BeachBlythe

A beautiful day

 
Today I spent a good two hours deadheading my parents garden. Since I am staying with them for the summer it is fun to get back into gardening. It is one thing that I missed living in Hawaii since the lanai at my condo did not get enough sun. It must be pretty hard to find a lanai that does not get enough sunlight but I succeeded in doing so. Since I was accross the street from the ocean and it had so much space I opted to stay.

Some 8+ years ago I planted a rosemary plant in their yard. About 4 years ago it died except for a teeny tiny little piece after an exceptionally cold and windy winter. I must have purchased the rolls royce of rosemary because now it is a good 4 foot tall and 3 foot wide. Running your hands through it is wonderful!

A challenge when gardening (especially at the seashore) is to choose hardy plants that will bloom all summer and not get beaten down by frequent winds. By chance one year I purchased an annual called Angel Wings. I believe its proper name is Angleonia. It has become my favorite favorite plant for container gardening. The white flowers do not turn funky and bloom for a long time. It continues to grow and bloom under fall. I just love it and now add it every year. Some day I will have to also try the purple variety.  

Thursday Morning

Hey Kim.

 

Yeah Hawaii is great. Whatever.

 

There's frost on the ground still. I had a pile of seed packets ready to be planted after the last danger of frost has passed and thankfully I was too tired to dig out space for them last week. So far two types of peas are coming up (Telephone and Lincoln), some strain of snow pea and possibly fava beans, possibly weeds are sprouting in another corner. All of the salad greens and broccoli rabe have given up and appear quite happy to squat in their containers, snug against the dirt. I didn't winter sow nearly as much this year as in the past. I have seven types of tomatoes this year. Let's not go crazy.

 

 

See those green dots? Those are seedlings! Maybe of salad greens? Maybe arugula or spinach, I don't know, but they are green. I have no idea what Mellie is using to plant the seedlings with. It's some random piece of plastic orange brush indigenous to NJ. I believe one normally finds it thriving after a Spring rain under a GSP bypass.

 

Otherwise I have two cardigans near completion. I'm working on the collars, then I need to finish sewing them together. Seaming? What do you call it? Put them together so that people can stop asking me what I am knitting. The one I began three years ago for myself ought to be interesting once it's complete beings I lost the instructions several pieces into it. Here's Francecsa's cardi:

 

 

Note the ceramic baby shoe above the sweater. I use that heirloom to hold straight pins.

 

How about I try and finish the sweater before Memorial Day? Here's a shot of the puppy:

 

I believe that he would like a sweater as well. No roses, please.