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Visiting the garden of Vanessa Gardner Nagel…
I resisted joining Facebook for a very long time. Just didn't see the need, didn't want another account to check or update. I finally signed up last January and for the most part it's been a good...
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Acquiring that elusive plant…
I've been approached before about participating in the Berry Go Round ("a blog carnival devoted to highlighting recent blog posts about any and every aspect of plant life") but honestly I didn't really...
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Flooding in the turtle courtyard and more from New Mexico…
The week before last was one of extremes. We left record setting heat in Portland (Wednesday, September 11th a new high of 95 degrees) to arrive in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, to record setting...
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x Mangave 'Macho Mocha' gets the favorite plant title this week…
He’s been flirting with being the fav several weeks running and it’s time he got the spotlight.I’ve grown a couple of x Mangave 'Macho Mocha' in containers and never loved them as much as I did the day...
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Just how many Callistemon do you have?
That’s what I was asked recently when a fellow blogger visited my garden for the first time. Ya okay…so I have a few…only fourteen…that’s not too many…right? I mean plant lust lists 97 of them so I...
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The Organic Mechanics
This garden was the first stop for my group during the San Francisco Garden Bloggers Fling. I felt a little like I was visiting my parallel life, what my gardening endeavors may have looked like had I...
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Fall, why I'm just not in-love with it
I want to love fall, really I do. There is so much about it that I adore...sweaters, boots, fire, soup, pumpkin bread, chestnuts, etc. I was trying to explain my less than enthusiastic response to a...
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October 2013 Bloomday…
There is no denying it's autumn and the garden is in graceful decline. While I'll never claim this season as a favorite, I'm also not blind to its many charms. To my memory it's unusual for the eucomis...
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Eryngium venustum is my favorite plant in the garden, this week…
There are so many huge and intricate spider webs all over the garden right now; I figured what better plant to feature this week than one that looks like a web...Eryngium venustum also quite dangerous,...
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Visiting Heronswood
It's a legend, Heronswood. A nursery and botanical garden with cult-like status. Plant-nuts get a sort of wistful look in their eyes when it's mentioned, old catalogues are hoarded, and plants which...
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Let’s back up a bit…
Yesterday I wrote about my visit to Heronswood, however I need to catch you up on what came earlier in the day. Before the Heronswwod sale I (we: Andrew and I) first had to get up before dawn and drive...
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Our evening at the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers...
After an amazing Day 1 of the Garden Bloggers Fling (spent touring gardens and enjoying lunch (and shopping!) at Annie’s Annuals), we made a brief stopover at the hotel (too short for a nap) and were...
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Say Hello to my Little Friend…
Moving containers around in (semi) preparation for their winter storage I was surprised to find an entire, preserved, dragonfly. I approached him carefully, expecting him to take flight. He did not,...
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Echium candicans 'Star of Madeira' – it’s my favorite plant in the garden,...
On a recent walk through the garden I found myself doing that thing I dread doing, but do none-the-less. My eyes start to see the plants differently. The ones which are only marginally hardy start to...
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Field to Vase and the "buy-local" flower movement...
A couple of weeks back I had the honor of attending a special Field-to-Vase dinner, sort of the floral equivalent of a Farm-to-Table dinner, held at the Leach Botanical Garden here in Portland.flowers...
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After Heronswood, a visit to Celestial Dream Gardens…
Location location location…is there anything more important for any business? Okay reputation maybe but since Celestial Dream Gardens is located mere yards from Heronswood, they’re super nice people,...
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What do you do when you're the project assistant and you're bored?
Andrew has come up with a new design for the annual shade pavilion to greenhouse conversion. Not that the old design was broken but, you know, when the creative mind thinks of something better it must...
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Multiples
Last weekend I visited Flower World in Maltby, Washington. I’d heard about this place from a couple of friends, most recently The Outlaw. Since it was a grey and chilly day we spent most of our visit...
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The Shade Pavilion Greenhouse, upgrade…
Most of you know the structure we refer to as our “shade pavilion” undergoes a winter-time transformation to become a sort of greenhouse. The design we’ve been using goes back to 2010 and had become a...
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But it looks dead! (my favorite plants in the garden on Halloween)...
I thought it would be fun to change things up a bit this week, in honor of Halloween, and share with you some of the plants in my garden that aren't so, well, lush. In fact they've been said to look...
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