Siebold Elegans Hostas

 

This is a beautiful grouping of Siebold Elegans Hosta that I spotted today at Furman University. It was the best day ever for photography, 70 degrees, light breeze and sunshine.

My daughter Lauren is getting married in June and today was her day for wedding dress pictures. She is so beautiful in her dress! Our first stop was Furman University, pictures among the huge 100 year old growth oak trees, then in front of the fountains, then the Rose garden!  When the photographer was done, he had taken over 1200 photos, I took over 150.

These hosta were growing under the huge old growth oak trees, aren’t they beautiful!!!

 

 

 

Madame Isaac Periere

Madame Isaac Periere is a bourbon rose and is well known for it’s wonderful fragrance.  It was named after the wife of a French banker, Madame Isaac Pereire. It has fat, cabbagey flowers and has perhaps the strongest deep rose perfume of all roses.

I have two Madame Isaac Periere growing on the fence, both are about the same size and both are filled with roses. They are very beautiful and the fragrance is wonderful. If you would like to grow  fragrant rose, this is the one to grow. Very easy to grow and it  blooms twice a year!

Each morning for the past week, I  have cut roses and placed in vases for our kitchen, den and bedroom! After 10 minutes the rooms are filled with their  perfume!!! 🙂 My wife loves this rose!

 

The  photo below was taken by Bob Bernotsky, one of two boards I made Bob. Check out his Instagram page, he is a wonderful cook and into the Paleo food; @That_Paleo_Guy

Blue Flag Iris

This is Iris versicolor, it has many names, also commonly known as the ‘Blue flag’, ‘Harlequin Blueflag’, ‘Larger Blue Flag’, ‘Northern Blue Flag’, and ‘Poison Flag’.

I planted hundreds of these two years ago and finally this year they are really beautiful! From the looks of it I will be thinning these out at the end of summer. Do you grow this iris in your garden?

Enjoy your weekend!

The Land & Water Co. has posted the picture of Chef Ruiz food presented on one of my Walnut cutting boards on their website, photo credit is Carolyn Himes!!

Spring Flowers

I snapped a few pictures while walking the garden today and thought I would share a few spring flowers! In this post you will also find Hosta Guacamole.

The above picture is Hosta Guacamole, this is after the hail storm we had on Tuesday morning and Tuesday afternoon. We had a thunder-storm that lasted 40 minutes that brought nickel size hail. Then again that afternoon we had another thunder-storm that lasted 35 minutes that also brought hail but was ping-pong ball size. All of my hosta look like this, it made me sick because hosta do not re-grow their leaves but once a year in the spring.

Enjoy your evening!

 

Check out the beautiful photo of my Walnut board that was taken by Aubrey Jenkins!

Handcrafted Walnut Cutting Boards

The above photo was taken by Aubrey Jenkins, check out her website, Drum Beets

 

 

 

Tulip Magnolias are Blooming!

The tulip magnolias are blooming about a week early this year than last year and they are beautiful. We have three large pink tulip magnolia tree, I believe the name is Sharon. We also have one large yellow tulip magnolia tree.

The yellow tulip magnolia tree flowers are spectacular, some are a light yellow and others are darker color!

Do you grow any tulip magnolias?

Enjoy your Monday!

 

The photo below was taken by Food Photographer Tricia Buice

 

Creeping Phlox

Early this morning I could count the number of blooms on my creeping phlox. Our temperatures today reached nearly 80 degrees and by 5:00 this evening it is now in full bloom. My Creeping Phlox is very beautiful this year! Do you grow Creeping Phlox?

The bumble bees were hovering all around but I just couldn’t get a good picture!! This is the first of our spring blooms, isn’t it beautiful?!! Spring is  finally here this Friday, I am certainly ready for warmer weather!

I hope you have a beautiful spring! What is blooming in your garden? What is your favorite spring flower?

 

Click image to find out more about my handcrafter ice cream scoop!

 

Garden Moths

This is an Imperial moth (Eacles imperialis) that I found in our garden yesterday evening. I usually find 10 or more of the Imperial moths in the garden every year but this is the first one this year. Lunar moths are also popular in our area too but I have only  seen one of those this year too!

Do you often find the large moths in your garden?

It’s Friday! 🙂 Enjoy your weekend!

A loving heart is the beginning off all knowledge.
– Thomas Carlyle

Things I saw Today

Our weather has turned from rain to hot! It’s 81 degrees F today with sunshine so I decided to take a short hike. Along the way I took a few pictures. Most of you will recognize most if not all of these! How many can you name?

 

How many plants did you name?

After my hike, I spent a couple hours making homemade Mint Chocolate Chip and Dark Chocolate Ice Cream, look for a post later in the week on how to make both of these 🙂 you won’t believe that these are homemade!!!

Sunday is nearly gone, that means tomorrow is Monday 😦

 

Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream

 

Plant Exchange

Plant Exchange plants I received, perfectly packages and arrived safely!

I am doing the Happy Dance!!! It’s fun to find a box full of plants at your mailbox! Check out the pictures of the beautiful plants I received in my trade~! In case you missed my post last week, Plant Exchange , I was looking to trade Lemon Lime hostas for variegated bearded iris.

Elizabeth commented that she had reblooming German Iris, “Stairway to Heaven” to trade and was interested in the Lemon Lime hosta. We emailed and agreed on the trade, I would send her a bunch of eyes of Lemon Lime hosta and she would send me two bearded iris. Next step for us was to prepare and ship the plants.

The above and below pictures are the plants I received from Elizabeth, are they just beautiful! I am very happy with the trade!! She also included as an extra gift, a Begonia. I got the Begonia planted right away and the iris were planted today.

Thank you so much for trading with me Elizabeth!

Reblooming German Iris, “Stairway to Heaven” and Begonia

As you can see in the above picture, she cut the fans on the iris to help them survive the trip to me. By the way, Elizabeth loves the outdoors, excellent photographer, gardener and blogger. She has also posted about our trade, check out her post, Forest Garden Blog.

I shipped the Lemon Lime hostas (above left) and an extra gift, a good size Japanese Iris!

I also cut the Japanese Iris fans to help the iris survive the shipping. My package arrived at her home today, got an email saying that FedEx delivered the package safely to her today. The plants all made the trip beautifully!! She is going to plant the hosta in a containers and was going to give some thought on where to plant the iris before planting.

We were both very happy with the trade and have already talked about doing another trade. Trading is fun and well worth the effort! 🙂

Now on to proposing another trade! Ok, for my second trade this is what I have;

HAVE:  Japanese-Iris-Jin-Yu, Siberian Iris, Agapanthus Stevie Wonder lily of the Nile and Lemon Lime Hosta. The Japanese-Iris-Jin-Yu is a mature plant as well as the Agapanthus and hosta. The Siberian iris are good size but not full grown. If you are interested in trading please leave a comment letting me know and list what you have for trade. Below here are a few plants, seedlings I am looking for but just make me an offer!

Helleborus
Variegated Bearded Iris
Oxblood Lily bulbs
Crinum Lilies
Striped Solomon’s Seal
Iris cristata
Lily of the Valley
Pink Paniculata Hydrangea seedling
Japanese Maple seedlings
Walnut Tree seedlings
Blueberry seedlings
Black Bamboo

 

Japanese-Iris-Jin-Yu

Agapanthus Stevie Wonder lily of the nile

Siberian Iris

 

The Plant Exchange provides a place where you can offer plants, seed, cuttings and bulbs for trade and make requests for what you are seeking. It’s fun, you offer a plant, seed, cuttings, bulbs to trade for free in exchange for plants, seed cuttings or bulbs in return.

If you are interested, in a “Plant Exchange”, you can post a comments on this page include details of what you have to trade and what you are looking for. If someone is interested, they will comment and email you. Be sure that you include your email so that you can email each other and work out the details of the trade and exchange shipping addresses.

Sorry but I can not be responsible for your trades, trading is done at users’ discretion. Michael’s Woodcraft has no control or responsibility over trades arranged here. Keep in mind some traders may let you down, let’s hope that doesn’t happen, please be fair in your trade. Other might send a free gift, an extra plant that they think you would enjoy having in your garden! 🙂

The rain has set in for the weekend here on the mountain, our local forecast shows 100% rain today and tomorrow. Great for the garden 🙂 Enjoy your weekend!

 “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things.”  – Ronald Reagan

 

 

Slow Moving! Really Slow!

July 12, 2014

Can you see him? He is hiding in the pine mulch!

There he is, moving kinda slow!

I watched this snail for about 15 minutes and during that time he only moved 2 inches. This time of year it’s easy to find the snails and slugs, they are attracted to the plant areas I am watering. Last night I found and killed 21 slugs in my garden.

As I sat there watching him, I couldn’t decide what to do with him. He was in my rose garden, so I knew he would not bother my roses but he could snail his way into the hosta garden. I ended up moving him into the woods. Maybe he will find another place to eat and I hope he didn’t leave behind any hiding babies or cousins! 🙂

“The only man who never makes mistakes is the man who never does anything.”
– Theodore Roosevelt