flower power

Since I get about 50 hits a day off my sweet friend Nester's blog, they're probably coming over here expecting to see something domestic instead of all the yap yap yapping I do :). Well, it might not be much-- BUT for all you designin' ladies, and all the rest of you too, I thought I'd show you a few pictures of my "babies"---my flowers.


peony from my yard. Love that growing your own flowers always gives you something to cut and bring inside! Because I insist on always having fresh flowers around, this has saved me a bundle :)!




In our last house, we had a couple of bushes, some climbing vines, a few potted topiaries, and bulbs in the spring---but that's about all the work I put into it since I knew we would be moving one day soon. And seven years later we did...



In this house I have discovered a new love for gardening and landscaping. It seems like such an extension of what's going on inside. Besides having a MUCH bigger yard than our last place, this home already had some defined beds and mature trees to work with. It was a challenge keeping what I wanted and ripping out the rest to make it all work with the English country garden feel I love so much, but I'm seeing it start to come together now. It will still take a few years for all the perennials to grow and fill up their spaces, but even the difference between last year and this has been amazing to look at when I compare photos!



Our front porch use to be all brick and it looked pretty gloomy. Plus I'm more of a backyard sitter-- so I ripped out all but a border of it to add something pretty to look at from my front window. Here was that spot in March, right after pruning:




water+sunshine+love, and here was the same spot last week:





My backyard had nothing but California orange poppies to work with, so it was pretty much a blank canvas. Here was the border back in March:
And the next two pictures are of the same spot now:
the poppies are still growing, but mixed with daisies, delphinium, lavender, annuals, and "maiden hair" ornamental grass.


This is my front yard border that use to be nothing but scrubby rose bushes. Now it's got topiaries, Russian sage, and this coriopsis/purple salvia/ bellflower/ and "livewire" ornamental grass combination. It's going to be gorgeous when it all fills in.

And if any of you haven't checked out my other blog Evolution of a Home, you may not have seen the before of my house (September 2006--and this was after ripping the rose bushes out):

and the after: (still makes my heart skip a beat to think that we did all this in just a few months!) So tomorrow we'll get back to discussing life's big and not so big dilemmas, but for today: go smell the flowers!