Hi Diana - I lurk here more than I post but thought I'd share pictures of our little cottage garden that I took on Saturday..a few simple interior decorations as well.

I'm still afraid of planting many pansies - it is supposed to be in the 80's again tomorrow - I may wait a few weeks.

I'd love to see pictures of your pond when you get it finished.

Here is a link that might be useful: october garden

Well, I'm still planting some knock-out roses, hydrangeas, and peonies. It has rained so much, I can't get my timing right. If I can just get this done, that would make my day. I'm mainly already thinking ahead to next year. Lots of sod to pull out and a potting shed to build, amongst other things. I haven't had good success with the poppies. I mean as far as over-wintering them, they never come back. Any suggestions? I mulch, but I'm thinking maybe I should try some burlap also.

Cattknap,
I have admired your home on the home design forum for years. It is great to have you share your design talent on this site as well. Keep showing us those beautiful pictures.

faye

Cattknap,
what is the lovely purple plant in the picture titled "amaranth, angelonia, Marigolds and dianthus? I can't tell which is which. I looked up all of the ones listed but did not see any that looked like the purple ones in your picture.

Thanks,
faye

Hmmm...these threads look suspiciously like journal threads. lol.
The garden is looking pretty darn good, actually. It normally does this time of year. Especially with the addition of the ornamental grasses doing their thing. I have one Aster that is just a big giant ball of color. Its easily 4' x 4'. pastely(word?) blue in color. Pretty awesome. Roses, Sage, Eupatorium, Coreopsis, Salvia, are all blooming nicely. Very colorful for Oct 2nd! Plus my new favorite annual: Verbena bonariensis. I love the airiness of it, and it just keeps blooming! Great plant.
I've done most of the Fall work that I wanted to get done. Move some things around. Added some plants to a few beds. My summer annuals still look surprisingly good. I'll be yanking those in a week or two when I am able to snag some stuff from work.
The weather has been a bit odd, though. Not very Fall-like at all. It's like Summer just doesn't want to let go. Temps in the 80's and no rain for almost 6 weeks. We finally got a half inch yesterday, and the forecast has more coming tonight. I Think its supposed to cool off next week. It better, because I am tired of watering!
Halloween Decs will go up this weekend. lets see if I can scare off the new neighbors!

Diana, your garden sounds like it's still pretty much carrying on despite your cooler temps. I too would love to see the progress of the pond you're building. I never did do mine this year. Too darn hot to dig and now I'm no longer inspired to do it. Maybe next year?

Hi Cattnap, Thank you for posting your fall garden pictures. I've admired your lovely spring gardens before so it was nice to see how it progresses. I see you have signs of fall going on in your area too. The changing leaves just compliment your pretty flowers. I also like the new mantel arrangement you came up with. I know the GI girls would love to see your fall decor too.

MeMo (Rosalie)

Good morning Diana ~ It really is amazing how fast this year has gone by. Speaking of Christmas, we were at SAM's yesterday and in an area I noticed Christmas music playing rather loudly and I really got aggrevated. They can't even wait until after Halloween and Thanksgiving. Grrr!

Anyway, your gardens sound like they are doing great for this time of year, and your temps sound fantastic. It is terribly warm and humid here today after two days of rain. At least the sun is shining. The rain has made me happy though in that everything has had a great soaking. Of course, weeds have also grown.

Do post your new seating area and your little pond. I always love seeing what you are doing around your lovely place.

Cattknap ~ What colorful fall flowers you have. Your home and gardens are really pretty. Thanks for sharing.

MrMorton ~ Your cottage gardens always sound fantastic and then when you post pictures we are not disappointed. It must be nice working for a place where you can get flowers. Looking forward to seeing your place dressed for Halloween again this year.

Memo ~ I know what you mean about it being to dang hot to do anything. That's how I felt all summer and it's still hot and humid down here.

As to Plum Cottage gardens, they really need work after a long, (not over yet) hot and humid summer. I've lots of weeds, and things need trimming. We did get our Queen crape planted Sunday morning in a window of opportunity of no rain falling. The gusty winds had blown the potted thing over during the night and DH said well, we better get this in the ground. Now it should really take off. Roses are putting out new growth and lots of things are doing well. This is the start of our best time to grow down here and I'm looking forward to it.

Happy Gardening ~ FlowerLady

Faye - it isn't amaranth - it is something else that I believe starts with an "a" - it has a spreading habit that I really like mixed in with the Angelonia (which also spreads) and those tiny yellow marigolds - I know the name of it and will get back to you when my fading memory comes up with something....old age, ya gotta love it.

Cattknap,
could it be ageratum? I kind of looks like ageratum.

I understand about fading memory. Sometimes I can't remember my name.

faye

That's it! Thanks LoL! Faye it is scary isn't it....but at least those of us that are of a certain age can laugh about it....between my husband and me we have one good brain :-).

"Can you believe it's already October! Wow! Where did the year go?!"

I can tell you where my year did go - working, stuck in an office 8 floors up from the ground, in the middle of the city :-( I hardly saw my garden this past Spring/Summer... and it shows... The garden is extremely overgrown at the moment, after a mild Summer with no excessive temperatures. I need to do a lot of trimming and pruning and I have no time to do it, sigh...

On the positive side, Fall is here as well. We've had quite a huge downpour of rain this past weekend, which was a blessing for the garden after our usual dry Summer. We have had scattered showers and even thunderstorms this week too. The cassia has grown from a large shrub into a small tree and is looking lovely at the moment, covered in yellow blooms. The quince tree gave me a bumper crop this year. The fruits are now gathered and waiting on the kitchen counter until I find some time to do our traditional "marmelada" with them.

Mums are starting to bud. Sedums are looking great and the mexican sage is doing well too. It's still too early for Fall color here, as far as leaves are concerned, but the mums will soon produce a burst of color. Does anyone grow acidanthera? I have planted a few bulbs and although the flowering is erratic when they bloom they are a very pretty sight. Naked ladies are in full bloom too - such pretty flowers for the Fall garden.

Still haven't done any Fall decorations to the porch. I need to rethink porch decorations this year too, since we have enclosed it fully, to provide a place for Timmy to stay during the day when we are at work, and now is no longer a porch, rather a sun room. I'm already agonizing about how am I going to put up the Christmas lights this year, since this new configuration requires a lot of changes for that.

Garden centres here are late with mums too. I managed a quick trip to a nearby one last Saturday and they had no mums at all yet! That is surprising, because usually by this time of the year they are everywhere already. I suspect the mild Summer had something to do with it, since even those I have planted in the ground since last year are only now beginning to bud.

Cattknap, lovely to see your beautiful home and garden again, now in its Fall attire. As pretty as your Spring pics. And Diana, I can hardly wait to see what you come up with this year. Are you sewing a Halloween costume for Katarina? :-)

Happy Fall, everyone!
Eduarda

First, Cattknap, you have a beautiful home and gardens. I loved every bit of it!

We are still too warm here for me, high 80's and 60's at night. We could use more rain too.

The cooler temps (from 90's) have really improved the color of all the flowers. In bloom now are salvias, zinnias, asters, grasses, one reblooming iris, one reblooming daylily, rudbeckias and gaillardias. I have a few phlox still blooming and the mums are all budded up, but not in full bloom yet. I am new to grasses and am really loving them. I want to do more next year.

I don't have too many roses, but they are starting with the gorgeous fall bloom. Most are hybrid musks. I do have one Westerland (thanks to Diana's praise) and am really impressed with it. It would get more blooms if it got more sun, but it is going to stay where it is! Much too large to move.

This was the summer we removed all the overgrown shrubs next to the house, so it is looking somewhat bare now. I won't plant until next spring and plan to keep it very farmhouse simple. That was our project for this year.

October and we're still in the 80's every day - and with a complete watering ban except for food gardens...things are not looking so nice.
One strip, a narrow strip beside the driveway has been fantastic all summer, but then again that is the only place I've even occassionally watered. The cup plant has just finished up blooming - since June!! All the colorful gingers are now in full bloom and scent along this strip. Orange, pink, peach, yellow - the Confederate rose is also ready to burst into bloom. They don't care much about drought, and the pink flowers are unusual in the fall. Honeysuckles, and one dahlia - Kelvin Floodlight which has grown over 15' tall, peeks out of the now blooming pink lemonade honeysuckle.
However, every shrub is crispy, the entire back hill planting I worked so hard on and spent so much money on is almost completely dead...probably a blessing for the future (I want to terrace it) but still disappointing right now. My neighbor let her kudzu grow into our back yard while we've been renovating and I can't get back there -and I've been livid at her (and there have been other problems, much more serious problems at her home all summer, which have effected us).
The summer food garden is almost completely ripped out (just a few cherry tomato and eggplant left) - I'm working on prep for fall.
Hopefully rainfalls will return this winter so I can plant all the new discount shrubs I bought for the new garden area next door. We took a large chunk out of our driveway and I have plans....

GGG

Our temps are above average for Oct - in the 90's ! Had a nice slow rain this morning and I spent time in the veggie/rose garden, cleaning up and weeding. Looks much better. Blooming beautifully now are morning glories, hardy hibiscus, tansy, zinnias, marigolds, mexican sunflowers. Have lots to move around and need to get a couple foster hollies to replace the blue point junipers that bit that dust.
This cockscomb reseeds every year, and I now have some yellow ones coming up too.

Diana- please post progress pictures of your pond. Every time I try melons they grow the size of a baseball. This year I tried pumpkin and they reached the size of a golf ball and turned yellow.

primgal36- a potting shed! How fun! I don't quite understand what problem your having with poppies. Can you tell us a bit more info? I don't understand what you mean by overwintering, poppies are spring/summer annuals.

cattknap- darling garden!

mrmorton- wow, you've been busy. I too am looking forward to seeing your place dressed for Halloween this year.

Flower- That's one beautiful tree you have.

Eduarda- I'm so happy so see you back.

gldno1- *LOL* Diana is why I have my westie.

GGG- Nothing worse than having a dreaded neighbor. I hope things work out for you.

msmisk- Lovely how the cockscomb contrasts with the morning glory.

My garden had been neglected this year. I'm spending too many hours at the office.

I planted summer white clover in the spring, as a green mulch. I'm pleased the way it spread and chokes out the weeds. It adds nutrients to the soil and I don't have to water as often. Bonus, bonus, bonus. As soon as the weather cools and the rains kick in the crimson clover should come back for the winter and early spring. The skippers love it and it attracts lady bugs. I think I'm becoming a bug nerd.

My roses are starting a new flush of blooms. I just counted how many roses I have and couldn't believe I have 26! Did I go a little overboard last year?

I really should be pulling the old veggies out of the potager but I found Sphinx moth caterpillars on my tomatoes. I found as many as I could and put them in cages to raise. They are so beautiful!

Hummer's are hanging around the garden when they should be migrating. I guess they can't resist the salvia blooming.

Happy October :-)

Edna

This has been a joy to read. Thanks for starting this thread Diana.

We are experiencing our most beautiful weather right now. Temps are in the mid-70s to low-80's, cooling quickly once the sun goes down. We've been waking up to a noticeable Fall crispness every morning. Most notably, the light is changing. I'm just starting to see color in the trees. Our Japanese maples are blushing.

Even though things don't look fresh like Spring, I've got an amazing abundance of bloom. The huge clean-up that I did before our party on Sept. 15 paid off in spades. It prolonged the life of many of my mid-Summer bloomers. Snaps are going full steam along with zinnia, coreopsis, salvias, sweet William, begonia, stock, petunia, scabiosa, cosmos, and I don't know what all. Good news on the miniature hollyhock. They are reblooming beautifully. Several of my roses are giving a great show right now. Don Juan is giving one last flush. Iceberg and Fairy are covered. I even have two beautiful delphinium putting on a show.

But that will all change by the end of the month. My callas are already two feet tall. The tomatoes are looking ragged, but still producing more than we can eat. I'm seeing squirrels burying nuts in the garden frequently. I don't mind really, so long as the remember to eat them in February.

To be honest with you all, I'll be quite content to close this garden down and get it ready for Winter soon. I've had the very best garden of my life this year. It was immensely rewarding. But I'm ready to be inside and make soup and plan the holidays and build the first fire of the season in our fireplace.

Mark me though, by February I'll be complaining about the rain keeping me from getting back out there (and the itty-bitty acorn saplings planted by forgetful squirrels).

October regards,

Steven

Weds. : Here in northern lower Michigan the wind was really honking last night and is still gusting today, although it's sunny and beautiful. I just helped DW hang a comforter on the clothesline and we used just about every clothespin in the basket to try to keep it draped over the three lines. A gust came along and clothespins were suddenly flying through the air as the comforter started flogging like an insane beast, and... -- break -- OK, we just went back outside and grabbed it just as it was three clothespins away from launching itself off the line and into the straw-covered newly-seeded back yard. Well, that was fun, but we are giving up.

Thurs. : We are getting a bit of fall leaf color around here, which is pretty, but the flower gardens are definitely winding down. There are some mums, sedum, salvia and catmint still doing well, but that's about it for blooms. I cleaned up the veggie garden a few days ago, although oddly, we haven't had a frost yet, so I left a few tomato plants going. Winter rye is planted and should be showing up next week.

For next year I had started 60 or so sweet William plants in July, mostly for cutting, along with some purple coneflowers, foxgloves, and coreopsis. They are all now transplanted and nicely settling into their new homes. I know I have matured as a gardener (and have more time on my hands) when I see myself getting things like this done the year before I need them. I used to never be able to get biennials like sweet Williams going when they needed to be and would only have them blooming every other year or so.

My next project here is to pour a new front sidewalk to our front door. We now have some small flagstones there with grass growing in between, which we like, but don't love, and it's really hard to shovel snow from. We don't love concrete either, but practicality is going to win out in this case.

What is it about grandkids that is so great? I used to snicker at people who were ga-ga over their GKs, but now, I guess I'm one. Yesterday, my 2 year old GS came over, saw me in the garden and yelled "Ba-Paaaa!", and came running pell-mell down the hill to me, raising his hands to be picked up. Did my heart melt? Oh, yeah!

That's a good note to end on, so I will.

ThinMan

Aaaawwwww! TM, you have heart of gold.

Edna, thanks - melted gold now, I guess. :-) My first sentence in the last paragraph wasn't constructed very well. I was trying to say that I am amazed at how much fun and how dear GKs have become to me. Who knew?

TM

The colors of a New England cottage garden...Goldenrod and New England Aster..

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I can't compete with Ellen's gorgeous photos!!! WOW! But my garden is making me happy these days. There is one corner of my "old" garden that has become so harmonious with Santa Barbara sage and asters and one sweet little lantana...well, I like it. (And notice, please, those are almost all still BUDS!! Imagine what it will look like in a week!)

Here are a few photos:

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beautiful photos - lindakimy and ellen and msmiks -

linda post more photos when buds open up - don't you just love salvias? Did you do those from seed? I did so many from seed and they are just so easy and gorgeous

Carrie

Such gorgeous photos! Thanks for lifting up my sad gardening spirits a bit! :-) Smiles.

About the only thing I've got going right now- swamp sunflower (beside the outdoor faucet), salvia 'Navajo Red' and some buddleia.

Still crunchy here. As the newspaper so aptly put it, you could have squeezed a washcloth and gotten as much water out of it as our rain on Friday. It's in the 90s today and tomorrow.

I saw my first Eastern Newt today -- orange with copper spots. Very interesting little critter.

Cameron

My fall garden still looks pretty good. We have had a warm, wet fall so everything is pretty green. We did have a frost on 9-14 but I only lost some annuals. As for projects, I have begun edging yet another of my gardens with reclaimed bricks. I'm also in the process of designing and building a grandchildren's garden. Not much has happened on that front as I am waiting to get a playhouse in there first. Here are a couple of links to my fall gardens that I posted elsewhere on GW.

Thanks to all who posted pictures and Cattknap for sharing her beauty. I enjoy so much seeing what is happening in each of your gardens.

Enjoy the season!

Michelle

I don't believe its possible to have 2 direct links so this one is a copy/paste:
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/peren/con1010355510640.html?13

Here is a link that might be useful: Come stroll in my country fall gardens

Michelle - I love the design of your gravel path garden -thanks for posting that wonderful shot from above - beautiful! Your granddaughter is such a pretty little charmer - I have one about the same age - aren't they fun?

Thanks for posting pictures of your beautiful Fall garden!

MsMisk ~ love your purple/reddish cockscombs and those wonderful blue morning glories behind. Wow!

Eduarda ~ I want you to know that I miss you being here.

Ellen ~ your goldenrod and asters make a wonderful combination. I need to see if I can get some goldenrod to grow down here (zone 10 s.e. FL), as I don't have a lot of yellow and those looks so 'cottagey'.

lindakimy ~ I love your blooms and your coleas are so wonderful too. Is that Russian sage in the background behind your yellow flowers?

Michelle ~ Love your gardens and that we could see it from above. Your dear GD is a sweetie.

It is still hot and humid down here in Plum Cottage gardens. When oh when will we get some cooler weather? They are predicting night time temps in the high 50's the end of the month. We'll see, it sure would be a welcome relief.

I've been working in my potting garden. Setting up my mini green house and getting ready to plant some seeds for lots of colorful blooms these next 6 months or so. I've still got weeds to pull, vines to trim and weedwacking to do. I've said I'd like more garden space, but I really don't think so latley. Our 1/4 acre is plenty for me to handle these days. I don't want to be overloaded. I want to putter and enjoy our little haven.

Happy Gardening ~ FlowerLady

That is Santa Barbara sage behind the yellow mums. For some reason I totally don't understand it has lost most of its lower leaves but is putting up a lot of new growth at the ground. It isn't going to have time to make anything of that. I don't get it. WHAT?

But anyway. The asters have continued to open and are stunning. At least to me.

And the mums are doing well, too...

Wow~ Those asters are gorgeous. my chrysanthemums are getting going and my dahlias are finally flowering. Really late this year; wierd. Its at this time of year that I really appreciate the annuals. My 4 oclocks are STILL cranking. I can't believe it!
I guess we learn garden lessons every year, huh? I still struggle with design or the absence of it! I am so in awe of you all who seem to have constant color and variety. Maybe some day! Ibought a pumpkin yesterday though, and am reveling in this gorgeous weather. We still have no rain- hasn't rained in months. Losing some of our big maples which is so sad.
I agree Steven, time to start thinking about soup and the holidays! How fun! I will say, last year was my first year to wintersow and it SERIOUSLY helped with the cabin fever in February!
So excited to try it again!

lindakimy
your garden is breathtaking.All so pretty.What is the red plant--- coleus?Never saw anything like that and the asters are so full and pretty.Everyones pictures are really uplifting.
Rachel

lindakimy
your garden is breathtaking.All so pretty.What is the red plant--- coleus?Never saw anything like that and the asters are so full and pretty.Everyones pictures are really uplifting.
Rachel

Louisiana girl, thank you so much for your kind comment!

Yes, that red one is coleus and I haven't seen many like it either. That's why I take cuttings from it and grow them indoors over winter so I can take even more cuttings from those to plant out in spring. I just love the color, which varies from bright red to dark wine or rust depending on the amount of light it gets.