Suburban Dirt

The Molly Sanderson violas and so-called 'hardy' carnations (yeah, right) are now on order. I don't know how long they'll take -- they probably won't even ship them until my personal check clears, so I'm guessing maybe two weekends from now. Yet another summer spent rooting around up to my elbows in the dirt. Big shock there, huh?

I planted a dozen lobelias and a delphinium -- none of the ones I started are really doing all that well -- split between the flowerbed by the driveway and the one next to the house. I may take some pictures tomorrow, if we don't get the deluge they were predicting for the weekend that hasn't even come close to happening yet (we put off early morning watering two days in a row because it was supposed to rain, but it cleared up yesterday and never really rained again, and it's been clear as a bell all day today).

Yesterday, I put in a good five hours cleaning up schmutz (sticks, dead leaves, maple propellers) and pulling weeds, then dropped a 1/2" to 1" layer of organic topsoil down in the bed next to the house, and finished doing the one by the driveway that I'd started last weekend.

Spent the morning at the animal shelter's annual dog walk. Got up real early, went and took lots of pictures of dogs with the digital camera, stood around a lot. Eh -- most of the pictures were for the couple who are doing an annual calendar for SICSA, they have an advertising company and are donating the work on the calendar. Some of the shots may go on the critter blog, in which case I'll put a link here.

Anyway, got home and collapsed for all of about half an hour, then went back out and bought the flowers mentioned above, planted them, and ate dinner. Likely, we'll go play trivia tonight, so there's really just not enough time and energy here to get pictures today.

Notes -- in the fall, I really need to separate out and divide a few of the bulb plants. The big peony bed needs to be reduced a little, again. I have been thinking about putting some along the side of the animal run, just down the side from the tulips. Also need to divide and/or relocate the hostas in the front flowerbed, next to the big red rosebush -- have thought about sticking some on the back slope, since there are plenty of shady spots, and I don't care if they divide and spread like mad, back there. Anything that keeps the bank of soil out of the yard can't be a bad thing, I guess. I could move all the ones along the back of the house, too, I suppose. I don't know -- that seems like a lot of work for plants I don't even really like all that much.

Both of my new rosebushes have blooms starting on them, now. The one in the front yard is a little slower to go than the other one, but then it gets somewhat less sun.

We've talked about doing a complete scorched earth on the slope back there -- either tearing everything out and terracing it for hostas and stuff, or just taking out all the forsythias and unidentifiable shrubbery and planting grass where there's nothing else growing. Either way, it'll be a big job -- it ain't going to get done this summer, that's for sure.

Having plans -- even big, easily procrastinated plans -- is considerably less depressing than not having any, of course. Why else would you garden at all in a place like this, otherwise?