I first got my hands dirty as a child helping both of my grandmother's in their gardens. I didn't get serious about it until my kids were almost grown and I found it theraputic after a major loss in my life. I tended that garden for 10 years then moved to the PNW and started another one and will be starting over again when we sell this house and move north. Your garden will change and grow as you change and grow. Just dig a hole stick it in if it doesn't make it try again. I find that little vignetts work best for me. That way I get some instant gratification. LOL! Just let your space talk to you. It will tell you what to do. Sounds weird I know but it works. Gardening blessings, Patti

We moved our house on to a total stripped lot about 5 years ago and had a bunch of renovating to do, so I didn't really get serious about the yard right away. I did put in a few beds, mainly for plants donated from my parents' yard and some rescued from various sites. The garden in my head has lush beds of flowers, spring flowering trees, and beautiful shrubs, surrounded by a white picket fence and accented with sculpture twined with flowering vines. Am I close to that yet? Nope, but I'm getting there (hopefully helped by the 160+ containers I'm wintersowing this year). And the journey is most of the fun!

Well, we moved into our 1st house 8 years ago, and started the first bed the next summer. We moved again this past fall, and my old garden was still not done. ;) I have rather ambitious plans for this new house - I hope it progresses quicker this time!

I've been at it here for 9 years. The first few years were very slow as I was learning about climate and soil. It's been about 5 years for the current garden in the front, including the garden I started next door. It takes time, but that is part of what I love about it!

GGG

I have lived in this house for 13 years. The first 10 were just some annuals, and they never really did well.I didn't think soil, it was just dirt to me then.I did the same at work the first few years, just some annuals.Then one of my elderly ladies told me how to do roses from cutiings, i did 4 or 6.kind of like a snow ball my gardening history.If it grew good if not oh well.then last year I pulled out something that grew that i didn't like.all of a sudden, i felt like a gardener.a few dozen books,a few hundred bulbs, a compost heap and my first winter sowing almost all done, i'm starting to get the hang of it.I don't plan on any whopper of a garden, i just enjoy it.

I could easily date myself here but let's suffice it to say that I've been gardening since I was just a kid. I am on my third serious property now. I'd say it takes a good ten years to get your gardens to the point where you no longer have to add, add, add but just maintain and enjoy for the most part. I do have a plan as to the layout of the property, what will be beds, where the greenhouse will go, placement of trees and shrubs, walkways or paths, that sort of thing. I don't plan the plantings themself. I just add as I can afford to. I study things for a while and then decide what needs to come next to build on what came before it. I rarely rip anything out because I'm pretty sure of what I want and where it will go before I buy anything. I also make sure the soil has been well amended and that the mulch is available to add after planting. That way I don't waste a lot of time weeding and watering but can move on to the next area in the plan. Of course I want it to look like all the magazine shots someday but I'm happy with the progress I make each year and just enjoy each day and each bit of work as it comes.

MeMo

I started flower gardening about 25yrs ago. I began with annuals which were pretty but not very challenging. Then I discovered perennial gardening and I've been hooked ever since.

It sounds like you're off on the right foot. Start with a small area and expand gradually.

Best advice I can give is RESEARCH. Find out as much as you can about a plant before you buy. Some things are just short lived by nature and you might want to wait until you have a larger garden to try these. Some things are fussy about conditions or are suseptable to disease or bug infestation which could be very discouraging to a beginning gardener. Of course you should buy some things that tug at your heart when you see them in your local nursery, including annuals. But the bulk of your additions should be carefully selected to do well in your conditions.

Best of luck!
PattiOh

When we bought our house 26 years ago it was a blank slate, except for some foundation plants the builder added. The first couple years were spent cultivating a lawn and adding trees, although I did put in a small flower bed in the backyard.

After having 2 sons, my dreams of a lush, flower filled backyard were again put on hold as a large swingset and fort took their place. Later the backyard became a place to practice soccer moves, swinging a bat, tossing a football etc. Those were precious days and I don't for one moment regret not having the garden of my dreams. We were busy growing kids!

Now those boys are in college, and the backyard has been transformed, and is still being transformed, into a real garden. Grass has been removed, and flower beds have been expanded, along with the addition of more beds. It continually evolves with time.

I guess what I am saying is that I believe a garden grows and evolves along with its owners. Mistakes are made and knowledge is gained along the way. It's the journey that is so enjoyable. :-)

Marilyn

I have always loved growing flowers and vegetables and gardening since I was a tiny little girl. I can't say I ever had what you would call a comprehensive plan except for ..like my vegetable garden in all those years except for the past few since I have come to love hummingbirds. Now I plant for the hummingbirds!...Gardening is very much a trial and error process that never really ends. I like to read so I would go to the library and get books, I would ask my mother who was a wonderful resource and also ask neighbors and friends along the way. Now I have joined my local Garden club and it is a wonderful experience! So that is how I have gotten to where I am!!! It has been a great deal of fun and hard work and I love it!

I have really enjoyed reading all your posts.
Threeorangeboys I know what you mean about wanting the garden to become an instant English cottage garden. I can picture it all it my head and my yard is a nice clean slate to do pretty much whatever I want. Getting it to be as full as I want and as quick as I want is a different story however!LOL Glad to hear about the Larkspurs doing well as I direct sowed a bunch last fall. Wish me luck!
My DH thinks I'm nuts for pouring over all the books and tending to my plants even in the middle of winter but I love it and my plants. I baby all my perennials and hope that by those my collection will spread. I'm so excited about the fence going up and can't wait to plant some beautiful climbing roses over them. It is slow going but I enjoy it so much that I don't mind too much, it's worth just the small plot that I have to look at during the year!
I love this forum and it has been so much help to me. My friends call me up and ask me to help them with their garden (just this morning infact) the funny thing is I'm just learning myself but it makes me feel good anyway! LOL

Gardening is really a social and collaborative effort, I know it is for me. :-) We all share cuttings & seeds, and advice.

A lot of the content in my garden is the result of ideas picked up in GW forums. Gardeners are a generous group!

Marilyn

Momof2luv2garden, let me know how your larkspur goes. I experimented, starting some in pots and direct sowing, and the direct sowing definitely worked the best. It was a wonderful way for me to sort of have delphinium which I always wanted in my garden but just can't- toooooo humid and hot here. I still drool over those photos of gardens in the Northwest or England with the rows and rows of delphinium.
I agree that I love this forum. I have learned a ton here and it is always my first stop for garden info.

3orangeboys, that is exactly why I'm trying to grow those. I love the look of del's but like you said from what I have read they don't work at all with our humidity. I will let you know how they do. X my fingers!

I have been gardening 19 years in my present house, and 2 years in a townhouse. The garden has evolved and changed greatly as my taste changed and knowledge grew. I did my first bit of real planning about 8 years ago, scale drawing on graph paper, laying beds out with tape measurer and string, and have been evolving the plan and planting in those beds since.

My biggest inspiration was traveling to England six years ago and extensively studying the gardens there and looking at "real" cottage gardens and incorporating a lot of the character here but with plants adapted to my climate. It is so much better and educational to see other gardens in person than just drooling over photographs!

I have always gardened a bit.
DH and I quit smoking 5 1/2 yrs ago and put out our backs "getting healthy" by putting in raised beds! LOL
We are expanding our beds this year to incluce asparagus and.... just bigger beds!
Love, love lovin it! Nancy

6 years with a garden proper. Started with a blank slate, as soon as we finished building the house. Before that I was an apartment dweller, doing houseplants and growing stuff in balcony window boxes. I used these apartment years to get my hands on all gardening books I could find and read, read, read like mad. I love to travel and always tried to visit gardens whenever possible, learning all the way. As far as I can remember I have always had an interest in plants and even limited by space constraints I always grew a few.

Eduarda

Neat thread! Momof2 and 3orangeboys, I feel sorry for you not being able to grow delphs - they truly are stunning. Even here in eastern Canada I get some mildew, though. Still, they are worth it! Larkspur are lovely, too. Hope you both have good luck with those. I have found direct seeding the best for them - they simply don't like transplanting.

I've been "working" in the garden since I was a little girl, with my grandmother and later my mother, but it was never really gardening to me. I started gardening proper about 17 years ago, when my oldest DS was 1. He loved it then, not so much now:o). I've been gardening (and living) at my current home for 14 years. I can't imagine ever having to leave it!!!

balsam, I think it's so nice to see many of you who grew up gardening with your grandmothers and mothers. My mom has a black thumb and can't grow a thing! Even her azalea's are dying and around here that's near impossible!!
The only person who gardens and is about the best darn gardner I know is my grandfather and at 83 still has a large garden that he works in non stop till winter comes (he lives in RI). He has even been in the newspapers up there. I wish I lived up there or he down here so he can teach me a thing or two. He's not from here and so he doesn't know this area good enough to really help me. Even when he comes down here for a visit he has to be raking or mowing or something in the yard and at 83 to boot! We have to tell our neighbors that HE's the one who wants to do it not us putting him to work. LOL He mostly grows veggies though with the biggest, redest, juiciest tomatoes I have ever had! It was those that put him in the paper.

Mom of 2,
I've been gardening for about 15 years. The last 3-4 have definitely been the best, though, since I discovered Wintersowing. Definitely check out the wintersowing forum and read the FAQ. It is a very inexpensive way to get lots of plants started from seed. The forum is also filled with some of the most entertaining and generous people you'll ever meet. We would all love to have you join us in sharing our gardens and the fun of gardening in the middle of winter. If you need seeds, many of us would gladly send you packs to help get you started.
Martha

Fammsimm said "Gardening is really a social and collaborative effort, I know it is for me. :-) We all share cuttings & seeds, and advice."
For me, it is the exact opposite. It is a very solitary and personal thing. When I am out there, I prefer to be alone. It is therapeutic, humbling, and ridiculously satisfying. This board is really the only "socializing" I do in regards to gardening.
When we first bought this home I drew up a plan right away. It was kind of a given considering I was working at the time as a Landscape Designer. That plan become worthless real fast. I wasn't even going for the Cottage look when I first started out. Things have changed quite a bit over the past 7 years, and while I put much thought into what I do, none of it was done according to that early plan I drew, or any plan for that matter.
I have been working on my garden for about 7 years now. Funny thing is that very few parts of it are actually that old. I am constantly "refining" it. I am anxious for spring to see how the changes I made in the fall turn out.
Growing up I always liked helping my dad in the yard. I think it really started back then. Like some others here, I also have many fond memories of my Grandmothers garden. Specifically, Hollyhocks. Could be why I have such an affiniy towards them nowadays.

Momof2, I love to hear stories like the one about your grandfather! So inspiring. Of course, the fact that he gardens may well be the reason why he has reached 83 - and in such good shape too. He reminds me of two of my lady colleagues in wood restoration classes, both way beyond their seventies and always eager to try new projects. Remarkably fit and putting us younger ones to shame. So often people loose interest in life when they retire and do nothing but sit at home in front of the tv. Give your grandfather a hug from me and tell him he has all my admiration.

Eduarda (who wishes she can garden when she is 83 as well)

Yes, grandmothers, grandfathers, mothers and fathers can be such an inspiration. My grandmother used to let me run amok in her yard, picking flowers, eating berries, gathering crabapples, etc. I think my love of gardening really came from her, even though it took years to mature. She actually gave me the very first seeds I ever owned - calendula and poppies that "grew wild" in her yard. I still have the calendula.

My mom gardened for utility mostly, but she had some lovely flowers here and there. With a family and full-time job she really didn't have much time for gardening, but now that she's retired, she's become very keen. My parents bought an old farmhouse and she's spent the past 5 years working on the yard. She doesn't want too much, just enough to putter in. That's what my grandmother called gardening......puttering. Makes me smile just to think of it.

luvs - that is so sweet about your grandfather. I hope I will be out in my grandchild's garden working away when I'm 83. What a great memory to treasure.

mrmorton - I understand what you mean about being alone in the garden. I just love that solitary time when I can think, weed, work, plan..........I can spend an entire day out there alone and be quite happy. I do like the social aspect of being a gardener (swapping seeds and plants, this forum, chatting with friends about gardening, etc.), but when I'm actually in the garden, I prefer to be alone. That's my soul time. Same thing with kayaking for me - I'd far sooner be by myself paddling than with someone else. Both of these are how I reconnect, I guess.

I just have to say that I am so glad I found this forum. I feel like I found many new friends with the same love for gardening as I do and so much help and ideas.

I too like to garden alone it helps keep my sanity except when dealing with those pesty bugs that eat and destroy my plants! I would love to get my kids involved but right now I am just enjoying the time to myself. It is also really good exercise!

Eduarda- I will tell him. I'm a little nervous for him though as he is having an anurisim (sp?) removed (or whatever they do) tomorrow which is right by a main artery. I pray it goes well. I wish I could be there for him.
balsam- My grandfather also called it puttering, funny.

I have always had a love for God's creation, the sights and sounds of nature. I guess the reason I love cottage gardens is the romantic nature of it and how everything comes together eventually to look like a little peace of heaven.
My DH on the other hand has no vision and just doesn't understand which is fine as I don't understand hunting and guns and the military channel! LOL However I amuse him with his interests and he does the best he can with mine though mostly by putting up the fence I begged him to do and pulling out stumps and hauling over to my work sights bags of organic compost oh ya and driving me across the state to look at and buy roses but hey that is just fine for me. I just always say trust me babe and he does! It usually always works out the way I invisioned it to be.

Don't misunderstand, I am very much a solo gardener at my house. :-) But, the content of my garden really has been a collaboration. I can point out Edna's sweet peas, GGG's Nigella, Dawn's betony, Tracy's Cosmos etc. Swapping seeds and plants among family, friends, neighbors, co-workers is really a lot of fun. I've also come under the spell of some rose enablers, like Eduarda, Diana and Anne!

Gardening has been a tradition in my family, too. All 4 of my grandparents emigrated from Europe and even though they lived in a city, they always had wonderfully creative, though very small, gardens. As both my grandmothers grew older and found it harder to tend a garden, their flowers were dug up and past on to their children. My mother was the lucky recipient of quite a few varieties.

I can remember my mother burying egg shells and vegetable peelings in the garden before composting became a common practice. As a child I never understood why mom buried garbage! :-)

I guess you could say that my love of flowers is genetic. Apparently, this gene did not carry down to my sons. Hopefully, when they marry, their brides will be gardeners.

Marilyn

This is an interesting subject. I may have you all beat; I have been gardening since 1971 and that is not counting the enforced labor of working in the family vegetable garden when I was at home! I started out first with just vegetables and grew into the flower gardening. I have just gardened at 4 different homes. We are where we will stay...on the farm, so I plant anything I want without worrying I will be leaving it.

My father was the gardener in our family, but he did not do flowers. His mother was the flower gardener. I still have a rose, Aloha, that she gave me as a started cutting in 1976. I keep fighting RRD with it, so take a few cuttings each year to keep it going.

I don't do a plan...........I definitely have a country garden/cottage garden. I just plant what I like and where I can find space or sun. Sun won't be such an issue now.....the Ice Storm damaged so many trees that lots will have to be removed. My yard is filled with broken limbs and it is so depressing! We are waiting for some warmer weather to get out there and begin cleanup. I have been in a slight state of depression since the storm; we were without power for 12 days and had DH's parents (89 and 83) with us the whole time.

Thank God for gardening...........I find I am poring over catalogs and looking at websites and getting fired up over Spring! I agree with Mr Morton, it is my restorative time. Once I get out there, all thoughts fly away and my mind is totally absorbed with what I am doing in the garden, whether it is weeding, digging, planting, or tilling. It is the best therapy in the world.

Well, I am 25 now and so i guess I've been gardening for about 24 years!! I was raised in the nursery business so as soon as i could walk i was diggin in the dirt. I always had my own section in the veggy gardens. Now I am a plant finatic. I have 400 var. of TB irises and many other plants as well. I will buy just about anything so long as its beautiful. My garden never looks how i want it but its not nearly big enough either. I live on a sigle town lot with thousands of plants. Its a jungle. My lawn is almost nonexistant which doenst bother me. THere is a million things i want to do with it but cant until I have my own house and acreage. 40+ acres is what im after. I have huge plans for my gardens but i have to sit on em till i have the land.

Growing up I learned a lot about plants working on my dad's avacado "ranch" in California.
I didn't start to like gardening until I grew up and moved into my own house about five years ago. Most of the gardening I've been doing has involved more hardscaping than actual planting. As the beds come into being, I start figuring out what I can plant in them depending on sun, soil and hardiness. Anything I have to baby does not belong in my garden.
The one lesson I've learned about gardening is that it is every changing and never ending (in a good way). It also teaches patience, uses a lot of imagination and creativity. May that be something I never get tired of exploring!!

Heather

Mom of 2, I'd post a photo of the larkspur if I knew how. I can't seem to figure it out! You will love it- I agree, direct sowing is definitely the best option.
I am excited to hear some of you say winter sowing makes gardening even more fun. this is my first year trying it, and i am so nervous about all those babies out there in the freezing cold. I direct sowed some too and I hope they make it!

3orangeboys- I too wish I knew how to post pics. I would love to show everyone what I have so far and help me plan for what I don't have yet. I will have to look into the winter sowing thing. I know I can't do it indoors no space and DH will in no way shape or form put up with trays everywhere!

Threeorangeboys & momof2luv2garden:

Donn posted step-by-step instructions for posting pics over on the WSing forum. Now, I haven't tried it yet (no pics on work pc), but I'll give posting a link a shot. Here's hopin' it works!

Here is a link that might be useful: Donn's Instructions

gldnol, you presented a challenge. LOL!

I have been gardening 46 years. The first house my ex and I rented was in the middle of a farm. We planted hibiscus and cannas. That house had 6 of the biggest fig trees I have ever seen. That is when I started hating figs. We begged people to come out and get some. They fell on the ground and rotted and smelled terrible. It did not help that I was pregnant at the time.

All my life.

Some of my earliest memories were wandering around my grandparent's gardens. Old fashioned zinnas as tall as I was at the time, lush, neat veggie gardens, and roses. They had a mint plant near the front steps. When they knew I was coming, they would hide sticks of spearmint gum in the plant. It was years before I knew that gum didn't grown on that plant. lol

My mother, their daughter, had lovely cottagy flower gardens in the front with a big veggie garden in the back. Watering, weeding, digging in the dirt plus flowers in bloom were a normal part of everyday life. When I was a teen, I took over the veggies. I suspect that she didn't want to give up control over the flowers in front.

I've had gardens in every place we've lived. Our place on the farm is now an abandoned homesite--but the trees we planted are thriving. I'm sad about the house and such, but the trees remind me that life goes on. The pecan trees will be there 200 years from now if no one bothers them.

I didn't realize what a legacy my mother's family had given me in gardening memories. When we would visit one of her aunts we always come home with a cutting or start of something from her yard. I wish I could remember more of what she and my mother had planted, but perhaps it is enough that I remember at all. And I garden, so the legacy continues.

Happy

Flowergirl1, I want to see pictures of your yard! 400 irises in bloom would be absolutely fabulous. If you have a camera, please post pictures.

Why doI get that little box? ARGH!

3orangeboys, I read this post in the gallery side about those boxes. Here is what Xuân said:

Yes, that happens when the posters re-organize their photos in their photo sites, like photobucket, for example.
I noticed each time I moved the photos around, I got a warning note saying "moving a photo will break your direct link"... blah blah... and that's it.
Now, we will have to wait for Sierra to give us the link again!
Xuân

Here is my larkspur!

{{gwi:351364}}

Still an X. lol

The larkspur works if you right click on it and select view image.

{{gwi:632213}}

Is this better?

Wow, what a gorgeous color!! Love those larkspurs,3orangeboys.

Wow! Oh I hope mine will look that good! Actuallly I just hope they come up for that matter! I planted the 'Giant Imperial,Mixed Colors', with 2 different shades of purple, and like 3 shades of pink.I also planted some rosy pink hollyhock seeds with them. If they don't come up I will be so disapointed. Unless Lowes carries some this year then I can maybe get a plant or two to hold me over. Last year was the first year I have ever seen Hollyhocks there before. They had so many more perennials to choose from.

I really didn't start gardening until 1980 and now it's an ongoing experience that I love. I don't mind working in my gardens by myself either. DH isn't into 'gardening', but he does build arbors and help me when I need to move heavy things, etc. We do walk around or sit and enjoy the colors and scents together. One of my first memories of flowers and their scents was in the early 60's at my grandmothers. She had a fanatastic gardenia bush, and some wonderful honeysuckle. I've always loved the scent of freshly mown grass especially with the wild onions mixed in. This forum is a wonderful inspiration to keep working in my gardens. Gardening is wonderful for my heart, soul and body.

3orangeboys ~ your larkspur are beautiful! Such a vibrant color.

FlowerLady

Like most of you I got into plants when i bought my home. Alot of it was hardscape. We had a fenced in acre in a small town but part of it was wild woods we have slowly cleaned up while mainting the woods feel. There is plenty of open space to 'fly a kite" if I can keep DH from filling it all up with trees. Then added a veggie garden, then an herb garden, flower beds around our trees so on and so on.
i learned how theraputic it is after I went through 3 surgeries in 18 months. i was so desperate to be outside but not very mobile. I would just go out and sit in one of my beds and pull weeds and dead head. I was on alot of pain meds and planted a ton of small things that I have yet to identify and its been 5 years. Someone told me they are wine cups? Is that a poppy. The are some of my favorites they absolutly glow and I want more. DH says I was on morphine so i probably palnted opium. LOL. There is always something that comes up in the Spring that I forgot I even had. It's fun and pretty.

Got into gardening very late in life -- we bought a house in '89, spent way too much remodeling it, and thus had no money for landscaping until 2002. It's a small cottage on a large (for an urban) lot, and had nothing but weeds, Bermuda grass, and "trash shrubs" - hideous contorted junipers and toyon.

Fortunately about half the property had been fully hardscaped, so we only had to design and install a manageable amount. But since we have a sloped hillside lot with adobe clay, we had to think carefully about how to terrace it so we would be improving the drainage, not worsening it!

I'm an impatient sort, so after almost a year spent in research and planning, we jump-started our plantings once the remaining hardscape was installed. The adobe soil was dug out and tossed in the furthest part of the backyard to tame the steepest slope. Compost was trucked into the newly created terraced beds. Container plants were purchased and planted fairly close together for impact. I have taken plants out on a regular basis to keep things spaced properly -- some plants just end up doing better than others and need more space or to be moved elsewhere. Keeps me busy, but the beds have established good "bones" and popping in different peripheral plantings keep the look changing slightly from year to year, which is more fun anyway!

Here are 3 sets of comparison photos -- before and after shots. All 3 are 2002 vs 2005/6 composites.
The front yard:
{{gwi:632214}}

The south-facing side yard:
{{gwi:53261}}

The backyard is very large, 45' wide and almost 80' long. It's now terraced into two separate patios. This is one of the backyard beds, at the furthest end of the lot:
{{gwi:632216}}

Jk, WOW, what a transformation!!! I love it all!

I've been gardening on and off since I was about ten and planted my first carrots and radishes in mom's flower garden. (47 now). Its funny, this post had me thinking back over the years and how the gardener in me prevails through obstacles. my ex, hated anything growing, i'd plant a tree, he'd pull it out. gardening was the only thing my mom and I could discuss without a full blown fight brewing.

when i remarried, we lived in a townhouse, got permission from the apt manager to rip out two horrendous hollys on either side of front door, and plant little beds there, which i loved. when we bought this house 8 1/2 years ago, I dug in like never before. had expanded the beds considerably in two years. in these past 8 years, my health has taken a hit a couple times, and the gardens always show that.

this spring, after fighting some big health issues, i'm going back out to play in the dirt, and do whatever I can. I miss my flowers so much.

It's a fresh start for me as there is nothing left in the gardens at all, save a lonely half dead azalea bush, a couple daffs that missed getting dug up last year, and a whole slew of weeds, though the beds did get completely cleared out last year for the makeover, so not as bad as they could be.

I've got to do some major frugal gardening, so almost everything I'm doing is coming from seeds, which I pretty much always did anyway :D

some of those seeds have been started in the last couple days, and I see this week it's supposed to warm up to upper 50's, so you can bet I'll be out there doing whatever I can do.

Gardening is ever revolving, the history of your life shows in your gardens. The one thing I will always have growing is my forget-me-nots. My neighbors are all older, and the one across the street used to sit on her porch and just stare into the gardens out front, said she loved to see the forget me nots blooming. she's now in a nursing home, and i've planted some forget me nots in a pot for her, if they bloom this year, i'll take them to her.

gardening is what I love to do and come what may, i'll do what I can. My dreams of the garden as I used to want it, will never come true now, but that doesn't stop me from having what I can have. I know without my flowers, my life is just too bleak.

this place, GW, is a real picker upper for me, I'm glad I found my way back here after two years of being gone.

sally

JK, an amazing transformation. Now that is a garden!

Began by "helping" my Dad with his vegetable garden back when I was very little. Had my own small flower patch in my teens. As as adult have had gardens now and then, when I have had space and time. It has been a passionate avocation for the past 15 years or so.

Rosefolly

bump

I started loving plants around age 12. I was given a live little Christmas tree as a gift. I planted it and watched it grow. I would use my babysitting money to by small house plants at Sears.

First off Wonderful wonderful thread - it has been so much fun reading all your stories and an inspiration.

jkom - your yard transformation is simply fantastic - kudos to a job well done **clapping hands**

my love of gardening and experience started pretty much from birth some 62 years ago - both sides of my family were into farming plus the women in the family all had flower gardens - grandmothers, mother and aunts. I always had a small place to have my seeds. When I got married we had a small postage stamp yard and I gardened from the day we moved in - over the years the intensity came and went depending on where I was in child/teen rearing but always instilled a love of gardening into them also. The kids would always get me a couple of flats of annuals for Mothers Day instead of other gifts. They loved going to the garden center and picking out their favorites. Needless to say it made for some interesting gardens but those are memories I will always cherish. When my late husband and I moved from the house we had lived in for 32 years there was no grass in the back yard. I had window boxes all along the chain link fence and containers everywhere. I wanted at least an acre of land to garden in when we retired to North Carolina. My current garden got off to a rocky start literally (our development is called Rock Pillar Estates for a reason - lol). I had to learn gardening all over again being in a different climate and soil conditions so took the Master Gardening course. Finally now after slowly coming out of the untimely passing of my husband of 38 years due to cancer - I have met and married another gardener and we are putting our stamp on this place. The gardens will evolve and change as we grow older but I intend to garden as long as God grants me the health to do so....

Lynne