Category Archives: flowers

Jun26

Photo Hunt-Purple

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Purple and lime orchids, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

Here’s some exotic orchids from always reliable Longwood Gardens. (Make note to go in the next week or so).

Please keep my husband Brian’s dad Fran in your thoughts and prayers. He has something going on and is in the hospital now. He’s had GI issues for months and months and refused to go to the doctor. His RBC was low as was his BP. He had a CAT scan on his stomach and his colon has pockets, but not sure if that being irritated is his main problem.
I’ll probably go see him tomorrow. He was always quite heavy in the 240+ range . Now he’s like 160. He just had a birthday on the 23rd-turned 87!

Jun16

Late Spring plantings

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Best Pots of the year so far, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

I have these pots right near one of the seating areas outside. Seems the coleus like the dapples of sun they get here. I’ve have these black kettle flower pots for years. Besides Coleus, there are Pinwheel Zinnias, White Petunias and Blue Lobelia. I’m still potting up a few things and adding some annuals here and there for a surprise of color.
There are things that I’m not happy with-so much things are getting munched on and I have to spray here and there. Branches need trimming and don’t get me started on the weeding! I haven’t mulched. You think I would have learned to wait until the Chestnut trees dumps their catkins which are so messy. I wish we could get those trees cut back sometime.

Jun9

My front step welcomes you

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Front step, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

This is just one side of my step. The fuzzy plant under the birdhouse is new, really pretty and called Nicolletta (I have a friend named Nicolette-I should root her a piece!). I added a few Nasturtium seeds in with it. I also have a pot of pansies and that unnamed pink daisy like flower keeping it company. I have a pretty coleus and peachy begonia on the other side.
Splish Splash Coleus
Splish Splash
We are expecting much needed rain today. My mom needs to come out this way and hopefully get her very pricey hearing aid. Unfortunately she isn’t the only family member who is hard of hearing, so is Bri’s dad and Bri was tested to have slight loss. I’m blaming headphone use! Bri is going to the eye doctor today(we are still trying to figure out why he doesn’t feel well so much). Sean and him were playing a little baseball and he thinks he hurt his knee and is limping around now. The poor guy!
I am so looking forward to Thursday evening as my ‘new’ high school friend Lorin and I are going to see James Taylor and Carole King down in south Philly. She asked me back in January if I’d like to go and I said sure, so she gifted me with a ticket. Will give you a report. If I take my camera, you’ll probably see a little video if I can sneak one in. And maybe Lorin’s hubby can take one of both of us. He’s driving us as she can’t drive at night and I don’t drive to south Philly! I guess I could, but I can’t drive Lorin home.

Jun6

Pond Garden 2010

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First of all, yes, this in on a slight incline. : )



Pond Garden 2010, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

This is finally weeded and edged so it is now worthy of sharing a photo of it. The Japanese irises were just ‘so-so’ this year. The foliage they leave behind looks nice next to the pond. The Red Hot Pokers on the other hand are gorgeous!
Red hot poker plant
I have them in about 3 places around the yard. My mom said she’d like me to dig some up for her. They are actually the orange topped plants. The large bunch of plants in the foreground are Shasta Daisies. They have a bit of a disease on them like last year. I have some next to the overgrown (never trimmed) butterfly bush there on the left. There are some Pinwheel Zinnias and Red Salvia around the gazing ball and also some potted Lantana
Orange Lantana
and another with white Salvia and a peachy Diascia.
Apricot Diascia and White Salvia
I have a pot of two tone white and wine colored petunias hanging up
Two tone purple/white Petunias

and some yellow calibrachoas there too.
The double light is solar powered and flashes different colors at night-very cool. The pond lights all got new batteries but aren’t working well. I have one frog resident that I see. : )

Jun6

The ‘C’ garden

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The ‘C’ garden, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

This use to be the Circle garden, but Bri kept hitting a few box hedges on the right with the mower and they met their demise. It now looks like a ‘C’ which is the first letter in our last name! I realized my box hedges are a few different kinds, but just this year. It doesn’t bother me a whole lot, but the 3-4 different ones are bigger and needed more shaping. This is the garden where my irises, dinner plate hibiscus (the deer like to munch them), some Gladiolus and Black-eyed Susans are planted. I added a Julia Child yellow rose bush (gift from Brian), a gorgeous orange Wall Flower,Orange Wall Flower
a pink Columbine and a few others. I think it needs mulch-I love and hate the stuff, but it sure gives the gardens a finished look, but my poor back is already bad this year.
Update-that’s a pot of Hens an Chickens on the white stand Hens and Chicks

and a shallow bowl with colored glass too. Where the bowl is use to be where we had one of the monstrous satellite dishes.

May31

Roses and Spookiness

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Happy Memorial Day. A day to reflect and remember the brave soldiers and those who gave up their lives for our freedom.



Yellow rose bush with 17 buds, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

Yes, and they all have bloomed except one or two. My other roses, though not as big, are blooming nicely also.

Here’s a pink one:
Deep pink rosebud
The guys are both home today. Not planning to do too much.

We decided to take a vacation to Ocean City, MD this year as Brian’s dad hasn’t been well and it’s not a plane trip away like a Carribean trip would be. Plus, the prices are better and I told Sean we can stay right on the beach if we could find a reasonably priced place. We pinpointed a place through Ex*pedia, but he has to see when he can take 3-4 days off.
Yesterday I had the entire afternoon to myself. I read, I sat a spell, I cleaned lawn furniture and I planted the last of my herbs. The bugs are coming out, so I need to buy mulch. My flowers in the front garden are much happier and productive being mulched.
Saturday I planted some perennials in my round bush edged garden where I have mainly irises. My pretty irises did not like the 4 feet of snow and only 7 out of 15 varieties made a show this spring. I then went and planted flowers in the pond garden and Brian edged it for me. It looks so much better.
I’m reading a young adult fiction by a lady also named Dianne (K. Salerni)
Sean and I were in a bookstore a few weeks ago and he saw her name on the cover and pointed out that she spells her name like I do! I then remembered she was the daughter of prominent church members and that there was an article in the paper about her writing ‘We Hear the Dead’-so I bought it. It’s based on a true story about the Fox sisters from the middle 1800s who were said to start seances. There are yet other coincidences besides our first name. In the first 30 pages of the book, there are two names of people with the same first and last names as people I know or have known. The doctor’s name is my maiden name of Knowles and they have an older brother David! Spooky. I plan to have Dianne autograph her book for my niece and I will pass it on to her in a year or so. I found Dianne on Facebook and we friended each other there.

May7

Two tone clematis vine

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Two tone clematis vine, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

Here’s the pretty vine I told you about. I’m waiting on a white and lime green one out front next.
Brian planted a new ‘Gypsy’ rose for me last night. I had it a few weeks and the poor thing started to bud in it’s packaging. The roses look so healthy this year-shiny green leaves and buds galore.
I potted up mostly pink and purple petunias on Thursday. I need a few more bags of potting soil. I shouldn’t have been lifting as I pulled something near my left arm pit over to my scar area. I finally put a piece of that sticky icy hot patch on it and it feels better.
We are getting all this wind and no rain. Still have lots to do outside and inside. My summer clothes are still in the space*bags (which don’t work that great).
Have a great Friday!

May3

Magenta clematis

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Magenta clematis, originally uploaded by DianthusMoon.

It’s a great year for Clematis! I have two of my three vines in full bloom. Heading out to take more photos to clear my head soon. I have a few big projects under way-craft stuff sorting and changing winter to summer clothes. We don’t have enough closets in this house! And I do have too many clothes. I take pretty good care of them and they don’t wear out.
I had so much stuff jammed in the corner of my dining room (my craft ‘room’, but Sean’s room will be that area someday) that I opened a tin that I thought contained pens, etc. and inside were Cmas cookies! They were 4.5 months old, but looked perfect. I was mad at the stupidity of forgetting about food I spent an hour or more making -grrr!
So there is more drama going on in my extended family-one reason I can’t seem to think straight a lot of the time. I’m going down in a few days to see what I can do, if anything. It seems nothing ever changes as some people are never happy or are very stubborn. And they need help from the entire clan. Wish me luck!
Ah-the sun!