Sundays are my days in the garden.  It’s the only guilt free day I have to garden; the rest of the week there are deadlines and commitments, lunches to make, dinners to cook, carpools to drive, photos to take, gardens to scout.  In my free time, I write.  I’m a working girl, so I have to schedule garden maintenance. Sundays are important to me because the garden is where I need to be to get grounded.

Often I walk through the garden before carpool to prepare myself for the day ahead.  I might check on a new flower waiting for the dew to dry before opening, to see if certain plants are budding or to see if fruit is ripening.  Each day I’m in the garden–several times a day actually.  I am not the type of person that is so pre-occupied with other things going to and from the car that I don’t stop to enjoy the journey. I tend to take the long way around–the slow road down the garden path, ducking under the fig tree, and watching the bees go about their business or listening to the birds singing their hearts out.  Doing so makes whatever stress in my life mellow for a moment.

I see what needs to be done for my Sunday in the garden but I’m never worried about it in the time.  I don’t let it distract me.  Instead, I make a list.  List making is a compulsive behavior I have.  No doubt, I would be remind of what needs to be done as soon as I step into the garden but I make a list just the same.

In 2001 I began keeping a list of maintenance tasks that was needed in my garden. They became a bookmarked site as a go-to place for the area of what to do when.  Here is April’s maintenance for the Mid-Atlantic.

Maintenance has always been my thing. This compulsive list maker is also a compulsive neat freak.  I’m a tidy gardener and with this comes a need to keeps things looking good.  It’s my therapy.  I never tire of it, I never think I can skip it (or would want too), I never care if someone thinks I need to branch out in my hobbies.  Gardeners tend to gravitate to their personal loves and fascinations.  Some like to plant seeds and watch them grow, others like to concentrate on one type of plant–roses, vegetables, salvias.  Others are into ponds or waterfalls or bogs.  My bent is tidiness and variety.  Since Helen’s Haven is a wildlife habitat, I have a lot of diversity.  My last count listed 750 unique taxa.  With only a 1/2 acre and large grass areas for the kids to play, that’s quite a few plants.  To keep it from looking “busy” I keep it tidy. I make no apology.

 

RED BED

• Visited Campbell Road Nursery in Raleigh and happened upon a Calycanthus ×raulstonii ‘Hartlage Wine‘ (Calycanthaceae).  I couldn’t believe my good fortune.  This J.C. Raulston introductions has been on my list of wants for some time.  I’m kind of ashamed to admit it but last fall I “settled” for Calyanthus floridus ‘Michael Lindsey’.  So when I saw it at Campbell Road, I had to have it.  I figured I could move the ‘Michael Lindsey’ somewhere else (I moved it to the Mixed Border.)  While at Campbell Road, I spoke with Lane Snelling, who works there, (Lane is retired from NC State University; he worked with plant breeder, Denny Werner) and he shared with me that the plant was propagated from a cutting that came from his garden and that plant came from J.C.  Raulston himself.  I hope you know I love these kinds of stories.
• Just when I though I swore off ever buying another daylily, my order from Brent and Becky’s Bulbs arrived. I planted  Hemerocallis ‘VT Spirit’ along the path in the Red Bed.
• The Brent and Beck order also included Hymenocallis harrisiana, spider lily, which I planted near the fountain so it would get plenty of moisture.
• Any cutting left behind from the forsythia I removed last fall is sprouting.  At least they are easy to pull.  But I need to stay on top of this or they will grow in to the massive shrub I could no longer stand.
• Pulled several Euphorbia lathyrus, gopher spurge.  I like this plant; it’s a biennial that came from the JC Raulston Arboretum.  It reseeds freely.
• I was given a nice size Buddleja ’Ice Chip’ (A Denny Werner introduction) rom my friend and editor at Triangle Gardener, Beverly Hurley.  It was planted in this bed.  I’m about out of room in this garden…all the others too.

 

FRONT PORCH

Spared.

 

SIDEWALK

Planed Okra seeds

 

MAILBOX GARDEN

• Top dressed the composted leaf mulch with mini pine nuggets.

 

ROSE GARDEN

Spared.

 

THE RIVER BED

• Spared but thought again about adding a metal edge around this bed to better define the shape. This bed is in transition while I wait for the daffodils in the Meadow Bed  to fade. The River runs through the Meadow.

 

LE PETITE POTAGER

• Planted green and yellow bell peppers, a Better Boy & Early Girl tomatoes, and a Japanese eggplant (Ichiban.)  Direct sowed marigolds from Dollar Seed.

 

NORTH GARDEN

• Admired the larkspur that started to bloom.  In the sunny part of this garden, I added Paeonia ‘Festiva Maxima’ Peony.  It was a good price at Campbell Road Nursery since they were past bloom. Because I’m in gardening for the long haul, I don’t mind buying good priced, perfectly good plants at 1/2 price because I missed the bloom.

 

ROCK GARDEN

• Admired everything that is flowering in this 18 month old bed. It looks lovely.

 

BACK PORCH ONE

• Decided I need to pop the stepping stones to make room for growing plants. I did it.  I don’t like the curve nearly as much as it was, but the plants are happier.

 

MIXED BORDER

• Added Liatris floristan ‘Alba’, Gladiolus  callianthus ‘Murielae’, Alstroemeria ‘Tangerine Tango’, Baptisia ‘Carolina Moonlight’, Lilium canadense, and Uvularia grandiflora.
• Direct sowed Cosmos.
• I was going to direct sow Zinnias, but I either can’t find them or I never had them…must get!

 

CHILDREN’S GARDEN

• Six cubic yards were added to this garden and around the shed area. Protected the Magnolia ‘MicJUR01′, Fairy Magnolia ® Blush I won from a raffle at JC Raulston Arboretum Friends of the Arboretum lecture. It was getting to much sun.

 

WOODLAND ONE

• Pruned a dead branch off the standard Camellia.

 

CRINUM GARDEN

• Added Kniphofia ‘First Sunrise’ to a container.

 

WOODLAND TOO

Spared.

 

BACK PORCH TOO

Spared.

 

SOUTH GARDEN

• Planted red cabbage.

 

Helen  Yoest is a writer and speaker through her business Gardening with Confidence ®.

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Helen’s book,  Garden with Confidence–50 ways to add style for personal creativity is due out this fall.  The book launch will  held at the JC Raulston Arboretum, Thursday, November 1, 2012,, 7:30 p.m.