Merry Christmas from Meadowview

There is sure not much going on in my garden right now. The weather here in the Dallas area is a roller coaster. It was in the 20's two weeks ago, it was in the upper 60's today, and it will be back in the 20's on Christmas. Even the pansies are confused. So, since I am not out in the garden very much right now, I thought I would share Christmas from my house with you...

The old school desk in the entry hall welcomes you in the door...
Two Santa's say hello from the dining room. They like to look at...
The Dickens Village on the hutch...
I started this collection about 6 years ago... no room for any more cottages!
Not sure why--maybe it's because I live where there is no snow..but I love, love snowmen! They are all over my house at Christmas..
on the mantle...
in the kitchen...

Love the snowman towel!

The snowmen even have their own tree!

Snowmen are in the family room on the sofa..

And on the sofa table...

You can even find a snowman ornament in a basket on the coffee table!

I love my new tree. It's tall, but "narrow" and fits our room so much better! I have ornaments on this tree that are new; that are from other countries; that were made by my children; and that are from our vacations. I even have a few ornaments that are from my childhood.

But, of course, this is the most precious decoration of all. Our "reason for the season."

From my home to yours:

I wish you peace, hope, joy and love.

December

The turkey and pumpkin pie are all gone. Fall is put away. The Christmas Tree is up! And gifts are....well, no gifts yet, but that will come. And I am happy to announce..
the bulbs are in the ground!
I ordered all my bulbs except for some hyacinths online this year. I am really hopeful I will have some beautiful flowers in spring.

From Brecks, I ordered 3 different types of daffodils: Spectrum, Quail and Replete. The Spectrum and Quail are yellow and are suppose to be very fragrant. The Replete was Brecks 1995 Daffodil of the year. The 4" blooms begin to open as ivory-white petals. As they unfold, they are yellow-orange hues that quickly change to a rose-pink! Doesn't that sound fascinating! Actually, I planted only one of these at my house. I planted the others at my Mothers. I thought she might really enjoy watching them change. And, Tina--I did what you suggested and planted 3 types of hybrid tulips: Darwin, Triumph, and Daydream. The tulips are mixed colors.
Then I planted 4 types of daffodils from Old House Gardens. I mentioned this catalog in a post last spring. They sell "unique, endangered and amazing bulbs." These bulbs, as you might guess, are kind of expensive since they are heirloom, so I only planted 3 of each kind: Sweetness, 1939; Campernelle, 1604; Trevithain, 1927; and Jonquil, Early Louisiana, 1612. This Early Louisiana is one I already have, but it came in the sampler package that I ordered. All of these daffs are suppose to be very fragrant. I can tell you the Early Louisiana is the most fragrant bulb I have ever seen!
The one thing I worry about is all the rain we have had. I just hope the bulbs do not rot. I don't ever remember having a problem like that, but I planted all these in the back, and our back has just been saturated. It rained again this week and I hear there is more to come. According to the Farmer's Almanac, this will be a cold wet winter for Texas. All I can do is hope that some wonderful sunny day in February or March I will walk outside and see the green tops of daffodils and tulips shooting up all over the garden.


"It is a greater act of faith to plant a bulb than to plant a tree!"
Clare Leighton

Pansies!!

I have been looking forward to "Pansy Saturday" for a long time! I headed to my favorite garden center early Saturday morning and filled the back of my SUV full of sweet smelling pansies! Do ya think I bought enough?
I usually plant pansies in front..all along both sides of the front flower beds, grouping them on either side of the entrance.

They always look so sparse when I first plant, but I know in early spring, they will be beautiful.
I bought one flat of cute little violas. A few go in the containers on either side of the porch. The remaining flowers will be planted in an old bucket on the flagstone patio next week some time.
The pansies were on sale, and who can resist a sale..so I bought enough to plant some in back. I thought a few would be pretty around the pond.
On a bleak winter day it will be nice to look out and see a little color around the rocks.
I filled 2 old baskets with a few remaining flowers and proceeded to plant the wheel-
barrow. I hated to take out the coleus and sweet potato vine, but I wanted to get it done before we get our first freeze.

I never cease to be amazed to see the "potato" when I dig up the sweet potato vine. Wonder if I could save these and start a new plant? Anyone know?
I always enjoy planting the wheel-
barrow. It is one of my favorite old
"treasures" in the garden. I mixed in 2 different types of ornamental kale and a birdhouse along with the pansies in this container.
When I plant pansies each fall, I use a combination of bone meal and blood meal as I plant..and I add a small sprinkle of fertilizer as well. Just like to give them a boost.


So I can check planting pansies off my list of things to do.
Next weekend's project: Bulbs!!!

The Wedding is over and The Mexican Marigold Mint is in bloom!

What an absolutely fabulous weekend we had. The weather for the wedding could not have been any better. Everything was decorated for fall...the church, the country club where we had the reception..it was all beautiful! I only have a few pictures right now, but if we get some good family pictures, I will post those later. This is a sweet picture of our Pastor explaining the vows to Jen and Jason.
And a picture of the very happy couple cutting the cake. (and YUM was it good!)




With the exception of the bridal bouquet, all the flowers were fall colors. These are what the bouquets looked like on all the tables at the reception. They were in short round vases with 4 votives surrounding them.(I didn't keep their vases-this is one I had in the garage.) The chocolate brown napkins on the table had a pocket fold with a silk fall leaf and little bag of chocolates tucked inside. I got to bring some of the flowers home. Roses in every fall color filled the vases along with several other things. The florist did an outstanding job.

And, while I was busy with wedding details, my Mexican Marigold Mint started blooming! I bought this as a small plant back in early summer. Just one of those things I wanted to try. I didn't even know it bloomed in fall! It just got taller and taller all summer, and now it has these buttery yellow flowers.
Sorry the close up is so blurry-I wanted you to see the cluster of flowers blooming only at the top.

Mexican Marigold Mint is native to Mexico and Guatemala where its foliage is used for teas, seasoning and medicinal purposes. Herb gardeners in Texas often substitute this plant for French tarragon, which cannot withstand summer heat in Texas.
Although it is a marigold, this plant is not susceptible to spider mites. After becoming established, very little needs to be done to keep Mexican Marigold Mint looking attractive, although growth may be pruned back before June in order to shorten the ultimate height. Mexican Marigold Mint does best in well-drained, sunny locations. The leaves are slender and have notched edges, and the blooms are in clusters of golden-yellow single flowers, appearing from mid-fall till frost. There is a noticeable fragrance of anise associated with the plants.
This plant even survived all the October rain we had! I think this will be one of my fall favorites!

Do you have a favorite fall flower this year?

November

It's November! Can somebody please tell me where October went?? And, while you're at it, can someone please explain what happened to summer!

From time to time I go back and read articles I saved written by the late Jo Northrop who wrote for Country Living magazine many years ago. This is from one of my favorites of her "Simple Country Pleasure" articles about November:

"The exquisite cranberry and chrysanthemum days of November are a gift. We intensely and thankfully absorb them, knowing the inevitability of sudden, bone-chilling cold. Even in clear autumn sunlight, a scarecrow among fallen leaves in a deserted garden looks cold. It is this deepening of the season, the passage toward the end of the year, that gives November a quality that is energy charged."

Jo Northrop was legally blind; however, I think she "saw" the seasons better than anyone else and described them so vividly. Through her writings I can see that scarecrow standing in the now empty garden, and I can feel the sudden chill of the north wind. And the passage toward the end of the year is certainly exciting-(thoughts of spring flowers-whoo-hoo!) And, for us, this November is very "energy charged." Our daughter's wedding is next Saturday--so I will be away from blogging for a week or so getting ready for the big day. (I think it was just yesterday I was driving her to dance lessons! )

Happy November everyone! I wish you all cool and crisp cranberry and chrysanthemum days!

Garden surprises and Red Geranimums

In the fall I love to walk around the yard and find little blooming surprises. I didn't have to go far before noticing this lonely little cosmos growing right in the grass.
Not a blooming plant, but I thought it was odd to see an asparagus fern growing in the bed in front of the tree. Now, where did that come from?
I bought this little plant because I thought it would look good growing around some of the large rocks in my garden. I don't even know what it is..so how surprised I was to find a little yellow bloom on it!
The little star creeper has started to bloom again. Poor little thing has been struggling to survive this summer. I think the ground ivy is taking over.

When I put the new trellis in the wildflower bed, I saw this one BIG bloom on White Swan Coneflower.
And look at the tiny bloom of a rose moss growing in with the hens and chicks. I think this pot at one time was full of rose moss.
Not a surprise though are the red geraniums all around my yard. Now that the temps are lower and we have gotten so much rain, they are lush and blooming up a storm. This is one of two containers that I kept on the front porch. They are just too heavy for me to move around, so hubby did one final move and put them in the back bed. I will try and keep them over the winter, but this may be the year they go.
An old tin picnic basket holds more flowers...

I actually started both of these plants from cuttings from the large pot of geraniums.
Red in a garden is my favorite!
I completely forgot there was a little geranium in the basket of all mixed plants I bought in March. It never really bloomed, but I see now there is one tiny bloom.
I love these late fall surprises..and I especially love seeing all the geraniums blooming for probably the last time this year. I guess I will move all the plants to the corner of the patio and cover them during the really cold days (if we get any of those!). It's quite a treat to have early blooms in spring after looking out on the brown of winter. Flowers never fail to brighten my day.

"Flowers are sunshine, food and medicine to the soul."

Luther Burbank

Saturday things..

Do you see this..it is sun!! Today is the first time I have seen the sun in a month. We are so grateful for all the rain, but cloudy and dreary every day really gets to a gardener. I was ready to get out in the garden today when I saw the bright sun!
This pretty yellow daisy is one of my favorites. I bought it last spring to put in a red ceramic container (you know me with my red and yellow in the garden!) It has bloomed continually all summer. I did have to water it twice a day during the hot summer days, but that was not a problem.
Have you noticed I keep calling this pretty little thing an "it?" Well, it's because I forgot what it was! Is it an Englemann Daisy? I always keep the plant tag that comes with plants when I buy them, but guess I lost this one. Look closely at the petals--does this look like a cutleaf to you?
Remember this? I didn't know exactly what it was-and I still don't know. Some of you thought asparagus, Robin thought it looked like her sea shell cosmos, and Cindy thought it was probably just a weed. Well-I didn't know..and decided I didn't care. This plant was taking up too much room in my wildflower bed. So, today it was cut down. I still needed height in that bed, so--I did what all good gardeners do, I went shopping!
And this is what I found at Lowes. It is just a plain wooden trellis, but I think it was just what I needed. The green looks really good against the fence.

The trellis looks pretty lonely right now, but what you can't see is that this bed is full of little seedings. Bluebonnets Mexican Hat Coreopsis, Coneflower rosettes and who know what else.

Winter may find this bed rather dull, but I am hoping spring will put on a beautiful show of blooms to make this new trellis happy.

What did you do this Saturday? Hope it was a good one for you too!

Fall at the Arboretum

It has been so rainy in the Dallas area, I have had a hard time finding a Saturday to go to the Arboretum. Even though today was cloudy and pretty chilly, it was a great day to tour some of the gardens.

It is fall, and the trial gardens are full of plants showing off their fall colors. It was so wet, I just stayed on the walkway and didn't venture over like I usually do. Looks like most things did really well this past year. They will be planting bulbs and pansies pretty soon I think.
The cute little thatched roof house is still transformed into Hansel and Gretel's house. The plants on either side of the walkway look like they are about ready to stop blooming, but they have been spectacular this past year. I love the cottage look this area has.

This is one of the ponds. I think it looks great! It won't be long before the lilies and poppies will stop blooming. In the winter, the ponds look cold and lonely, but the minute warm weather returns, the pond comes back to life.
This is one of the beds around the grassy meadow. This time of year the Arboretum beds are full of coleus (my favorite!) and ornamental grasses. The colors are normally very striking-this cloudy day does not do justice to their brilliance.
And, Cindee, I took this picture just for you! These hens and chicks were really big!
Can you tell it's getting about time for Halloween? woooooo...

And of course, we saw lots and lots of pumpkins!

They lined the walkways..

There were pumpkins to buy..

There was even a pumpkin house!
But we had the cutest pumpkin there!