Plant geek: slight succulent obsession

This plant geek is firmly on the succulent bandwagon.

 Almost every style blog, retail outlet, and garden center has succulents as the star.

We are huge fans of the ease of care and the wide variety available. From the tiniest to the largest in all different shapes and colors, we love how they look.

We started a few cuttings from some of our existing plants. These cute little vintage clay pots are so sweet.

We also planted an arrangement in a galvanized container that we found. We have a whole collection of these galvanized pans and they are the perfect depth for succulents.

 Here is a better view of some of the plants we selected.

We were also surprised to see one of them blooming! Look at these delicate little blossoms.

Dreaming of spring

This time of year always begins to wear on us - too much time cooped up inside, too little sunshine, too much cold.

We begin to feel a little hopeful when the seed catalogs start to arrive in the mail.  My dad has already called and asked about my wishlist for our combined seed catalog order. The tradition of collaborating in planning our separate gardens is one that I love.

This month's Midwest Living has a feature on a plant about which I know very little, but it has made it's way to my wishlist.

Hellebores is touted as an early bloomer, but I can't figure out if it will grow in Kansas. It has an old-fashioned look that
I love and the idea of having early blooms is certainly attractive.

I will have to see if we can some to plant as an experiment.

Plant geek: garden update

 Our garden is looking beautiful!  The recent rainfall has helped everything stay green.  The moisture has also caused the weeds to grow like crazy and we have been putting in a little extra time to try to pull weeds when the temperatures are a little cooler. 

I guess we always have plenty of "therapy" to keep us on track.  The best therapy is pulling a bucket of weeds - at least that is what I tell myself.  If you agree, we have plenty of "therapy" to go around (and extra gardening gloves).

 Our cucumbers are really taking off and because of my husband's diligence, they are growing up the fence like we had planned.  I am always amazed at the tendrils on a cucumber plant - beautiful and amazing how something in the natural world works so well.

 While this is a dragon fly, I want to joke that it is the same size as the mosquitoes in the yard.  One of the downfalls of all of the rain is the chiggers and mosquitoes...not fun!  I am trying a new insect repellant from LuLu and Max.  I am a big fan so far.

 We try to grow new things in the garden each year. This year's grand experiment is the tomatillo!  I am super excited to try to can some salsa verde.  I am doing some reading to make sure that I know what I am doing, but I am pretty sure that we'll just take it one day at a time and see how it works out.  The plant has set on some small fruit - a good sign.

I planted these on a whim and sort of forgot what I had planted.  They almost got yanked out of the ground when we thought it was a weed.  Thankfully, I put two and two together and remembered they were part of the actual garden plan.

 The plant also has some blossoms, so we must not be messing up too bad.

We also pulled a bunch of onions tonight.  We have some giants in the harvest.  My husband thinks we should enter them in the fair and I keep threatening to put him in open class.

What is in bloom

 This afternoon was a great chance to see what was blooming in the yard and garden. 

I was surprised to discover the pink geraniums on the planters on the east side of the house. 

You see, we stumbled into a great deal with our local FFA chapter.  At the end of the school year, the students offered all of the leftover plants in their greenhouse for a free will donation.  We selected several flats to help round our the flowers gardens and containers and to replace some of the plants that were damaged with a late frost.

So, our purchases were a little bit of a leap of faith.  We didn't necessarily know the color of blooms.  This was such a pleasant surprise - the delicate pink with the darker pink edge of the petals.

Beautiful.

 I am also reminding myself of the simple beauty of the classic combination of spike, asparagus fern and red geraniums.  This grouping never disappoints.

The garden is starting to bloom, too.  These blossoms are on our cucumbers - the bright yellow is so wonderful!