Spring Beauty

I just had to share my garden with you. Last fall I decided that the iris that came with the house 5 years ago were taking up a lot of real-estate without any benefits. They were compacted and heaving out of the ground and I decided it was time to thin and replant the younger rhizomes. That is garden talk for roots. So I began digging piles of them up and throwing what I didn’t want into the wooded vacant lot next door. Boy is that handy! I spent so much time on the Victory Garden last year, which you can see here, that my yard beds went unloved. Bad mom! So this spring I have been rewarded with a beautiful array of color.

It looks like an Easter basket out there.  One thing that people told us when we moved to Tennessee, is that “everything grows here.”  I just had to share my Iris. I have been cutting them and bringing them in to enjoy.

You should see the beautiful Iris standing proud in the vacant lot. I have actually thrown my pansy leftovers out there and one tomato  plant last year and they bloomed and produced cherry tomatoes.

I had scads of petunias pop up around my Camellia bushes and there has never been petunias there since I have lived here . Sometimes I wonder if there is a garden fairy in my yard. The Phlox in the front was started two years ago and really thickened up for this year. We did have more rain this winter and added pine straw to the bed, which makes me wonder if these are possibly acid loving plants. I know the Azaleas are and they are beautiful. I do fertilize them in the late spring and fall. And oh yeah, I have to show you the vacant lot display.

I added a few shots of the back yard flowers around the pond. I love the Salomon Seal on the back side of the pond. They will droop their pretty white flowers over the pond. My neighbor, Diane, shared them with me and I just love them. They will spread as time goes by.