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Whew!

May 25, 2009

All the dahlias, sorted and waiting (no, begging!) to be planted.

Well I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend. Memorial Day is sort of do-or-die time around here for gardening stuff so the extra day off was much needed. And what a day it was. But like most you, I never get to the bottom of the list. So, even though I had an extra day, I could use about a week! But I’m wondering if even that would do it. I mean, has anyone, EVER, crossed off everything on their gardening to-do list? If so, I want to hear about it.

I also braved the nursery (and I do mean braved: a nursery on Memorial Day weekend is not for the faint of heart) because I wanted to pick up some annuals while there were still some left. I think I have everything I need for my containers, well most of them anyway. And a few things I don’t need. I got to the checkout counter and looked in my basket and thought, “Hmmm, I wonder what I was planning on doing with that plant?” An hour before it was all clear but you walk around that greenhouse long enough and your head gets a tad foggy.

So I got oodles of delphiniums from Graceful Gardens planted. Their delphiniums have always done great for me the first year. Which is good, because I have about a 2-50 record of getting them to come back the next year. Weeded and mulched the circle garden, did a bunch of other stuff. And just as I was thinking about taking up my neighbor’s generous offer to help relieve him of oodles of very course mulch left for him by the people who rape the trees near the power lines for the electric company, I had a revelation: The dahlias were still in the garage!

Whoops. I realized it’s definitely time to get those guys in. So I unloaded the bins carefully (I’m hoping my labeling system worked), and got them all in the ground. By now it was approaching 4:30 p.m. It’s supposed to rain all week so it’s A.) a good time to get them in and B.) my last chance until next weekend (which will be equally filled with gardening chores). The first ones in were very lovingly planted in nicely dug and amended holes. By the end, I’ll be honest, they were lucky if I managed to get them planted at more or less the correct depth.

They were so eager to get going that almost all of them had sprouted quite a bit.
dahlias graceful gardens list
by Erin @ The Impatient Gardener 
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The Impatient Gardener

Do you love gardening? Me too! I'm Erin and I garden in Southeastern Wisconsin, zone 5. The Impatient Gardener is all about real-life gardening: the good parts, the bad bits and even the funny stuff. It's part information, part inspiration and a little bit commiseration. Thanks for visiting.

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Erin Schanen 🌿 The Impatient Gardener
These sister dahlias are big, beautiful girls. Pen These sister dahlias are big, beautiful girls. Penhill Watermelon (first picture) and Penhill Dark Monarch are the best two HUGE dahlias that I grow. They share slightly twisty petals (Watermelon more so) and, when you look closely, subtle striations that add a beautiful depth of color. Watermelon grows taller than Dark Monarch (7 feet tall or more sometimes) and they both need serious staking, but it’s worth it because they produce a lot of flowers for a large-flowering dahlia. 

I like them both but if I was forced to choose (and who would make me do that?) I’d give the edge to Dark Monarch because it’s a little easier to manage size-wise, produces more flowers and has a bigger variation in flower color so it’s always interesting. 

Which do you like better?
I don’t love tools that only do one thing. But w I don’t love tools that only do one thing. But when there’s only one tool that does that one thing really well, I’m here for it. This pottery/container knife from Sneeboer makes it possible to actually get plants out of pots without breaking or damaging the pot. It’s also really expensive. 😀
A little snippet of a bouquet from the weekend. Zi A little snippet of a bouquet from the weekend. Zinnias, pycnanthemum muticum and bronze fennel shown here.
My love for Nicotiana is not a secret. I love tryi My love for Nicotiana is not a secret. I love trying out new varieties and I feel like they just work so well in my garden from both a design standpoint and a cultural standpoint (they are happy here). Because I grow so many, the ones that self sow can be surprises. 

All of these self-sown Nicotiana are probably at least partly the children of the F1 hybrid Perfume series, which grow to be about 24” tall or so. Last year I grew purple, pink, white and lime versions and these are likely new variations on those. 

Picture 3 is, in my opinion, a good example of how these self sown second-year hybrids can go wrong. I’ll probably rip that one out. 😀

And the last photo is of my favorite colorway, lime, popping up amongst the Zinnias. I find these self-sown Nicotiana popping up all summer, so there’s always a fresh-blooming supply. 

Are you as enamored with Nicotinana as I am?
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