-crunchpa, these are some of the best garden pics I have seen in a long while! It has certainly brightened my day and reminded me why I love gardening so much! I adore your arbor! Stunning. New York seems to be a wonderful place for growing beautiful, lush gardens. Thank you so much for posting. CMK

I'm okay that the flowers are pretty much finished (there's still some out there, they're just not good enough to cut and take to someone), and the leaves are continuing to fall. It's much easier now to see the structure of each rose. I can see exactly which canes to remove on the overgrown roses. Banshee and Shailer's Provence have each made a thicket of suckers that will soon threaten my path ... I can see exactly where they are and which ones to remove. Winter pruning will come later. The Gallicas and Hybrid Chinas will benefit from being shortened ... I'll wait till the deer have finished their part of the job, tho. The ramblers? Those few nice days in January are perfect for cleaning these up and reattaching them to their fence. I have also discovered camellias. I visited a garden earlier this month that had THE most lovely camellias. After that, I have started noticing them more and more. I have places in the gardens that are too shady for roses to thrive ... camellias fit the bill. I was in Richmond yesterday afternoon, and I just happened to go past a nursery that I know, and there's now 5 new camellias in the back of my Expedition. My husband calls them roses without thorns. :) When I am really pining for the garden, I work in the greenhouse. There is always at least one flower out there. Right now, off the top of my head, I know there's a flower on Dixieland Linda and Fresh Pink. York, one of my winter jobs is to add photos to HMF. There are a number of roses that I grow that have no photo on HMF at all ... I intend to fix this if I can. This is part of a goal for me to create an album of all of my roses (bush and portrait shots) to share. I'll get all organized with what I have so far as winter progresses, so I'll be ready to jump into action and photograph the once-bloomers when spring comes. and, if I have the time, I want to learn to weld. I have a lot of metal garden structures in my imagination, I just have to learn to weld so I can make them. Winter is a time to dream of spring. Connie Here is a link that might be useful: garden blog

Oh my goodness. What a surprise to end the day finding all these wonderful "favorite things" -- I love it! Creating and sharing beauty; everyone here seems to have an interest in that. Michaela, you and I are sharing the uplifting experience of finding some new roses that don't "sleep" after they're newly planted. I expected these roses to do not much of anything this first year. Instead, they're lending a maturity to the new "Garden of Forgotten Dreams" that's making me so happy. From my early observations, though, I do think Carding Mill performs better in heat than it does when the weather cools. Msdorkgirl, is your Grand Dame a prolific bloomer? I've been seeing pictures of this rose exploding with blooms, and wonder if that happens commonly. Ingrid, how warm and inviting to share your cherished antiques -- exquisite! You say you don't have many roses blooming, but the ones you have are gorgeous. I especially love the picture of Aunt Margy's Rose. Thank you everyone for this nice gift at the end of a very long day. So . . . When the Bloom Balls . .

Dave, thank you for the photo of Pinus mugo 'Zundert' I think it is beautiful and Punus mugo is very hardy here. I am adding to my wish list. It sure does have nice gold coloring. Richard, thank you for your words of encouragement. I hope it looks nice. I hope I can sneak in a few of my favorite perennials too. I just don't want it to look out of place with a large flower and a small conifer. I will have to work on that. Blue yew, your wish is my command. LOL. I went out this morning and took a couple photos of the needles. Here they are: Sluice, Juniperus scopulorum 'Woodward' is gorgeous and would be PERFECT by my pond. I should be able to grow on cuttings of that. I will have to see if a few of my friends has that plant so I can nab some cuttings from them. Thank you for sharing the photos. Dax, thank you for the list of upright conifers. I will look them up and see if I can find some this spring. My Abies veitchii 'Glauca' is about 11 years old. I purchased it as a small plant from Bob & Dianne Fincham with Coenosium gardens. They send some nice plants. The only problem is the cost of shipping is OUTRAGEOUS. Waas, you are right the Abies veitchii 'Glauca' even though I purchased the smallest plant they had for sale was still rather expensive. Dennis, thank you for the name correction. I will make a note of that. I've had my Pinus parviflora Adcocks Dwarf for about 5 years. I was going to try wintering this year without protection but I'm a little worried now by your comment. I am growing another Pinus Parviflora called Ibo-can for about eight year and the past 3 winters it has been uncovered and doing well. However, we have had an abundance of snow and it has been completely covered with snow the past 3 winters. Gosh they are such beautiful conifers. I hope they don't die out on me. I've had troubles with that happening. I tried 2 Pseudotsuga menziesii 'Graceful Grace' and each of them have slowly died on me after I took off the winter protection. It seemed each winter a branch would turn brown/crispy and soon the entire plant died. I will keep you posted on how my parvifloras do.