meet & greet part 2...

I have more clematis blooming so I thought I would continue the meet & greet post...

John - "John Huxtable"
Kermesina - "viticella Kermesina"
Barbara - "Barbara Harrington"
AG - "Avant-Garde Evipo033"
Gypsy - "Gypsy Queen" I always look to the UK clematis on the web site for pictures of every clematis - interesting is their spelling of "gipsy", my American tag spells it Gypsy :)
Claire - "Claire de lune"
I'm still waiting for Ernest Markham, Rosemoor, Bourbon & Tangutica to bloom. I just purchased Elsa Spaeth and Carnaby on a clearance sale so when they get planted and the others bloom I'll do a meet and greet part 3.

Even though this post is about the clematis, I can't resist showing you the tango lilies before they are done blooming.
The warm and bright colors of the planters up front are also so pretty right now.
By blogging break is over and it's time to get back outside to weed and thin...Hershey is waiting :)
Have a great day!

Happy Anniversary...

It seems like only yesterday N & T were leaving the church in a cloud of bubbles but a whole year has passed. J & I want to wish them a Happy First Anniversary - we wish you both a lifetime of love and happiness.

I've been lax on my steeple Sunday posts for a few weeks so I'm throwing in a mini steeple since it is Sunday.
We've driven by this garden in Degraff, MN many times and admired the little church in the flowers.

WWII era air show...

On Saturday, J & I went to the Ray Fagen memorial air show and enjoyed seeing all the WWII era airplanes, ground vehicles including tanks, jeeps, etc. and camp set up.
While I don't know my planes I heard lots of PT's coming from the announcer - I just enjoyed the beautiful day and the pilots skills in aerial manuevers.






We were told that this plane the P-51C Mustang N61429 was the rarest plane at the show. It is a Tuskegee Airmen Red Tail and you can find more information here at redtail.org.




What a wonderful way to spend a beautiful MN afternoon out of the garden and enjoying the "garden of life".

feathered friends Friday...

I've been working in the garden the last few days and have lots of opportunities to watch and listen to the birds. There are three sets of wrens in houses around the garden - the constant sound of a wren song is all I hear all day. The bright goldfinches are one of my favorites - bright little spots of color to brighten my day.
I had just taken an old orange off the fruit feeder because it was covered in flies when an oriole came by. It was so windy he was using it as a swing :)
The tree swallows have nested in one of the garden bird boxes so I look forward to watching for babies soon.

PS - last week's kingfisher didn't stick around so my goldfish are still thriving :)

4 years and 738 posts...

ago I started this blog. My how time flies when you are having fun! A week ago I posted that my 4 year blogoversary was today and asked for your favorite posts of the past 4 years in order that I could repeat the top 4. While I did get 8 comments to that post only Kathy mentioned a favorite post so I guess we are showing the top post rather than the top 4, one titled "Close encounters" from September 2, 2006 which I am repeating here...

Have you ever observed a humming-bird moving about in an aerial dance among the flowers - a living prismatic gem.... it is a creature of such fairy-like loveliness as to mock all description. (W.H. Hudson, Green Mansions)
The hummingbirds are extremely active in the garden these days. Because of all the frenzied feeding they allowed me to get closer than I have ever been before.
The stationery one is a dominant one that staked his territory around the feeder and rested on the nearby butterfly bush to scare off any others expecting a drink of nectar. Believe me when I say he scared them off too - lots of dive bombing and aerial acrobatics! If only I could capture that on camera. . .
I marvel at the detail in the feathers and beads of nectar still on his beak that these photos allow us to see up close and personal. I'm sure hoping for more close encounters before they leave us for the season.

What I didn't mention in last week's post was that I was hosting a blogoversary celebration give-away. I wanted comments from readers reflecting favorite posts and not because there were prizes involved. There was one prize for those that listed a specific post and this will go to Kathy (because she is a local reader, I totally changed my mine on what her prize will be) look forward to seeing a post about that prize in July. The second prize goes to the random winner from the rest of the commenters and that prize goes to Mollie. Congratulations to both of you, I will send you both an email with details!

Looking forward to sharing my garden and garden of life with you for many more years!

meet and greet...

The weatherman on last night's newscast said we have had rain 12 of the first 14 days of June and it rained again this morning. It's too wet to be weeding the garden so I thought I would take this afternoon's break from showers to introduce you to some of my favorite garden friends.

Nelly - "Nelly Moser" paired with HFJack - "Jackmanii"
Betty - "Betty Corning"
HF - "H F Young" paired with Nelly
Rebecca - "Rebecca Epivo016"
VL - "Ville de Lyon" paired with VV
Doc - "Doctor Ruppel"
Roo - "Rooguchi"
Huldine - "Huldine" paired with another Jack
Prez - "The President" paired with EM not yet blooming
Kilian - "Kilian Donahue"
VV - "Venosa Violacea" paired with VL
Niobe - "Niobe" paired with another Huldine
There are lots of buds on my climbers not yet blooming - I'll be sure to introduce you when they are ready :)

mosaic Monday...scenes from the weekend

We spent a wonderful weekend in northern MN with Jayme & Scott. On Saturday, we drove the Seven Bridges Road and admired the falls on the Lester river. Jayme is quite the photographer and showed me how to change settings on my camera to freeze/blur the water so I learned something new as well. We also took a short hike to view the lady slippers in bloom in the park.
Jayme shares my love of flowers so we went plant shopping and filled some pots with her favorites while the guys were doing some yard projects.
They have a beautiful yard and gardens including a vegetable garden they grow in cages to protect it from the abundant deer & bunnies in the northwoods.
June is a wonderful time to visit northern MN, the lupines are blooming along the roadsides for gorgeous color.
Driving down the interstate, we even saw a doe standing in a large patch of them but no time to grab a camera at that speed. It was a wonderful site to see :)