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November garden happenings & OT photos

12 years ago

It's NOVEMBER now so there isn't much happening in my gardens lately, but I miss chatting with you all so I went around my yard searching for something to share...LOL.

That 2 feet of snow has all melted, thanks to some warmer weather but the plants are all flattened from it. Strangely though, I found a few plants that just don't want to give up. And for those who asked about Lily and my Dad, I'm including some photos...thanks again for your concern. They are both doing much better.

Celeste

A very WEIRD sight...Spacecoast Dream Catcher is pushing up a scape! It was under 2 feet of snow for a week....what is it thinking? Notice how the foliage is dying down for the winter but the scape is emerging.

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I found these little Johnny Jump-Ups blooming today...strange but wonderful to see.

I have several dwarf japanese maples that I planted last year. I love how they are the very last trees to turn colors and how brilliant the red is....

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'Larissa' is still doing her magic tricks. I posted photos of her all Fall, then of her peeking out of the snow, and now AFTER the snow...still has blooms in November in zone 4!

One of the fall projects...a raised bed my hubby made for me out of pressure-treated wood. He used roof shingles to line the inside to protect the wood further. This is for daylilies only and will give me room to order more over the winter. I made several more raised beds over the summer from rocks and I will show them in another thread.

This is much bigger than it looks from the photo. It took 2 truckloads of loam to fill.

He put crushed rocks as a base for drainage and support.

My Mom and Dad

For those who don't know, my Dad broke his hip this past Sunday and is in a nursing home now mending. He is doing well and hopeful he will be able to have another amazing vegetable garden next summer.

Mom has Alzheimer's and is visually impaired...she lives with me and I take care of her. They are both 88.

Here he is this past summer in his vegetable garden...

Miss Lily, feeling like her old self again...using the birch tree as her scratching post

with Connor....

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Fat Cat Nemo, enjoying being lazy on a warm fall day....

ZEUS...snoozing on hubby's leg

....(this is an older photo from a couple weeks ago when I had picked the last of the roses for the table. I caught Zeus eating them...LOL)

There is still lots of snow atop Mount Washington. Glad ours has all melted, but I know there will be plenty more!

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Comments (16)

Ginny McLean_Petite_Garden
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well, I stand by my last comment about enjoying your photos! Excellent as always! I can't even take candid shots well and you seem to pull them off like a pro! Bravo! Your mom and dad look so cute in that photo! You look a lot like your mom Celeste! That's a good thing!
That maple and Miss Larissa, well a picture speaks a thousand words! So good to see little Connor with Lily. He's just a cutey in or out of the stinker role! I know I've said it before but I believe you can tell a lot about a person by their pictures and their surroundings (their masterpieces, directly or indirectly) and yours all look very content and loved! You are truly blessed :) Thank you for sharing your beauty!

Namaste

Ginny
anna_in_quebec
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well don't just stop and smell the roses - have a nibble too! Too funny - thanks for the wonderful pictures - each and every one.
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GGG, we will be eagerly awaiting the photos I'm sure you will be taking as your efforts come to fruition. You always have such a wonderful sense of color and design! The yellowing maple and walnut leaves are slowly being stripped from the trees. I was surprised to come upstairs and see that it rained a bit during the night. The wind is starting to pick up too. Looks like our rainy season has indeed started here in Northern CA. We haven't gotten much, but just enough that I haven't had to water -- hooray! My cherry tomato 'Sungolds' are gamely hanging on. I'll try to keep them going as long as I can. The taste of these turned my tomato-hating DH into a tomato lover! The short bouts of unseasonable cold we kept receiving in the late summer/early fall have totally confused the spring-flowering bulbs and plants, because we'd get just enough warm days in between to encourage the rest of the garden. So my rhodies are budding and my freesias are sending up leaves, all a good 3 months early. Other CA gardeners have reported the same thing, so I'm not alone in this unusual scenario. You can garden all year 'round here, but we don't get those beautiful displays of fall color due to lack of consistent winter chill. Where we live there are 3-7 frost days per year -- not snow or real cold, just where the temps dip below 32 degrees overnight, then warm back up to the fifties in the daytime. Still, the dampness saturates the colors and makes the yellowing leaves of the Japanese maples and sweetgum trees stand out in the grey overcast: My beautiful bearded iris are blooming again, which they do 2 or 3 times a year. Best free gift I was ever given! The coral passiflora vine is happily invading the neighbor's yard. Fortunately it's a rental house now and they don't seem to mind that it's winding through the tops of their nandina and bird-of-paradise. It flowers all year long so at least it's a pretty intruder:
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Kim, I have no words for this situation. Well, I have words, but for the sake of politeness, I won't use them. I promise to only use nice words instead. I. hope. she. enjoys. her. lawn. (I said that through gritted teeth.) Lawns make no sense to me. People spend a lot of money to plant, feed and water a lawn for what purpose? So they can mow it weekly, rake up the grass clippings and have them hauled away to already overflowing landfills? Lawns are monocultures that do not support a diversity of life, yet we Americans cling to them as a vestige of the days when only wealthy landowners could afford the resources to maintain some pristine but largely useless green carpets of lawn. If I had to have a perfect green lawn, I'd just buy and install that stupid fake grass they sell nowadays (CostCo sells one that looks really realistic) and I wouldn't waste time and resources maintaining it. The sad thing is that your garden fed and nourished so many in so many ways, and now that will cease. 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The wise Kelly Clarkson sings "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger, stronger" and she is right. This change in circumstances will not kill you. It will make you stronger. It will make you better. Please don't let it make you ill. You deserve to stay well and healthy. You brain controls your body. Please don't let the distress over the loss of your garden make you ill. Take care of yourself and know, too, that this will pass and you will have your dream---you'll just have it in a different location. So, if you must, then weep for what you are losing, and then move on. Move on to bigger and better things. Life is a journey and it is time for you to journey on to the next place. God is watching over you and I believe you will end up in the place where you were meant to be all along. Now, please focus on your health. We only get one life here on this planet and we are meant to live our lives in a way that is meaningful and contributes to the world. You are doing that. You have done it with your current garden. You will do it in your new job and at your new home. You will do it in your future. Living well and happily is the best revenge. Staying healthy is important so you can begin the next exciting adventure. I learned long ago that I only could control the behavior of one person. Or three people---me, myself and I. I cannot control whatever anyone else does. I only can control my reaction to what they do. So, I live my life according to my beliefs and my own form of an honor code, particularly with regards to our Mother Earth. I cannot prevent anyone else from tearing up or destroying their patch of land. I cannot stop them from dumping chemicals on it. I cannot control how they use it, view it, abuse it, waste it, etc. I can only control me and how I treat the little patch of land where we live. I refuse to let anyone else hurt our little piece of Mother Earth. I love it, I cherish I and I admire how many creatures of all sorts it supports. 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Prettypetals_GA_7-8
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Your garden happenings are quite beautiful!! Love the shot of mom and dad. When dad leaves the hospital will he go back to his house? I can't remember where he is living. I am sure with his green green thumbs his garden will be just fantastic again next yr. I love the kitty kat shots. And last but not least, sweet little Conner is shooting up there. Growing growing!! You def have your hands full and do a great job as nanny and caregiver. Wish you the best, Judy
Julia WV (6b)
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Okay, you've now got me thinking about adding a rose bush to the garden. Larissa is on the list. You are an official "enabler". Just for my file, do you remember where you got it?
All the pics are great and glad to hear your Dad is on the mend.
Now I've not heard of putting shingles on the inside of the raised bed frame. Interesting!
Those cats are characters.

Julia
Cindy zone 6a
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Such nice pictures. Glad your dad is on the mend. Your mom and dad look so happy in the picture. What a great picture to have of your parents.
That is just crazy with the scape coming up on your daylily!! The raised bed will be so nice!The maples are just gorgeous.
thanks for posting. we need something here to keep us all going.
Cindy
organic_kitten
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
The photo of your folks is heartwarming. As you no doubt know, your dad being so active is in his favor for full recovery.

I love your Japanese maple tree. Mine are now the lovely red too, and I do enjoy those trees.

So Zeuss is a flower child...ummm cat. My Billy is one of those too. But that one will pull a daylily I have soaking in a basin out if I don't keep an eye on him.

Larissa is a fabulous rose. Somehow, I suspect she is very happy in your yard, but since my zone is much warmer, I doubt she would like it as well here. But Celeste, I do love seeing your pictures of Larissa.

Spacecoast Dream Catcher is confused! What a time to put up a scape! Great picture, though.

So happy to see Lily is much better. Conner is adorable, and growing.

The mountains are always beautiful. And we always love your photos, Celeste.

kay
avedon_gw
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
So happy to see your post, and then there are all the photos!!!Daylilies can really surprise us doing strange things when we think they should be going dormant. Your Larissa rose is amazing, I looked it up and I know the German Kordes is the hybridizer, so maybe that's why it does so well in your climate zone. A tip of the hat to your husband for building that new daylily bed, looks really nice, and it means more daylilies for next year, right? What sweet pics of your parents, love the one of your parents together. Your dad's garden is amazing, I am in awe. Hope he is making a swft recovery, bet he'll be chomping at the bit next year when it is gardening time. The cats are super as usual, love that Lily is so improved, that Fat Cat looks, well, fat, and Zeus is a flower lover, too. Connor is adorable, naturally, even without the skunk costume---bet he had a good time, and got a lot of goodies. I didn't realize you lived so close to Mt. Washington, it's beautiful. Will be looking forward to more news when you have time. Avedon
jean_ar
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Hi Celeste.Love all these wonderful pictures for us to see.The poor daylily is confused and since the snow is melted and gone now, I guess it thinks spring is here and time to bloom.mY 2nd bud on HOT LAVAhalf opened yesterday, but never opened up like the first bud did.it still has more buds, but weather man says 29 tonight, so that maight do it in.The JOHNNY JUMP UPS are so pretty.I use to have a big bed of them, but not that color,I have never seen that color before, but its really pretty.I dont have any, no more.DARN DEER.That meple tree is really pretty with its bright red leaves.Larissa loves to bloom, dont it, its very pretty.Love the raised bed,Thats really nice. looks like it will hold a lot of daylilies, too.the picture of your parents is very nice.They loook like such a happy couple,and I am so glad your dad is doing better. will he live at home when hes all mended, by himself?His veggie garden is super, I dont think I have ever seen a more greener garden...Loved the photos of the kitties,and so glaf Lily is doing so much better, and nemo just getting more lazy :))and i think ZEUS thought them roses looks good enough to eat, so he just as well sample them, hes such a sweetie and so pretty.Lily is a little doll,shes so pretty.,i loved the photo of the snow on the mountain.It looks soo pretty.I love to look at mountains and the snow on them makes them that much prettier,THank you celeste for some beautiful photos again.i loved every one of them.

Jean
celeste/NH
Original Author
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
THANKS to all my friends who responded to my post.
You are all the greatest bunch!

To those who asked, Dad will probably stay for about 6 weeks for rehab at the nursing home and then hopefully to live with one of my brothers. Knowing my Dad, I am confident he will be driving back & forth to his house next summer so he can plant his vegetable garden! My house is SO, SO tiny and my youngest daughter is still at home so we don't have any spare rooms, otherwise I would have him come here.

Also....I got 'Larissa' from Palatine Roses in Canada.
It was one of my best rose purchases. Some roses I have since regretted wasting my money on but this one is a winner.

Here's a couple photos of Dad w/ my son and grandbaby at the nursing home taken today on Veterans Day.

Celeste

my favorite VETERAN
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jean_ar
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
oH CELESTEm more photos to see.Love,love your photos, looks like your dad is getting better each day.which one is the veteran, dad, or son>?You certainly have a nice looking son, too along with mr cutie, CONNOR.Thats why larissa keeps blooming its heart out, its been bred for the cold weather.it is a beautiful rose.I so injoy seeing pictures of it blooming away.Love the phot of your mom and dad together with the cake, a square cake, haven't seen a square on in a long time, but its very pretty.your parents look so sweet together., ok, I ready for more photos now,:)

Jean
crackingtheconcrete
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
That is a really sweet picture of your parents and I think it's really neat that you're able to help and support them as they get older!
I love the Johnny jump-ups!! And that is pretty darn amazing that the daylily is attempting to bloom. I feel like we should be cheering for it! ;)
Ginny McLean_Petite_Garden
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Awwwwww! That's about all that comes to mind!! Such a blessing!

I have DLs who are still growing HERE in November! Of course it has been an unseasonably warm fall......yesterday it was 52F in this cold northern city!

Thanks so much for the pics Celeste! Awesome as always!

Ginny
avedon_gw
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Well, Celeste, I see you have your share of GG's (gorgeous guys) in your family. Good to know your dad is progressing nicely--have no doubt he will be in the garden next year. Best of luck to all of you. Avedon
jean_ar
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Celeste.Was just thinking of why zeus was eating the roses. he may be craving some greens to eat. cats eat grass every day if they outside.I raise grass in a little container for my snoopy and she begs for it every day soon as I get up she wants her tray of grass.They have grass seeds with a little container in walmart, and I buy that for her, and plant some of it,the packages of seeds is oats seed and germinates fast, and I get 3 or 4 plantings out of their package.,mYBE THATS WHAT ZEUS IS MISSING,?? jean
celeste/NH
Original Author
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Thanks Jean....I am going to go To WM today to get Zeus some cat grass. Great suggestion! He does always want to nibble at fresh flower arrangements on the table and for some reason he is infatuated with plastic too. I have caught him digging in the trash looking for wrappers. Giving him something that's HIS to eat would be good. He is so funny too about watching birds out the window. He makes little 'chirping' noises like a bird while he stares at them through the window.
Take care Jean!

Celeste
jean_ar
12 years ago
last modified: 9 years ago
Thank you Celeste.oh zeus will thank you for some grass to eat.Snoopy puts her head in it after she has ate what she wants, and wants to ley in it,and she knocks it over,which makes me so angry at her, but after she has ate some of it,i water it,as it drys out fast planted in peat moss,and i turn it when i put it back in the wondow so the light and sun will pull it back up straight.I just love looking at zeus, his front feet looks like a boxing glove. he is soo pretty,and LILY has the most gorgeous tail, so fluffy and pretty.

jean

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