Just beautiful, Carrie. Everything looks so lush, and the colors are outstanding! I love it!

Karen

Those chocolate centers on the ruds...yum yum.

Absolutely beautiful! Thanks for sharing.

How beautiful....are these all wintersown plants?

:-) Pam

thanks, all - just had to take pictures of the BES - yes, the choc centers do look delicious....

pam - everyone wintersown (but a couple of years ago), but the daylilies you may see and the clumps of fescue grasses and some shrubs. Agastache, BES, monarda, scabs, balloon flwrs, four oclocks, blue salvia - (right bottom) - all done by seed.

Here are my spring sown zinnias today, along with ws gaillardias, calendulas, salvias - Mostly everything in my gardens are from seed. (Who can buy all those plants??)
(To the left of the stones - on the "burnt" grass - is a wire dome - I have several of them and I surround the zinnias at night to try and keep the bunnies off of them.
{{gwi:404217}}

... lol - I mean "everything"... not everyone

Carrie

It just amazes me that you started all that with seeds. It's the kind of garden I like, tall plants and random colors.

well, amongst the borders, I do have daylilies and spirea and rose of sharon (not wintersow) - but for the most - yes, all from seed. Amazing, isn't it? And think of all the $$$ I saved.

I never knew BES came back and even taller than the first two years they bloomed, so this year was really a surprise for me.

Shasta Daisies were 10 cents in Walmart and I am loaded with them - Here is a repeat photo of just one area of the shastas that were done by seed:
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Lovely, it looks like a garden should look. I like the way you worked the pavers in and the stone border. Sure don't see any weeds in yours!

AhhhhMAZING!! Just gorgeous! The colours are just so playful and bouncing from one plant to another is fun!

There is a plant that repeats itself in your photos which I'd like to know what it is. In your initial post it is located in the lower right corner of the last photo. Looks variegated. What is it?

Bet you got butterflies with those Monardas. They were winter sown? I have pinks from when I started gardening in the early '80s and last year bought a deep purple and was given a red Jacob Cline. So looking forward to seeing them all bloom. How old are the reds in that first shot?

Nice, VERY nice! :O)

hi tiff,

Monarda - four years old. Come to think of it - I am wrong - I did NOT wintersow those. I think I bought them -sorry for the oversight.
The shrub is merely a variegated ligustrum and I have about five of them - which I intend to move out of there because they grow really big and every spring I have to prune them down - plus that gives me more space for flowers or another less vigorous shrub. I bought the shrubs for like $2.00 in Home Depot about four years ago - they were so small but they grew so fast. They make pretty white flowers in the spring, but other than that, they are just ligustrums.

Carrie

Beautiful, Carrie. Always enjoy seeing your garden. Those zinnias have really grown. I also have wire cages that I put over newly planted flowers to keep the squirrels from digging them up.

Just vibrant with colors. Love them all. ;-)

Your garden is much more advanced than ours up north. My Monarda is far from blooming. I did see a lot of buds on my Rudbeckia today.

Thanks for sharing.

Oh boy....you done it now! I'm moving in.

Vera

Carrie - I am in awe of your gardens and what you have done by wintersowing - one question tho - how long will you have that explosive color and will other plants take over?? I STILL cannot achieve that season long color. I did do a huge TM seed order and plan to do the mass plantings like you are doing and drifts of BES and daisies. Will they last for several months for you?? Do you deadhead on a regular basis to keep the blooms coming??I am also going to do lots of zinnias which I know will bloom all summer. I hope you don't mind my asking so many questions - we are so close in planting zones both being in NC that I feel what will work for you should work for me. Thank you so much for inspiring me again and again.....

Lynne

I wish I had your green thumb and your zone. I am so zone, sun envy. Awesome from a woodland gardener......... Barb

Carrie,

Oh gosh! Now you are going to have to get cages to keep Vera out. :O)

First thing I thought of when you IDed the 'shrub' is that since it's a member of the Privet family you could actually create small trees which would have just one trunk going up about 6 feet or so and then shrub at the top - like a topiary. These are easily trained to do this. You'd probably have to take cuttings and root them since the ones which are in the gardens have so many stems coming from the base, but it wouldn't take long.

Lynne,

It's easy to deadhead BES and Daisies. When the first flowers start to fade, just grab all the stems as though you are grabbing a bouquet and cut them. I don't go one by one as some folks do. Takes too long.

Looks GREAT! I like yellow and red together.
Isn't it nice when you have everything filled in? I didn't even weed my front flower bank till last week when I added zinnias, hardly any weeds because of the close plantings

thanks - all so much (Vera - "come on down"...)

lynne -

Last year the BES lasted until frost. As the Monardas lose their colorful blooms, it's a blessing because they are sort of crowding the BES...Agastache stays good if I keep deadheading, daylilies (a good many) are rebloomers, shastas last quite a while (been going strong now for over a month), I do keep deadheading but eventually they will be cut back - probably in another couple of weeks - the blooms are just shorter and shorter until all the plants are whacked. The daisies are in the raised bed behind my borders and inbetween them I have BES which will bloom til frost and Helianthus Angustifolius - blooms in October. There's phlox in there too and that will bloom along with the shastas anyday now and last year stayed beautiful til November.

This year I did something different. Of course, zinnias are good until November, but I used to have mums, sedums behind them, which gave me good fall color. It just so happens that a couple of days ago, I changed my mind. I could do that because I had taken those sedums and mums in the spring and put them in my holding bed.

Now, behind the zinnias (I started today) I put already bloomed (from my holding bed) coral salvias behind the pink zinnias. Behind them, BES which will stay til frost. The veronicas, blue salvias, powis castle, scabiosa pincushion, gaillardia - all stay bloomed until November's frost - but I do a LOT of deadheading. The other that stays bloommed are the melampodiums til frost (but you must be familiar with all of the above mentioned)

Does that help any?

Carrie

I do have goldenrods, sedums, boltonia and a few mums in another bed, but I've never taken those pictures. What pictures I do show are my spring, summer borders and hopefully everything will look colorful up until November.

Just read your post, tiff (LOL vera in the cage...)

Yes, the shrubs on in the privet family - very invasive but I like them (and they are cheap, too!).... Thanks for the tip - my, you are the ambitious one! and so creative!

Carrie

Carrie - hope you don't mind, but I snagged that first photo of the BES and monarda for my desktop at work. Totally cheers me up!

PV

pvick - I only charge a dollar.... but oh..okay, this time around it's free..... :0) (PS I am so flattered....I needed that!)

Carrie

Carrie,

In my fledgling garden, "everyone" wouldn't be a Freudian slip. My mom says "Dogs are people too". Well, when you raise a garden from seed, I think it's inevitable we will see the plants as a little village of children and friends.

So in my book, when you tend to your garden, you are free to refer to every one of your black-eyed Susans, Johnny Jump Ups, and Angelicas as "everyone".

I'm IN LOVE with your BES and gaillardias. Brilliant colors.

Well, I guess if I can "kiss" the blooms cause they are so pretty, I can refer to them as "every one" - after all they are living plus if you step on them, they let you know it! (by flattening out, that is...)

Carrie (I know, the heat has gotten to me.....)

Lovely. All that cheerful yellow is so inviting. I'm rethinking my personal ban on red/yellow combinations. Yours works so beautifully. And the cost can't be beat.

achillea - I know what you mean about red and yellow - I usually prefer yellow/purple - - but there are times when those two colors just cheer me up - I have a bit of the purple monarda - I may choose to place them near the BES next year and put the red near the Shasta Daisies - but who knows how ambitious I will be moving perennials next spring PLUS planting out babies....

Carrie

I really like your garden it is so pretty. I bet it is so relaxing to just sit out there and listein to the birds and see all those pretties near you.

Paula

If you tear out some of that Monarda, you can sebd it my way, :-) I am planning on tearing out all the ditch lilies in the back border of one slope I am working on, I have the yellows, need reds and purple.

Carrie,
Your flowers look like something in a magazine! I'm drooling!!

thanks, all...

now shasta, by any chance would that magazine be... "Plunk and Run?" ....

Carrie :0/