinking how it is soaking in around your green beans.  ~Marcelene Cox

 I even found a tiny pumpkin.

There are still quite a few patches of color around the yard 

and many flowers to admire as August winds down.

It’s kind of sad to see summer ending,  but fall brings color of it’s own, crisp cool apples as well as crisp cool nights.

go on over to Tootsie’s and see what everyone else has going on in their gardens.

Enjoy your last few days of August!

“When gardeners garden, it is not just plants that grow,�
but the gardeners themselves.”
    ~   Ken Druse

After looking over my photos I can see the vast difference from Spring until now. It is kind of like looking at pictures of your kids as babies and comparing them to now.  What a difference! It shows you just how fast time does fly. 

  The good thing about blogging is that it is a journal of your garden. It makes it easy to see the changes that occur right in front of your nose every day, that you somehow don’t really notice until you look back. 

Like my side garden here in May and then in August.

My front yard has huge pine trees  which make it difficult to grow anything. 

I put these impatients in on a whim-  just for color.  I didn’t expect much, and they were slow to start ,but they are finally looking good.

This section of my yard is one of the most colorful  and changing spots I have.   

 I loved it in the spring and it has kept getting better all summer long.

 This corner is of course where I put the stone patio.  The changes there are very obvious, and the flowers have filled in nicely.

My fire pit area started out slim and now in August I have cut back all the dying daylilies and ferns so it is not nearly as full as it had been, but you can easily see the difference on that fence between spring and summer.

  My back fence has  been fun to watch.  I have hibiscus there that never fail to make me happy.    

Watching everything change in the garden is what addicts us.

We strain our muscles, endure bug bites, water, weed, sweat and swat but still we come back for more, day after day. 

 Year after year we wait impatiently for spring to arrive so we can begin again. What are we gluttons for punishment? 

Maybe… but the word I like to use would be… 

gardeners. 

If nothing ever changed, there’d be no butterflies.  ~Author Unknown

Fertilizer Friday is here and things are still looking pretty good. 

The morning glories are bloming !  I just love those blossoms every day.  

A poker plant has surprised me with a couple of flowers.  

This is pink Lobelia.  First time I have ever grown it. 

Lots of hot peppers!

Yummy cherry tomatoes!   

 Thanks for visiting and be sure to wander over to Tootsie’s for the links to all the other great gardens being flaunted today.

A flower’s appeal is in its contradictions – so delicate in form yet strong in fragrance, so small in size yet big in beauty, so short in life yet long on effect.  ~Adabella Radici

Although, I too have the August issues, I still have a lot going on in my garden.   Many of the full bright flowers have faded, but there are still stome stars shining among the dried leaves and parched flowers. Here are a few of them. 

I am very excited about the pumpkin I found among the huge vine leaves.  That is surely a highlight for me.  I have never grown pumkins before.  We will see how that goes. 

The weather here is finally feeling like summer although it is winding down to fall, so I intend to absorb every last bit of my flowers and garden while I still can.  Fall is beautiful here but the winter is so looooonng. 

Enjoy the rest of August!

Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it.
Russell Baker

Gardening Gone Wild is hosting their monthly photo contest.  The Subject is Roses.  Weeeeellllll,  I just love roses. 

                                                               The following 3 pictures are my entries.   

   This is the rose in my garden that I think is easily one of the most beautiful roses I have ever seen~ It is a russet-colored floribunda named Hot Cocoa. 

The texture of the petals and the shiny leaves make it stand out from other roses.I watched the flowers unfurl.  When it is was a bud – I was sure that it was the prettiest thing I had ever seen, then it opened and it was even more pretty, now when it’s in full bloom, it is even more beautiful.  The color is extraordinary, and I also really love the name~ how could a rose named after chocolate be anything but delicious?

 I took this picture last week at Cayuga Lake.  I couldn’t resist photographing them, they looked very old fashioned and romantic.

      You can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses”~ Ziggy