Sunflower Hill

I am so happy to look out every morning now and see a hill complete with Sunflowers and Gladiolus. All the beautiful colors just brighten my day!

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then what is a slideshow? Hope you enjoy!

Spring came late

I've been bad this last week and haven't written a thing! So a little catch-up is due.

The last few weeks have been filled with rain and simply have drenched everything. Although it's wonderful to see the greenery actually green, and to see the flowers in full bloom, I would love to see them drenched in some sun too!

The hill garden in the backyard is in full bloom! It's so wonderful to see all of the seeds took hold and have turned into such beauties!

I really love how the sunflowers are coming up! We chose a good mix of sunflower seeds, but so far most of them are red.

 



This one is definitely my favorite!

In this same garden, the four o'clocks are in full bloom. I remember growing up a neighbor used to have these all over her yard. I know it's strange, but they were beautiful! I have only seen yellow and pink ones, but we have some really beautiful ones that came up: Yellow, Pink, Confetti (which is pink and yellow speckled all over), and white.

 I also have a couple new bulbs that have bloomed. I have no clue what they are, but they are both stunning. If anyone knows what they are, please let me know.

The first is in the backyard in the second Oak garden. They are not growing like amaryllis, but similar to a small spider or narcissus lilly. They are amazingly fragrant; incredibly sweet and smell similar to Jasmine. The stark, crisp white flowers are delicate and seem to just dance as the breeze tickles their tall stalks.

The other new lilly is in the front of the house amidst the amaryllis gardens. I found them on the back side of our fence and moved them hoping for something pretty. a year and a half later, the first blooms have appeared! The flower capsules open in the same way the amaryllis do. The leaves and bulb look like a corn plant. As the flower capsule opened, I noticed small scarlet buds appear and then a few days later, they popped right open to reveal deep magenta flowers in nice big bunches! At first 11 little buds were counted, but as the days pass, it looks like more and more of them have appeared. Any clue what these might be?

Tropical Storm Beryl filled our barrel!

The clouds continued to roll in yesterday. And it seemed that all day we continued to say, "Looks like it is going to rain any minute... It just continued to tease me all day long! Our friend Jessica was over. About 3:00, Jessica and I were outside on the back patio playing a game of backgammon, and there it was! Just all of a sudden the skies opened up into a complete deluge!

We sat outside just to enjoy it since the patio was covered, we weren't wet. And then I jumped up and remembered that this was the first time the rain barrel would be used!!! It worked perfectly. And it literally did only take a few minutes to fill it up.

Monitoring the progress, I opened the top hole to see how full it was, and again - it was only about 5 minutes into the rain and the barrel was full. Sooo... I had to see how well the overflow was working... And it was perfect! It directed all of the extra water away from where we had an erosion problem. I couldn't be happier about the rain barrel!

Thank you Beryl for filling our barrel :-)

Additionally, the much needed rain helped the yard again. It's been a few weeks without a good amount of rain and everything sprung right back to life. In fact, another sunflower from the hill garden is in bloom and this one is a deep dark red!

new flowers!

Today the first sunflower has bloomed!

And... Another hibiscus cutting has new growth and just opened it's first flower!

Hill Garden

I love gardening. And I love all of the plants in my gardens. But there is just something amazing about growing a plant from seeds. There is an exhilaration that you can only get from getting dirty, digging a small hole and then dropping the seeds in. And with your care, watering the dirt, watching the sprouts, watering and more watering and then just all of sudden it seems you have a plant and then you have flowers. It really is amazing to look at it and just know that it's totally your fault that this little "being" has grown up and graced your presence with it's beauty.

The hilltop garden has offered us just this kind of wonderment. I still remember planting the seeds for all the different sunflowers, and four o'clocks, and the corms for the about 80 gladiolas. and doing just what I described above. and now it's right at the stage where I am enjoying some of the fruits of the labor.

And even better is when you receive a complete surprise! This was the very hill where we scattered wildflower seeds last year. Sadly nothing seemed to take off, but this year a few rogue zinnias have sprung up amongst the sunflowers.

Four o'clocks

Marigolds

Zinnias

Hilltop garden

To the north side of the pool there is a small hill. The hill is not tall, but is more of a berm about 30 feet long. Last year we threw wildflower seeds along the hill, and got two cosmos. Nothing else. We also tried gladiolas, but only one took and it didn't even bloom!

So this year there was a new plan!

It took us two weekends to finish the weeding, but we pulled everything out of the hill. Then it took us another two weeks to get all of the compost dirt to amend the sandy hill. And then we were ready. We covered the top of the hill with Mammoth sunflower seeds and then used a red variety mix and a lemonade variety mix of seeds to surround the Mammoth. Below that on the grade of the hill, we staggered about 80 gladiola corms. And then finished with four o'clock seeds and marigolds. We used our broken concrete pieces from around the yard to create a border.

We have been very diligent in watering. After only a week, the first sunflower seeds sprouted. A day or two behind them, the gladiolas sprung up and so did the four o'clocks. It's been about 4 weeks now and everything is coming along nicely! I can't wait to see the blooms across the hill!!!

Long shot of the garden.

Sunflowers