in the garden

I must confess that I am not a very enthusiastic gardener.  My efforts are sporadic at best.  My neighbor, however, has a spectacular garden in which she spends as much time as she possibly can, with astonishing results.  Her charming little house is surrounded by flowers and shrubs and blossoming everything year-around.  She has even volunteered to start things for me and to putter in my garden while I am way.  I have been thusly shamed into doing something a bit more creative and colorful.

In that spirit, yesterday I drove here to begin my garden renewal. I spend a couple of hours wandering through their acres of greenhouses, sniffing and pinching leaves for fragrance and thinking about color and shade and layout. I came home with lots of these,

including red penstemon to plant (finally) in the three big terra cotta pots I brought back from Mexico last year. I am assured that these plants will bush out and be very content in these pots.

Most of what I bought are shade-lovers to fill in here.

and here.

In the back garden around the pool, these  coreopsis have pretty much taken over.

This morning I donned my sun hat, pulled on my garden gloves, and got busy.  First I cleaned up all the  debris from the front shade garden.  Then I dug up two big trash barrels full of coreopsis to make room for some other things I want to plant.

One thing I'm putting in the ground is another of these sweet little rose plants, originally put in my garden by my neighbor. Two more await the preparation of their new homes. I'm ready.