Little Magical One ~ Finn's Garden

I hadn't thought about the garden bed in front of the house, I don't even remember looking at it much until now..., didn't even notice how pitiful it was.
It came to me in an instant as I walked up the path to the front door the other morning on my way home from yoga feeling good and clear for the first time in days. It's going to be Finn's garden ~ below his bedroom window overlooking the Lake.

As it is now a nearly dead, over sheared cedar stands nearest to the front door, anchoring that corner of the house. It just has to go, ...sorry, to the compost. Two leggy, confused mugo pines are also headed for the compost, with whatever mystery spindles are left. There's some sort of lime-leafed spirea in the middle that I'm not sure what to do with - let it stay? Find a new garden for it? I'm not sure yet.
The rest is just empty, full of rocks... .

Finn's garden will be filled with soothing scents, healing plants, blues, whites, yellows, and crimsons, with meaningful names, and messages in flowers. The plants I'm sure will change over time, but as our grief grows so will this garden.

I've kept the one mugo pine that seems to be in good health in the plan, but I've replaced the cedar with a Picea glauca 'Pendula'..which Cathy is kindly sourcing for me. Heather has a beautiful one growing in her front yard, which I've swooned over for years. Though they originate in France, I think they look like neat versions of trees in Group of Seven paintings. 'Droopy Spruce' is what I've called them for fun..., but seeing as a giant black spruce or white pine are a bit too big for the space (a lot too big), the 'Pendula' is a good substitute. 

Baby Millar's Lady's Mantle is going to be taken from Pearl soon, divided and planted all over our new gardens. It will grow and spread, be divided again, given to friends, growing on and on. It was given to us from Chops and Patti, who wanted to buy us a plant to remember our first loss, after that devastating miscarriage ~ which was such a sweet gesture. Chops couldn't believe what I chose, as I carried the unassuming three leafed perennial around the nursery (Bill Martin's ~ before I worked there)... Perennials often don't look like much in their nursery containers, and at the time I think Chops worried it was an insignificant gift. 

I'll never forget the look on his face two years later when they were over for a barbecue, when he saw how the little plant had grown.

Alchemilla mollis has been a favourite garden plant for as long as I can remember. I love how the dew pools on the leaves, and the lemon-lime flower sprays are perfect for cut flower bouquets - like baby's breath... gorgeous.  

Little Magical One (from 2 March 2008) Alchemilla has long been associated with healing and alchemists. From an Arabic word, alchemelych, meaning alchemy; the plant is named so for its "magical healing powers," with folklore suggesting that even dew collected from alchemilla leaves has healing properties.

Also for tea, chamomile (I like the little pointy daisy-like heads of the German chamomile Matricaria recutita), and two of the David Austin roses Winchester Cathedral (to have a little of my mother and father in Finn's garden) and Heathcliff, lemon balm, echinacea, feverfew, and lemon thyme.

For blue, I'll plant a cranesbill geranium ('Johnson's Blue' is the usual go-to around here, but newer varieties have come along that just as blue, longer flowering, and less floppy...like, 'Rozanne' and another I can't remember by name right now..) and the purple leafed Geranium pratense 'Midnight Blue'..., also bluebells and forget-me-nots seeded beneath everything. 

The back border of the bed, with the chamomile and echinacea I'd like to plant so asters - so long as they don't get too crazy back there. Blue wood asters (A. cordifolius) and Heath Asters (A. ericoides) which will all bloom late in the summer, through Finn's birthday, my special September baby. 

For earlier in the season I've ordered some irises: 'White Wings' and 'Little Sighs', and I'm sure I'll find a few more. I haven't even started planning the tulip and daffodils that will begin each new year, but what I have in mind will be something special - from under the oak tree, across the yard and into Finn's garden I imagine a wave of early, mid, and late tulips surrounded by smiling daffodils.  

I'd like to include a lemony-buttery daylily - this may be the perfect spot for Double River Wye.., and some primrose (Miller's Crimson maybe). We'll see what sort of nursery finds follow me home this year.

Dear Garden Diary,

Rhodochiton
first bloom
25 June 2012

Okay, I'll say it - I can not find any reference to the above pictured plant being a "Rhodochiton"...; and though it resembles the Lophspermum I know, it's not nearly the same.

If anyone can help explain this plant to me, please...

I'm going to miss this plant when we're away this summer. I've waited so long (it seems) for this first bloom; and with more on the way I suspect the magnificence of this plant is only just beginning.

It's so different from the easily searched Rhodochiton we have blooming profusely in the greenhouse:

Also blooming madly is John Davis beside the back door, twirling up the obelisk. I imagined this thirteen years ago; it;s nice to finally see it.

John Davis Explorer Rose
25 June 2012

There's an awful lot of pink in our garden. I pointed that out to R recently, who didn't seem bothered. Morden Blush is blooming in the west side garden, looking so pretty. I think about this plant when I tell customers at the greenhouse that, yes, roses actually are easy. John Davis regularly attracts the aphids, but Morden roses in my garden have never failed - even in the face of army worms. Just a stone of amethyst away is a chewed to pieces Cranesbill geranium ('Wargraves Pink').

Down the way from the Morden Blush, and across the way, is the Campanula persicifolia 'Blue' (Peach Leaf Bellflower) that I planted last year in the rain. First bloom ever, 25 June 2012. Hello.

Peonies are blooming, the Weigela (Red Prince) too

tucked tight in front are some wild Knautia macedonica (Crimson Scabious),

with our special Alchemilla mollis (Lady's Mantle) blooming below 

in lemon-lime

contrasting all those pinks and reds.

The front shade garden is getting a little crowded (not that there are not still places to fill..). The leafeaters haven't got to the lush foliage street side...yet...hopefully never, and with all the rain and humidity we've had this year the ferns and hostas are large and full.

...from the back door:

pea webs

backyardovich developments

A hazard of working in a garden centre
is coming home each day with new adoptees.

I'm ridiculously excited about our new 'Striptease' hosta.
Lots of lemon verbena this year, a new 'Gay Parce' peony for the west side garden, and succulents for the west side of the new back porch.

Cosmos for Gromit.





I planted madly in the rain the other day: tomatoes and a jalapeno pepper, kale, Swiss chard, brussel sprouts, and the new yellow rose 'Rugelda' (Pavement Series, Hybrid Rugosa) for the middle trellis on the east fence. Though a little tender for here, he's not the first zone 4 rose I've grown - successfully. He'll just need a little extra attention during harsh winters. Our backyard near the lake is a micro-climate hot pocket, southern exposure, surrounded by old tall tree protection. It can be intensely hot during the afternoon from March - October.

I'm excited to watch & photograph Rugelda bloom
wegeila 'Red Prince' to the right, pink peonies to the left
in front: knautia macedonica,  alchemilla mollis 'Lady's Mantle'
monarda ' bee balm' & rudbeckia goldstrum

There are some gaps and empty spaces which don't bother me as much as they might have ten years ago. My younger gardener self was so eager to grow it all I packed it all in. I still have those tendencies, but rather than plant perennials I'm unsure of, I'll fill the spaces with containers full of the annuals I can't help but bring home each day.

Most exciting is our new Rhodochiton (Lophospermum) vine. This cultivar is new to me - not the same as lophospermum's I've had in the past. These leaves aren't as velutinous (velvety), and are much more ciliated – widely spaces 'hairs' along the edge: fringed, almost jagged - larger too than my previous plants, and star-shaped. I'd say more like dinosaur footprints.

I've planted in my oldest & largest (not for long) play pot with lots of compost, manure, and potting mix. The  stick trellis is a nice touch I think - though I suspect it will disappear under foliage and purple trumpet flowers soon. With the trellis it stands about six feet now, maybe more.., but I bet that won't be tall enough for this vine.

Keeping it simple, the lophospermum will live alone in that pot, and around I'll also keep it simple: some play with foliage, greens in pots. I've brought home lots of English ivy, lysimachia, vinca, chocolate mint, oregano - shades of greens that trail and tumble. The red tropical leafy guy - ti plant Cordyline terminalis? I think. He'll live outside in a pot until the autumn rolls in, then we'll see if I can keep him alive indoors until next year. Let's hope.

The west side garden, new last year, is coming up well. The Penninsetum setaceum 'Fireworks' (tender grass)(in a pot) moves around, homeless, like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone. 

'Sweet Sunshine' petunias in a cute white pot are now tucked in between Morden Blush & Wargrave's Pink Cransbill geranium

and the four hostas under the Tamarack.

cornflowers & hostas, hardy geraniums & blue irises
line the west side walkway
sky blue lobelia in a tulip pot looks sweet nestled between

West Side Garden 15 May 2012

Along the west side of the house (once home to horrible little pebbles) is coming up with colourful perennials planted late last summer. Everybody is returning as imagined, healthy but small. In addition to Campanula (Bell Flowers) and Sweet Woodruff are: 

Astilbe x arendsii
False Spirea
'Fanal'

Aruncus aethusifolius
Dwarf Goat's Beard

foam flower 'Black Snowflake'

Tiarella

Saxifragaceae

transplanted divided irises
hardy geranium endressii
'Wargrave's Pink'
hosta

hosta May 15

Morden Blush
Parkland  Rose
still so small :)