Symphytum "Langham's Pink"

Brrr, it's freezing outside so there's nothing better to do than sit here and go through some lovely photos taken last spring. One plant caught my interest quickly, Symphytum 'Langham's Pink" also known as comfry.

Now some of you might be groaning out loud since comfry is considered invasive by many people. I don't have any experience with invasive varieties, this pink version is extremely well behaved. I've been growing this beauty in my garden for about four years now and in all three spots it has stayed in a clump.

Here you can see it along with some of it's neighbors. The Coreopsis verticilata 'Zagreb' growing next to it is at least as vigorous a grower. The same goes for the lovely, silvery Stachys byzantine (Lamb's Ears).

Finally, here's a close up shot showing what a nice contrast there is between the foliage of these two plants.

This spring I'd like to divide the Symphytum. I've never done this before so I do hope that it's a simple dig and then chop. If you have any advice, drop me a comment here. Many times it's not HOW you divide a perennial but WHEN you divide it that makes all the difference. For instance, the Coreopsis get's divided extremely early in the spring. If I divide it after it's three inches high it just flops all over and looks lousy for a year. Divide it early and you'd never know it was cut.

By the way, after the Symphytum finished it's first bloom season, I cut it back hard and put the cuttings on my compost heap. About a month later you will be rewarded with another flush of bloom and the cuttings will have already decomposed. What more could you ask for!

Off to put on another layer of socks.
Melanie

Technology

Good morning,

Nothing like a fresh new day. My rested brain thinks it has figured out how to access those smaller images.

Hope you like today's image. Geranium sanguinium and the lovely silvery foliage of Stachys byzantine (Lamb's ears).

I've deleted my test posts from last night so I don't bog down anybody on dial-up.

Right now we are covered in a fresh blanket of white snow so the only gardening going on is photo manipulation.

Weight Loss Tips - 1

Ok, now many of you are probably asking how does the title "Weight Loss Tips" fit in with my garden blog theme here. Well for one thing, I really look forward to working in the garden this spring. For the first time in years I have more energy than I know what to do with and you can bet I'll be focusing some of that new found energy into my garden.

For the past week I've been hounded by weight loss spam every time I log on to the internet. These ads are combined with before and after photos that basically look like somebody first slouched over and stuck out their belly and then stood up straight and sucked their gut in as far as possible.

No photos here, at least not for now. What you'll read here (and hopefully once a week or so) is what worked for me. Bear with me, this post will be a bit longer as I lay out the ground work.

Here's the background, no holds barred. Last year during winter break (February 2008) I decided I was sick and tired of the extra weight I'd been carrying around. Most of the people who know me did not think of me as fat at that time. I was wearing a size 10 in pants, sometimes I squeezed into an 8 if it was labled "curvy fit". By the way, that "curvy fit" really means "hey, you should be buying the next size". When I was married at the early age of 23 I was 123 pounds. As my age crept up into the 30's, so did my weight and by my early 40's I followed suit and found myself weighing in the low 140's. So how did it happen that by the time I was in my late 40's I was no longer in that 140 range?

I was never one to step on the scale. Truth be told, I'd rather go to the dentist than confront the number on that little thing. It took two weeks of "dieting" before I had the nerve to get on that scale. Holy cow, it said I was 162 pounds and I knew I had already lost a few pounds by then. Did that motivate me? No way, I went into a funk and ate my way to happiness for another month. Great, now I was up to 165.

Finally, with no pants fitting me I decided I just had to get back on track. There are so many weight loss tips and products on the market but all I could think of was something I overheard at the pool at the Kings Point senior citizen developement in Delray Beach Florida. There was a younger man there with a body builders physique who was speaking to two women. He told them that his opinion was that somebody should NOT try to lose weight by working out. Working out builds muscle and it also makes you hungry. His idea was to try to lose the weight first and then start toning your muscles. Ok, but you still have to figure out how to lose that weight. Still, the thought of no working out sounded good to me so my next step was to figure out how to cut those calories.

If you are like me then you've read hundreds of weight loss tips and articles. I can't even count how many times I've read that you should eat a big breakfast, a medium lunch and a small dinner. I'm not a breakfast person but I thought this might work for me so I started making myself a big healthy breakfast. I measured 3/4's of a cup of Fiber One (bran) cereal into a bowl, added a lowfat yogurt and splurged on what ever berries were available in the supermarket. Yum yum, that was a delicious breakfast. Lunch was always a salad of some sort with lots of protein and dinner was our usual dinner fare but smaller portions. Did I lose weight? Nope, not really, maybe a few pounds over 3 months but nothing to write home about.

Maybe the big breakfast concept works for some people but for me it just stretched my stomach and I continued to want to eat all day. The good news though was that I had stopped gaining weight and managed to get into the high 150's which got me back into a few pairs of pants. Do I think this type of diet would work in the long run? Yup, it would but I wanted to lose weight now, not 2 years from now.

By May 2008 my motivation was kick started and I found myself looking more seriously at my eating habits. My biggest weakness came around 4:00 in the afternoon and continued until 6:00 pm. We were late dinner eaters here, usually eating as late as 7:30 pm. My problem was I was hungry long before that and nothing was safe when I began grazing my way through the kitchen. So I made a huge decision, I would no longer eat dinner at 7:30. Dinner time for me had to be when I was hungry, even if it was 5:00 pm. Luckily, with only one daughter left at home, this was something that I could manage since Emily spends most of her evenings at the high school at after school activities. Also, my husband Don is not a big eater and he was fine with not getting dinner many nights or just heating up something I had cooked earlier.

I began to cut things out of my diet. No alchohol unless I was at a party or dinner occassion. No bread, that meant no bagels, no toast, no sandwiches or anything like that. I didn't cut out the carbs all the way, I still had pasta (smaller portions) and potatoes when they were on the menu. I just cut out the bread.

The big breakfast just wasn't working for me and I switched back to my old standbye. Two cups of coffee and a slimfast meal bar. This is my number one tip and I truly believe the reason my weight loss began to really work. Today I still have the same thing every morning. It fills me up and I don't get hungry again until about 11:30 am.

Ok, I'm going to end this here. Be assured there are lots more tips coming. One thing I forgot to mention at the beginning of this post is that for the last two weeks my weight was 125 pounds and I've actually had to make an effort to put a few pounds back on! For those of you who are math challenged, that's a total weight loss of 40 pounds!

Now don't forget, this is what worked for me and I'm not a dietician or anything like that. I'm a stay at home mom and gardener.

So to wrap things up, the tips in this post are:

1. I didn't work out while trying to lose weight. I did move about though, walking is something I've always loved and once I lost some weight I swam daily but nothing super strenous.

2. The big breakfast didn't work for me. I'm much happier with a small breakfast and decided it's ok to eat lunch at 11:30 if that's when I'm hungry.

3. Late dinners are a killer. Rather than graze for two hours in the early evening, I ate dinner then and didn't eat later in the evening.

Stay tuned for more diet tips and of course, more gardening posts (once this darned snow goes away).

Poinsettia Guilt

Poinsettia. Nothing says Christmas like the Poinsettia.

The new colors available are amazing but even the old stand-bye red will warm your heart.

Poinsettia's are so easy to grow, that's the problem with them. You see, after Christmas, after New Year's, after all the holiday decorations are packed back in the attic, you find yourself left with a bright red plant.

Now don't get me wrong, I like the color red, my kitchen has lots of deep red accents. But a red plant that screams CHRISTMAS? Nope, this just doesn't fit into my decorating scheme. Ha! That sounds like my house is a showcase out of Better Homes and Gardens but it isn't. I just can't seem to get used to this plant being in my house right now.

So here comes the guilt part. You can stop watering it and let it die a slow, painful death. You can imagine it needs more sunshine and put it out on the breezeway and forget the fact that it's the frozen tundra out there. Instant death sounds so much better than a slow death but I just can't make myself do it.

The other day I posted to a daylily listserve I belong to and posed this same question. What do you do with your Poinsettias? The reply I liked best came from a woman who suggested watering it and ignoring it until spring. Then take it outside and plant it in the garden where you need to fill in a hole (or in a container with other foliage plants). The leaves won't be red then, but it will grow big and lush and fill in a spot that was barren. Come fall when a heavy frost settles down, it will die but it will have lived on for one more glorious season.

Now I only need to find blinders to wear every time I walk through my living room. Or better yet, maybe I'll move it to my daughter Lauren's room since she is away at college. Hmmm, I think I'll do just that!

Just "me"

Here we are, the end of January with the dull dreary days of February barreling down upon us.

So where have I been? I've been here, not on my computer but here, in my house and up at the school.

What's new you ask? Well, it appears our desktop computer has finally passed out for good. I have my photos saved on an external hard-drive but haven't moved them yet to this laptop. Since I'm known to be technologically challenged, it might still be awhile before I get photos back up here. At least I'm not chomping at the bit to take lots of photos these days, right now everything is white or dirty gray outside.

My first inclination was to title this post "the new me". You see, there have been some big changes in our lives and more changes yet to come. People around here who know me personally have noticed one of the changes. Over the last year I lost a total of 40 pounds. I really didn't have 40 pounds to lose though so I find myself with the unusual task of having to put 5 pounds back on again! So when it comes to the physical me, maybe there is a new me but I find the old me is still right there, under my skin.

This June will be our 25th wedding anniversary. It will also be our last wedding anniversary. Read between the lines if you will. The biggest change yet to come? Chances are this coming growing season will be the last one here in this garden. So here's another "me", not "us", just "me". The garden is something I just can't really think about, it just seems to be hiding in a corner of my mind, waiting for spring before it begins to set down roots and grow again.

Being a gardener, I think I'm an eternal optimist. While I know that any house I can afford in this town will be a tiny cottage, I have dreams of a magazine-like cottage garden with white picket fences and lots and lots of cutting flowers just cascading over rough walkways. Hmmm, maybe I can think of gardening after all.

Hopefully this tentative sticking of my big toe in the water's of the world wide web will lead me to jump back in. I've put up all the comments many of you left me on my blog but will only begin answering new comments for now.

Hugs to everybody,
Just "me", Melanie

Columbus Day

Whew! Columbus day weekend and our marching band home show are finally behind us. Now there's just a bit of breathing space and a wee bit of time for the garden.

Here's a lovely shot of one of the old churches on Main Street in our charming village of Huntington New York.

Looking up Main Street, we were waiting for the big Columbus Day Parade to begin!

And here they come, the most amazing, incredible, Walt Whitman High School Wildcat Marching Band. Hooray!!!

Ever wonder why?

Why? Have you ever seen a plant growing in a garden that you used to grow years ago? Do you ever wonder "why aren't I growing it now"?

In my very first, very beginner-like garden I grew a large patch of Chelone. I'm pretty sure I didn't know how to pronounce it back then since I'm still not sure of how to say it today. The nick name around here is false turtle head.

Back to the story, I had this big clump of Chelone. I thought I was the best gardener in the world because it was just thriving! Then I tried to dig a piece out of the ground. It had roots like I'd never seen before, they just twisted and turned and went all over the place. I was freaked out by those roots and have never grown it again.

How silly is that?

Last week when we visited Stonecrop I saw this nice clump of Chelone. Oooohhh, I wish I had a nice clump of Chelone in my garden. Look how lovely it looks even now in early fall.

I do have the white variety in my garden, it doesn't seem to be as fast growing as the pink variety. In fact, I don't remember seeing it bloom this summer but I was away much of July. It will be interesting to see if come spring I've matured enough to get past those weird roots and buy a pot of the pink Chelone 'Hot Lips'.

Stone Troughs - Part Two - Germany

This past summer I was lucky enough to spend two glorious weeks touring Germany with my mom. We have quite a large family in Germany so rather than see the big tourist sites, we also got to see small places that only the locals know about.

My cousin Ingrid took us to the most amazing place. I don't know what town it is in, I do know it's an easy drive from Frankfurt. The place was a mill stone museum and they had a charming restaurant and hotel by the name of Hotel Wambacher Muhle. If you are visiting Germany, I think this would be a great place to spend a day or two. Bring some hiking shoes as I understand there's some spectacular trails that start at this hotel.

At first I wasn't sure I wanted to visit a mill stone museum, then I saw that they also collected troughs. These troughs were real ones, carved out of stone, not the new light weight ones.

Here you can see how they were interspersed through out the mill stone display.

Germany was going through a cool, wet season while we were there so everything was amazingly lush and green. I really loved the way these troughs looked. Here you can see a spot where the stream was diverted through a channel alongside the hotel.

Resting over the channel in various spots were these beautiful troughs. You can see how different they feel as opposed to the dry barren troughs in my previous posts (taken in New York). I think both styles are fantastic.


This trough was filled with a Sedum that was at peak bloom. I don't have the name of the Sedum but it could have easily been Sedum 'Acre'.

Now we'll see some troughs with stones in them too. How about a dward hardy Geranium in the planting scheme? I love it!

Don't have any troughs near you? No worries, how about a big old wash basin? I know they sell them here at the hardware stores and they aren't terribly expensive.


I had to throw in a landscape shot showing the hotel in the backdrop. Oh if only I had a good pair of walking shoes with me.

This wash basin was filled with perennials, and yes, there are daylilies in it too.

Another trough, so lush and full. I think the different stone arrangements inside the troughs add great charachter.

As a last shot, I give you a tantalizing view of one of the walkways. This one was easy to navigate so I went down to the water. I can only imagine how lovely the walkways that went up into the mountains and woods must be.

Stone Troughs - Part One

The main focus at Stonecrop is their alpine collection. While I think spring is their peak season, we certainly had many wonderful things to see now in September.

This collection of stone troughs was set perfectly. I really liked how every now and then a specimen from the trough was also planted at the foot of the trough as if it escaped.

Here you can see how the different textures play against one another. Another thing I noticed is that they had no fear about leaving empty spaces. In my own garden I tend to cram in as much as possible but these troughs were very restful feeling.

This was my favorite of the rectangular troughs. I would really like to do something similar in my own garden.

This one was a very close runner up and I know I have these types of rocks around here. I think that this would be a fun project to do with children.

Be still my heart, when I came upon this type of planter I thought I had died and went to heaven. Kim and I both desperately want to make one of these now.

Here's a close up shot. Not much more than a jumble of rocks, just enough thought put into the placement to keep it from falling apart and yet loose enough to feel totally natural.

For those of you who have a shady corner that you can't get anything to grow in, you have to try one of these. Another pile of rocks but this time planted with shade plants. Ferns, miniature Epimediums, moss, mini Hosta, I can imagine all kinds of goodies to plant in these nooks and crannies.

Finally, another type of man made rock garden, these were on a larger scale. I bet you could even use broken up concrete from construction sites to make these cool beds.

These types of garden are not for the "flower" lover although most of these plants will flower at one time. Yet, I find they tug on my heart in a totally different way. Kind of a call to my wanderlust soul.

I titled this post as "part one" because I also have a wonderful set of photos of trough gardens that I shot in Germany this summer. They'll be popping up here some time this week.

Off to look at the stones in my garden,

Melanie

Stonecrop - An Overview

This past Tuesday I went on a trip with my garden club to Stonecrop gardens in Cold Spring, New York. My friend Kim and I have been waiting for this trip for years now so we were really excited to finally be on our way.

Today I just have time to share some landscape shots and give a quick overview.

My favorite part of the garden was the flower and vegetable garden area and this opening photo is my new screen saver on my computer.

Dahlia's were used in many places to accent the various color schemes. They weren't planted in groups, instead they used individual cultivars as focal points and they were stunning.

Grasses and Boltonia swayed with the most gentle breeze. What a delightful spot to stand and listen to our charming tour guide Michael.

I didn't get a chance to look up the name of the purple flower here. We were given highly detailed maps and plant lists but I tucked them in my backpack right away so I'd be free to shoot photos.

How's this for a glorious early fall grouping?

Interspersed through out the perennials were a wealth of tender plants too. Look in the top left corner and you'll see the leaves of a Banana peaking out. One plant I noticed quite a bit and have put on my wish list is Angelica. I've grown Angelica before in my herb bed but here it was a wonderful accent in the flower gardens.

Another thing I noticed quickly was that the purple perilla was allowed to naturalize in many locations where its dark foliage was just what was needed.

A photographer who likes to take landscape shots would have a field day at this lovely garden. Every time you turned around there was a spectacular view just begging to be photographed.

This bridge was aptly named the Flintstone bridge. I was disappointed that our group wasn't led across it.

A final shot from the inside of the Wisteria Pavilion.

As soon as I have the time I'll be posting about the most well known feature of Stonecrop, the trough and stone gardens that were just amazing.

No time for gardening :-(

Just a quick update here. No time for gardening during the past week or this coming week either. It's marching band season and around here that means that just about every other project comes to a full halt.

My oldest daughter went through marching band for four years and now my younger one (Emily) is in her second year of the color guard. In order to save our school district $$$ we make our own flags. Purchased flags run $29.95 to $40 per piece, home sewn flags cost about $5 per piece. A mid sized marching band (we have 87 students) needs 80 - 100 flags.

This photo shows some of the flags I made last year, in total I sewed over 50 flags on my dining room table. So far this season we've finished 30 flags, with 45 to go. We're going the team route with me teaching lots of other mom's how to make flags. So you can see why there's no gardening around here right now!

Tomorrow I'm taking a day off to visit Stonecrop, a botanical garden known for it's Sedum collection so I'm sure I"ll have lots of photos to share when we are all stuck inside this winter.

Be back soon,

Melanie

Slug Busters

Late summer is a tough time of year for the garden. The rich autumn colors still haven't started to emerge and yet the majority of our favorite perennials are long past their prime season.

This past weekend I was away for 4 days attending a seminar. While I was away, Long Island was socked with the remnants of a hurricane (down graded to a tropical storm). Walking around the garden today I noticed that not only were there many limbs and smaller branches littering my gardens, I saw that many of my hosta looked more like swiss cheese than pretty foliage.

Surprisingly though there were still many hosta with unblemished foliage. The above photo shows how Hosta 'Grand Marquee' looks today. Not only is it a late bloomer but as you can see, it is very slug resistant!

What about your hosta? Do you have varieties that are free of slug holes? If so, leave a comment here so everybody can see what works for you. I'm going to go around my garden again and try to make a longer list of Hosta that still look great.

Rudbeckia fulgida - Black Eyed Susan

One of the most well known perennials is the Black Eyed Susan. The only problem is, which black eyed susan do you have? You see, this is the problem with using nicknames instead of the botanical name of a plant.

Most often, the nickname Black Eyed Susan is referring to Rudbeckia fulgida. There are many different types of Rudbeckia, fulgida is a true perennial, ranging anywhere from 2 feet to almost 3 feet tall (under a meter).

If you look beyond the cheerful blooms you will see just how ratty the foliage looks at this time of year.

Still, ratty foliage or not, Rudbeckia fulgida is a highly valuable plant in the garden. First of all, it has a wonderfully long blooms season for a perennial. It begins blooming mid July or so around here and is still blooming strongly the first week of September.

Another thing I really like about Rudbeckia fulgida is that at this time of year it invites flocks of Goldfinch to the garden. They love to eat the seed heads so I don't remove those dead blooms.

You must keep in mind that if the birds are eating the seed heads, they are also scattering many of them about in the garden. Rudbeckia fulgida self sows itself all over the place. Not enough to be considered invasive but I'm sure I've given away or sold at least 500 plants in the last 7 years.
Another type of Rudbeckia that is fairly popular right now is the German hybrid Rudbeckia nitida 'Herbstsonne' (that means autumn sun). This type of Rudbeckia can grow as tall as 6 feet (two meters) and will flop about a bit if it's in an open, windy location.

It took me awhile to find the right place for 'Herbstsonne' but now I'm thrilled with it growing by the Miscanthus sinensis 'Strictus' (porcupine grass) and Eupatorium maculatum 'Gateway' (joe pye weed).

This summer I had a few Rudbeckia volunteers pop up in my herb garden. They aren't either of the above two types so I'm not sure of the variety.

There are also types of Rudbeckia that are annuals and I've grown them in containers in this garden so these might be seedlings from them. Then again, maybe the goldfinch dropped off the seed for me as a thank you for all the food I've provided them over the year.

What ever this variety is, I find it chamring with it's shorter, more blunt petals.

How many types of Rudbeckia do you grow in your garden?

Helenium 'Mardi Gras'

A few years ago (most likely 4 years ago) I purchased a plant that I knew nothing about. It was in a large pot, at least 1.5 gallons. The tag read Helenium 'Mardi Gras' and since I knew my garden didn't have enough late summer/early autumn blooms, I thought I'd give this one a try.


'Mardi Gras' has done more than I ever expected. It grew quickly although not at all aggressivly. It never flopped, it had wonderful colors in the blooms (as promised on the tag) and most importantly, it passed the division test.

This past spring my clump of Helenium 'Mardi Gras' had grown large enough that I felt I could take a chance and divide it. I simply dug it out of the ground the last week of April and cut it into pieces with my root knife. Those pieces were planted out in different parts of the garden where they took off growing as if nothing had happened to them.


You can see here in this less than artistic photo that Helenium 'Mardi Gras' stands upright. Not one of the newly planted pieces has flopped and every one of them is chock full of blooms right now.

Looking through some gardening catalogues I see there are other varieties of Helenium too. I think it's high time I add some more of these great perennials to my garden.

As a final note, I chose to post about this plant today specifically because Hurricane 'Gustav' is hammering the Gulf coast. My thoughts and prayers are with all the folks in the path of this storm.

In the garden today...

A short stroll around the garden today revealed these sights to me...

The Buddliea I had dead headed just two weeks ago is full of blooms again!

The garden is alive with luna moths (or cabbage moths) and they are in love with the Verbena bonariensis that has self sown all over.

The Miscanthus sinensis strictus (porcupine grass) is in it's glory even though it's not blooming yet.

Not everything is pretty as can be. The Sempervivum need weeding badly and it's not as easy as you would think to get those grass roots out without disturbing those hens and chicks. Also, I was amazed to see that they've lost their glorious spring colors.

The full shade bed out front is doing ok even without sunlight. The impatiens could be a bit more lush but the Hosta and newly tranplanted ferns are perfectly happy there.

Oohh! Check out the patterns emerging on my bird house gourd!

The Liriope which is oh so boring in the spring (and almost impossible to sell then) is the neatest edging and sending up lots and lots of bloom stalks.


One last peek on the way back to my computer. What do you do when you have too much of some flowers like Purple Perilla and coneflowers? Why you cut them and stick them in nice clear bottles!

Happy Labor day weekend all,

Melanie