Just Another Day in the Garden

This morning I went in to Downtown Atlanta to meet friends for lunch. I love getting together with this fine group of folks. But, I really hate going downtown. On the trip into town, I noticed the tall buildings were hidden in a smoggy haze.

But, 50 miles south of the big dirty city, this beautiful afternoon greeted me when I returned home!





This spring, the blooms seem to be coming and going very quickly! This plant's blooms have almost faded. I know it was not in bloom a few days ago! Does anyone recognize this plant? It grows wild at the edge of my garden and I really don't know what it is!

UPDATE! My neighbor identified this plant as Red Buckeye!




There are a zillion Cleome seedlings in the garden! If you want big showy flowers that love hot summer days and will re-seed themselves like mad, Cleome is the flower for you! Sadly, most of these seedlings will have to go. The flowers can't possibly grow this close together!




This is one of my favorite garden plants! Most of the year, it is almost invisible at the edge of the woods. For a week or so in spring, it's gorgeous! This is a Native Azalea. Grows wild in our Georgia woods.




This is a closeup of the bloom cluster.


And this, my friends, is what a Georgia gardener's boots look like after stomping through the woods and spraying Roundup on poison ivy! That yellow stuff is not dust, it's POLLEN!

Spring has Sprung and the Pollen is Plentiful

Spring has Sprung in the Sandance Garden and the world is thick with pollen. You can see a dusting of pollen on some of the flower photos.


I took this photo at 3am one night last week, when the daffodils were at their peak. These are my favorite flowers, and I have a lot of them. Many were rescued from soon-to-be-bulldozed sites.


Mattie, the Great Pyrenees doing what she does best...BARK! You can see that the Bermuda grass is just beginning to green up.



This is a funny little birdhouse pick in an iron pot full of some kind of succulent. I don't know what it is...it was rescued from an estate.



The spirea is now in full bloom. Most of the year is sits quietly forming a backdrop for the garden border. For a few weeks, it is glorious.




This snowball bush is 3 years old. This is the first spring we'll have blooms. I can hardly wait!

Wow. You can really see the pollen on this Flowering Quince! And something must think it's mighty tasty.

My grandmother had a whole bank full of phlox, which she called "thrift". My hope is to have thrift cover the bank by my driveway.

The front porch window boxes are full of pansies, which are doing very well right now. As usual, they look their best just when it's time to rip them out and replace them with summer annuals. It's a juggling act. The summer annuals have to be planted before it gets too hot, which means the pansies have to be replaced before the summer heat kills them. It's really difficult to dump out gorgeous flowers, but it has to be done. At least they have an after-life in the compost bin.

This is one of my garden favorites! Poncirus Trifoliata...called "mock orange" by its friends! Check out those thorns! They're at least an inch long. In the spring the mature shrub/tree will have white flowers, which are followed by small yellow-orange 1" fruit. I assume the fruit is inedible, as the birds won't touch it. These were planted 3 years ago, and have not yet bloomed. They are offspring of plants that were in my Grandmother's garden when I was a child.

The hosta are already up and growing fast. I think they grow about 3" per day right now. I need to set up some kind of deer deterrent before they chomp them down to the ground.

These are some of my favorite garden flowers! They were made by my sister and her husband out of horse shoes. They are truly perennial!

The grape hyacinth has about 'done its do', as my Grandma used to say! It's been very pretty this spring.

The forsythia is just past its glory, but still makes a pretty statement in the garden.

We have so many daffodils! These come along as many others are fading. I love these big double blooms. These resemble the ones Grandma called "butter and eggs".

The dogwoods don't seem to be as nice this year as in the past. Maybe it's just my imagination.

THIS is why I HATE deer! I don't think these tulips will be blooming this year. Anybody want to hunt deer off my deck?

I know spring is truly here when I see butterflies sunning. These three were slowly opening and closing their wings, and stayed still long enough for me to snap this photo.

It's easy to see why this is called "bleeding heart"!

And that concludes today's garden tour!

Stitching the Rainbow!

How to you spell COLORFUL? I spell it SCRAPPY STRING QUILT!

A few weeks ago, I attended a "quilting day camp" with my quilting enablers...I mean FRIENDS!

One friend was cutting shapes from fabric and THROWING THE REST AWAY! I couldn't let that happen. It was lovely fabric!

Sew...home it came. Since I was in the process of painting my sewing room, it had to wait a few weeks.

Today I couldn't get any of my computer tasks to work, so I headed for my beloved non-computerized sewing machine! Once I got started, I was able to assemble the first 9 blocks in no time.

These blocks are pieced on to sheets on onionskin paper. This paper has been living in my sewing room for years, just waiting to be needed. The paper keeps the fabric stable while I'm working with it.

Since the blocks will finish at only 8", I'll need to make a LOT more of them. Happily, it's a great deal of fun.

Where is the Tin Woodsman when you need him?

Where is the Tin Woodsman when you need him? I'd keep him so busy, he wouldn't have a chance to rust away on that road to Oz.

For the last three years, I've been trying to clean up the woods behind my house. There is only so much one woman working alone can do, so it's a very slow process!

We've had a lot of rain this winter, so I had very few days I could work in the woods.

Today was beautiful, mid 60's, not a cloud in the sky...so off to the woods I went.

These are the tools I took with me. A bottle of Perrier, a clock, a telephone, a tube of chocolate lip balm from http://www.goodiesunlimited.com/ , my house key, a pair of goatskin gloves, and my trusty lopping shears. All stylishly contained in a Neiman Marcus tote bag!

With a bag that snazzy, you know I'd be dressed in style. Check out the sexy black boots! The ground is damp and uneven and there is the occasional unexpected stump hole. I have stepped into a hole up to my knee, and don't want to repeat that wearing anything less than these boots. And they come in mighty handy when I have to cross the creek!

Before I started working, I had to take a few minutes to survey the situation.

Did you know that I own an island? Here it is! I call it "Rocky Island". The creek surrounds the island. When it rains, the poor island is usually submerged, so I won't be building a hut there.




I love the shadows the bubbles cast on the creek bed!

Just look how clear the water is! Yes, these rocks are under water.

Panther Creek winds its way through my back yard.



What gorgeous green moss!

I'm almost afraid to wonder what lives in this tree. It's hollow...it's leaning...it's on the creek bank...I expect it to fall within a year...and that will be another mess to clean up.



Brand new dead fall...This wasn't here a week ago!




Anybody want a few thousand River Birch trees? The ground is so soft, I've been pulling them up by the roots. They range in size from a few inches to several feet tall.

This big tree fell across the creek a couple years ago. I hope to wade across the creek and clean it up this spring...soon...before the snakes start swimming in the creek!

I managed to clean off a good sized area today. My two existing brush piles were so tall I couldn't add anything else to them, so I started a new one. Now, just as soon as I clear off about 100 times today's amount, I'll be all finished...until more limbs fall...

If you run into the Tin Woodsman, tell him I need help...now!

Art is Where you Find it

Last weekend I was invited to a family shooting trip. Since we own these firearms, it's a good thing to occasionally practice with them. Shoot, it's no different than sewing...you just aim where you want to go...

During a break, I saw these items on the table....a patchwork tote I made, and the pistols my father my sister and me many years ago for personal protection in a mean old world.

I call this one....Still Life with Patchwork and Pistols. I like the contrast of the soft floral patchwork with the hard cold metal of the pistols.

Y'all just call me Betsy Ross!

It's far from perfect, but the bargello flag IS finished! The finished size is 32" x 25.5".

Last Saturday (yes, one week ago!), Nikki Rainey led a class for our quilt guild, teaching us to make this bargello flag wall hanging.

The edges really are straight, even though they don't look so in the photo. It's hanging sort of unevenly on hooks over the door.

Thanks, Nikki, for teaching us how to make this project!

Saturday Snow - After The Storm

What a beautiful winter day! Blue sky and white snow. I'll just let the photos do the talking.

A Snowy View From the Kitchen Window

While snow is routine for much of our great country, it rarely comes to us in the deep south.


Snow started falling here about noon today. I was hoping for enough to look pretty for a while. Looks like we have it.


This is the view from my kitchen window this afternoon, looking out into the woods behind the house.




And this is how it looked a few hours later.



And this is the view from the front porch, looking toward the street.




I'm glad I don't really have any need to leave the house!

A Walk in the Winter Garden

Today was the first time we'd seen blue sky in days!




Just when we think it's the 'dead' of winter, Mother Nature shows us she's still busy behind the scenes.

It was a delight to find these tiny yellow crocus in bloom.



Molly Kitty will be happy to know that her catnip is coming back to life!




I expect these blue asters to freeze long before they have a chance to bloom.




Nice to see the yarrow coming back to life.




This time of year, you have to look pretty hard to find something the wildlife has not consumed. But, they seem to have missed these nandina berries, hidden deep in the foliage.





One of my favorites! The native azalea has one small pink bud. These will be gorgeous in a couple months.

There are many fat yellow daffodil buds. These fat pointy buds are the double flowering variety.

These are some very strange daffs. The center will be green. A very old variety, dug up from an estate just before it was bulldozed.

The Encore azaleas now have buds! These did not do well for several years after they were planted. After 4 years, they're starting to perform.

I was afraid our extended cold spell had killed the large rosemary bush. But, a close look shows live stems and some surviving needles. I think it will need a pretty good pruning later in the spring. But, I'll leave it alone for now and let it recover in peace.