First Snow!

First Frost

Woke up to ice on the deck this morning. Moved the herbs inside. Giving away cut dahlias like crazy!

Peonies

Old Time Peony Collection (White Flower Farm Photo)

Today I planted the 3 peonies that arrived from White Flower Farm - white, pink and red. The first of the fall blooming crocuses is up and purple. The garlic is sprouting which apparently is okay, but the anemones are also sprouting which I think is a problem. Looking online to find more of those, I'm worried these will fail. The dahlia is going to town - covered in red blooms with white tips. Once the frost kills it off I will need to figure out whether to to put the bulb in the ground or a pot next year - maybe the basement stairs are a good temperature for this?

Bulbs



Angelique Tulip (White Flower Farm photo)

  

Champagne Diamond Tulip (White Flower Farm photo)



Lemon Glow Daffodil (White Flower Farm photo)

Big day for bulb planting! The White Flower Farm tulips (Angelique and Champagne Diamond), Lemon Glow daffodils, ipheions, and Lily Naturalizing Mix all arrived. Luckily I had Mom's bulb planter which helped a lot. I got permission from the homeowners to plant on the south side of the house so I dog up the grass sod-style in chuncks and then replaced it after planting. I hope flowers are strong enough to grow up through the grass! My new south garden will include the tulips, hyacinths in white, ranunculus in all colors, 10 of the lilies, and now I've forgotten but I think there were more daffodils in there. In the front of the house I did a few patches of 5 lily bulbs and 5 daffodils because the packaging said they can handle part shade but I'm a little skeptical about this. At the corners I put patches of crocus and ipheion - all very small blue, white, and purple flowers that I think will bloom around the same time in the spring. I hope they bloom! After planting 100+ bulbs my whole body is sore!

Fall is Here

Temperatures are dropping. I'm starting to think about bringing the herb garden inside. I have planted some daffodils and crocuses (from Job Lot), irises in the pot on the front stoop, and the fall-blooming crocuses from White Flower Farm. The tulips will arrive in the mail soon. My morning glories are still okay and I'm harvesting a ton of seed pods. The calibrachoa is hanging on as well. The dinner plate dahlia bloomed last week (finally!) although the blooms are probably 5" across instead of 12". It's almost as tall as I am! The sunflowers are struggling at best - I've thinned them out a lot, and the cosmos don't look very good - sort of leggy.

Herb Roasted Chicken with Sweet Potato Risotto and Bread