Blog

Welcome to Garden Bloggers Bloom Day, when Carol of May Dreams Gardens invites us to share all the beautiful blooms in our gardens.

Because we basically enjoy nine months of summer here in Austin, and so many of the plants bloom for most of that time period, I decided to focus my post today on a few unusual things that are blooming instead of the normal laundry list.

Rest assured, the lantana and blackfoot daisy and other annuals and perennials that were blooming last month as still blooming. The one big change that I am seeing since our 90 degree spell — the beautiful magenta snap dragons are starting to wilt. About half of them have died and don’t appear to be coming back.

You’ll find a few favorites I couldn’t resist sharing, but also several blooms on the vegetables growing in my garden with the promise of delectable veggies yet to come. Here are my first day lilies blooming. These are not from my new bed, but ones that I planted last year. I got the full “frontal” shot for you (tee hee) but was more intrigued by the look from the back, so I took one of those as well. Isn’t the back of it lovely, too?

This is a Mexican Hat native wildflower that I planted after grabbing a handful of seeds on the side of the road during a walk last year! I crushed the dried head into an open meadow area where we have our bird feeders and they came up this year! I am so excited that my experiment actually worked!
This is a terrible picture, but I wanted you to see Mr. Lizard who was hot-footing it away from me down the driveway. Think he’s camera shy?
First blooms of the lovely Guara.
The Damianita in the front bed in its full glory.
This Black and Blue Salvia is one of my favorites. It’s so rare that we are able to get true blues in our gardens and I just love these.
A collection of little pots that I SWORE I wouldn’t plant this year. (When we get to 100, it takes a LONNNNNNNNG time to water all those little pots every single day without fail….and every year I swear I am not going to plant them again …… I lie!)
More little pots…
More little plants and more little pots into which I will someday put the plants!
My new Spiderwort who is still WAITING to go into the ground and has decided to shame me into planting it by blooming!
Rudbeckia that came from a mail order and I am so pleased with its lovely color.
These are Tomatillo blooms.
These are bush bean blooms. By the way, we have lots and lots of beans, so I am planning to cook homemade green beans on Sunday night for dinner…with bacon and onions! Yum…like my Grandma used to make.
The cucumbers are looking very healthy and started blooming this week.
A little garden art I picked up at a nursery across town — this is on the fence by our playscape.
And, finally, my Pavonia – or Rock Rose, that I have gleefully planted behind the fence out of the range of the hungry deer. Over the years, they’ve eaten 3 on me, so I’ve learned my lesson and was excited to think of a spot to safely plant one. This is across the way from the new daylilies on the edge of that bed. Tonight two Mexican heathers and an Idigo Spires joined her, but that was after photo time. I snuck in three plants while Kallie was brushing her teeth and putting her jammies on!

It’s so nice here in the evenings these day, it’s just plain hard to come inside until it’s dark, but Mommy duty calls, so I only get a few stolen moments!