As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m extremely tight with my flowers. I rarely cut them and bring them inside to enjoy. But on the rare occasion I do, I absolutely love seeing them displayed in the house. Last year I went out before the first hard freeze and cut all the leftover flowers I could find. Without so much ...
Funny how spring goes. One day you’re belly-aching about the horrible weather and wishing you could do more in the garden and then the next day you turn around and the garden has come alive, bringing with it all the good (flowers!) and bad (weeds!) bits. Silly me, I was feeling pretty good after two weekends of garden cleanup. I ...
I have only two indoor plants that I really care about. One is a spider plant I bought at the farmer’s market the day I moved into my freshman year college dorm, making it, well, old enough to be at college itself. The other is a large ficus tree I got from my grandmother’s house after her death. In her ...
A new raised bed is in and the onions are planted. I plan to grow some kale on the other side of it, but most other things will be off limits as this bed is not protected from the overactive deer population in our yard. It feels great to have something in the ground (I did finally get the peas ...
As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, we’ve been waiting for the tree guys to remove a few trees from our yard. I wanted to get rid of them sooner rather than later so I didn’t have to worry about protecting plants near them and we had some more time to figure out what to do to replace them. Many ...
Maybe I got too confident about our DIY ability. After all, I’ve jumped in with both feet to projects I had no idea would work, we installed our bedroom floors, I laid a huge stone path through our yard and built stacked-stone retaining walls and I’ve even learned how to do some electrical work. Our theory on when to do ...
When all else fails, at least there is this: It may be short in stature and damn near buried in an uncleaned garden bed, but the sight of this little hellebore (I don’t know which one it is, unfortunately) did wonders for my soul this week. The weatherman tells us it will actually feel like spring here and I can’t ...
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Well that was abrupt. Without a lot of lead-up, we had hard frost. And just like that, the growing part of the gardening season is over. I didn’t take the threat of a freeze too seriously because we usually escape the first few frosts that affect even areas just an eighth of a mile away. […]
The monarchs are making their way south, and the hummingbirds are all but gone. The geese overhead seem to be pointing south and all this migration can only mean one thing: It’s time for the annual houseplant migration. I like to think of myself as a good gardener, but I am a lousy caretaker of […]
Put the wheelbarrow down! I know you’re busy working in the garden, but I have to tell you that this post is a partnership with Lowe’s Home Improvement. Thanks for checking it out and thank you for supporting the brands that partner with The Impatient Gardener. Life is just periods of blissful unawareness followed by […]
As I got farther and farther behind in planting my vegetable garden I knew this day would come. In fact, it comes every year, but I knew it would be even more dramatic this year, as tomatoes just wouldn’t have enough time to produce and ripen all the fruit they were meant to provide. But […]
It’s funny how some plants mean more to me than others. Often these are among the first plants I bought. Acer palmatum dissectum ‘Orangeola’ was, I think, the first expensive plant I ordered online. It was certainly the first tree I bought online. I say online, but I think I actually placed the order on […]
The first fall after we moved into our house 16 years ago, my mother-in-law bought me a collection of tulips. It was a sweet gesture and one that was particularly lovely the following spring when they all shot out of the ground and showed that hint of color as their tight buds started to open. […]
I’m about to gripe about gardening, but I want to preface that by saying that I realize that in light of what many people are dealing with from Hurricane Florence and other natural disasters, this is small potatoes. So on that front, I am thankful that I’m in a position to be able to whine […]
Hi friends: I just want to tell you that this post is paid partnership with Lowe’s Home Improvement, but you know how I roll on these things: You’ll always get my honest opinion. I’ll be the first to admit that I will never have a lawn that looks like a golf course. And I’m 100% […]
The start of the gardening year is signaled, in my garden at least, by the blooming of the first bulb. Last year it was a race between one insanely long-lived and abused daffodil and the winter aconites. Even though I cannot bear to think of the months that precede that moment right now, I know […]
There is great irony in writing about varying methods of watering a garden after of two weeks of nearly constant rain here, a weather cycle I can’t remember the likes of but I know so many other gardeners have faced this year (or the exact opposite, and I’m not sure which is worse). Still, after […]
Well here we are, on the eve of Labor Day weekend in the U.S., the date many people think of as the end of summer. Well there will be none of that here! The garden is still going strong (although everything is a little beat up after our heavy rains) and I have a lot […]
I remember when I would enjoy laying in bed listening to a rollicking summer storm. The rain pounding on the roof above my head, the rumble of thunder, the waves crashing on the nearby shore were all sounds I enjoyed listening to until they lulled me to sleep. Apparently my brain is now permanently in […]
It has been a great year for dahlias in my garden and after talking to several dahlia-loving friends, I’m counting myself very lucky. Few flowers bring me as much joy as dahlias, and I like them every which way: big and blousy, perky singles, pokey cactus types, perfect little balls. I want them all. What […]
