Flower bombing

Ever driven by an ugly field or an empty part of your property and though "flowers would be so lovely here" - well, here is your chance (actually, next spring would be better) to make it happen.  They are called Flower Grenades.  

The "grenade" is made of clay and full of flower seeds.  The clay will dissolve in the rain and in a month or so you should see some wild flowers. 

Although this seems fun and throwing them into vacant lots seems harmless....I recommend you keep the "bombing" to your own property...just to be safe :)

These are from the UK - but you can get them here in the US through Amazon.

I guess it is a love/hate relationship

that I have with spiders....they creep me out (the real ones) but I love Halloween.....so they fit there.  That is why a few years ago when I remodeled my patio garden we had these gates made.

Current photo

Looks lovely in the snow also last December

They are one of my favorite things in the yard.

I keep them in the garden

instead of the closet :)  (my skeletons that is)

I just planted the pumpkins around him the other day, by October the vines should just be starting to curl around and through him and the flowers blooming.  Makes for a great photo opportunity.

And it confuses the heck out of people that visit the house!  I like that.

In the posts are a columnar pear and a dwarf apple.  I love fruit, but fruit trees make quite a mess. After the last of them died (my plum tree,) I told myself only small fruit trees in the future.  These two are perfect for us!

Dark plants

I am always on the look out for dark plants.....just fit well with my dark personality :)

I found the new deep red and black begonia called Lorraine Closson.  Not a huge fan of begonias, just never could get them to grow without looking all stringy and the stems are kinda see through.  Yes, those are technically gardening terms....at least at the Graveyard :D

But this begonia has tight leaves and a lot of of them and the colors are amazing.  I had to have it.  Thought that it would be a good contrast in the shadier grotto garden area by the shop - it would look good against the cream house color and the red trim.  This pot is right outside the shop door....I have second one by the gate, they flank the entrance to the covered patio.

But the pot that I wanted to use as an old antique cast iron thingy in it - probably part of an old fence.  So I needed to find something tall.  I have enough grasses in the yard, so I went on a search for tall dark plants that can handle pots - at least for a year or two, no luck.  So back to grasses and I find a purple millet called Purple Barron.  Love it, I think it works well with the begonia.  I just planted them so they are going to take a few weeks to fill the pot out.

I am very happy with what I have read about this millet and looking forward to moving it to on of the border beds in a few years.  (If I really wanted this pot to look fuller - should have gotten two millets per pot - oh well, live and learn.) As for the begonia.....they usually do not survive our wet winters.....we will see.

Yes, that small plant to the right of the pot has citronella......we spend a lot of time out there so I am going to see if this helps keep the mosquito off us while we are hanging on the patio which we will be doing a lot of while we are building the new abbey facade.

What are your favorite dark colored plants?