Category: Gardening (Page 1 of 177)

I had the day off yesterday for Veteran’s Day. I was afraid I was going to waste the entire day, but I didn’t!

In the morning, I went to the doctor’s office to have a regularly-scheduled blood test. They are usually so hard to do because of school, but I was off on a weekday! Good job, Brad!

After that, I went to get the oil changed in my car. It wasn’t even that much overdue. And since it was a weekday, there wasn’t even a line. Good job, Brad!

When I got home, I sat on the couch a little, but then I got up again and mowed the lawn. I did the full trimming and edging treatment, not just a quick mow. Good job, Brad!

Here’s the before and after:

And, for the memory archive, I had to replace the trimmer string.

The last time I did that was… checking… fifteen months ago. That seems pretty good – a year and a quarter. I had an easier time of it than before, so that’s good.

I went to water the houseplants in my bedroom, and noticed that the cabinet they’re sitting on was dirty. Dang it. I just cleaned that off where did all that detritus come from?

I investigated a little further, and noticed that the leaves of my pilea peperomioides had bites taken out of it. All that stuff on the cabinet was poop. Yuck! And what the heck was eating my houseplant?

I searched all over and found it:

There was a worm eating my plant. That’s so weird! How did it get into my house? After thinking about it, I figured it out – I took all my plants outside when my house was tented for termites. Something must’ve laid eggs on my plant while it was out there.

I took the worm outside and left it in my yard – better treatment than it deserved, for the damage it did.

A while back, one of the garden centers I really like closed. HERE’S a record of one of my visits there. When they closed, there was a sign on the gate that said they were moving, but when I went to check it out the new location, it looked like nothing was happening. Were they just closed forever?

No! They aren’t closed forever! I went to the new location yesterday. They have finally finished moving!

It was so cool. It’s a giant open space like a grocery store or CVS, but there are no aisles, just lots and lots of plants, and lots of grow lights on the ceiling.

The old place had an amazing succulent selection running along the front of the building. This is the picture from that old post:

Would they still have that wonderful collection?

Yes, yes they do! It was so fun to look at it.

And I think I know what I want the place I live in to look like when I retire. I want a giant room full of plants with grow lights all over the ceiling. And a bed and a couch.

There’s only one plant in my back yard that is from the previous owner. It’s a Christmas fern. It’s tough, and green, and covers the water pipes my hose is connected to.

And the termite tenting killed it.

Yesterday, I was cutting away some of the dead leaves.

And then I saw it – a new leaf! It’s all green and alive-looking!

I’m so happy! The fern is alive!

I planted some chocolate flowers (berlandiera lyrata) this summer. My first flower opened about three months ago. Now the plants are really big, and there are LOTS of flowers.

Yesterday on my way to our two-hour Saturday church choir rehearsal (which I am mentioning for memory archive purposes), I could smell the chocolate flowers when I stepped out my front door. The scent was so strong and delicious! Yum!

There are a lot of flowers now. My roses are suffering from some kind of affliction, so they look bad, but the chocolate flowers? They’re looking sunny and cheery and beautiful!