Yard Ornaments and Dead Flowers

I scored a few cute yard ornaments from a few different places.

Dollar Tree Stuff

 I got these cute flowers and garden posts at Dollar Tree. I got 2 sets. One set for my walkway and the other set for my chicken coop. I got a little outdoor decor for just $4! Yay!

Bird Tower

 I call this my bird tower. It was a throwaway at the swap shop. I got this and...

Plant Stand with Dead Flowers

this plant stand there. I love finding things I can use in my garden. This is my year to add cute stuff to my flower beds. The lady next door always has cute stuff. It's my turn. Oh! The dead flowers aren't really dead. They came off the discount rack at Lowe's. I jammed some Angelonia, Dianthus and Calibrachoa, that small trailing stuff in front. My baskets never look this good. I'm blessed this year.

More Dead Flowers

Not really...Lowe's again. I have Agastache, Arizona Sunset in back and more Calibrachoa in the front. The stringy-leaved plants in the back row are Red Hot Poker. They've been there for about 4 years, now. The Agastache has a peppermint smell to it. The wording in Spanish kind of tells me why "Anis hisepo Arizona Sunset". An anisette hyssop. This is a perennial, so I'm looking forward to this for many years to come.

I also planted some dead flowers in the flower bed in our driveway. Vinca and Verbena. They are starting to take off after a plague of snails hit them. Sevin dusted them. Yep. Snails gone.

A friend of mine 'rescues' plants from the dead plant carts in Lowe's. That's a good way to put it. You give a home and some TLC to these little guys, then you get a payoff of lovely flowers. It's rewarding and very easy on the pocketbook. I like how she thinks.

Take care. Happy planting!

Work Weekend

This work weekend is a pretty good one. Hubby and I have been revamping a table to use in our kitchen for meals. We have a really nice and huge dinner table, which is posted on a previous blog around last Thanksgiving. However, it is too huge for just two people to eat at. This one will be taller and I'll put it near my kitchen window so we can look outside and enjoy the view of our backyard. The only thing is, we've Frankensteined a coffee table and it is probably going to be heck trying to get chairs to match. If worst comes to worst, I'll cut down a pair of bar stools and rehab them, too.

The weather is getting a bit cooler, which is a really welcome relief from the hot weather we have in the summer. The leaves are falling and the yard looks fluffy in spots. The pine needles are dropping by the basketfuls. I'll need to pick them up for the flower gardens. Down here, they use these for mulch. People actually buy them in bales to use. I have a free supply for the raking.

I put in a small flower garden and used some of the pine needles for mulch. Let me tell you about the plants I scored at Lowe's this weekend. I've been looking to get some crotons and pansies for color. The crotons grow outside all year long. They are expensive! The pansies, not so expensive. So I decided I'd get a couple of large pots of croton and a flat or two of pansies. Then I saw my favorite clearance cart in an aisle. So, I drug hubby and his buggy to the clearance rack for a browse. SCORE! Small crotons, like I wanted...cheap! Pansies, like I wanted...really cheap! Mind you, the crotons are weepy, but I think they'll pull through. The pansies are really in good shape, but most of the flowers are gone.

Now, the fun part comes. I have a small flower garden near our fire pit. Hubby pulled weeds from it last week. This week I'm planting these flowers in it before they decide to croak. I spread some compost over the soil and started turning over the soil. WRONG! There were roots galore from spreading vines that we've been killing and pulling out. The roots are still spreading. They are poison ivy roots. Oh, yeah! They are thick and kept me from turning the soil. So I had to cut each shovelful of dirt before I turned it over. Then I pulled out the roots and filled two 5-gallon buckets with the roots. So far, I haven't got a rash. It would show by now. I planted the garden and it's going well after only two days.

Busy weekend!

Take care.

Reprieve from Rain!

Yay! Saturday was a little sprinkly here and there. Nothing that would keep us from being outside.  We went to Tractor Supply for straw for the chicken coop. We also went to Lowe's and got some cement to finish off our pavilion wall. Hubby laid block and I stained a fence.

Sunday was superb! It was under 80 degrees F with a breeze. It got a little over 80 degrees and still had a breeze. There was an overcast sky, which made it really nice.

I had a lot of outdoor chores to do. I trimmed the large cactus growing into our driveway. I also got rid of all of the berry bushes and pine trees growing in that cactus. Well...my arms look like they were in a fight and the bushes won. I also got a bug bite which turned into a biggie. I trimmed the willow tree growing over the driveway. It was rubbing the tops of the trucks as we came in to park. I also trimmed up the trees growing up the side of the ditch. They needed it. Now our driveway looks pretty good and our ditch looks better. I couldn't stop there so I trimmed my Weeping Holly a bit. Then I pulled weeds from around it. I have a LOT of weeds to go to finish out my flower gardens. Did you know that termites will live in your mulch? I found that out. They are living in my composting pinestraw mulch. A little bug killer and that is that. I know I just got the ones on the surface, but I'll go back over it with some more later.

Now I'll mention that Hubby cut and weed-whacked the grass, laid block, started preparing our garden for fall planting, plus a few other things. He got a Dietz lantern out and we sat out under the pavilion Sunday night. This was the FIRST time this summer that we were able to do that. The rest of the summer, it was either too wet or the mosquitos ate us up so bad that we couldn't sit out.

We're expecting company in November and I have lot of things to get done beforehand.  Mostly getting the yard in order so kids can play outside.

So, three days without rain and we're back to working in the yard.

Take care.