Cancelled on Account of Heat!

Absolutely no work was done this Wednesday.  Heat has rolled into Central Virginia like July, instead of June.  All that got done was watering the veggie and herb gardens.

Don't know what variety this clematis is, but it's always the last to bloom.  Some of the early varieties are into their second bloom already.

But we are coming into the prettiest part of the summer, so i did make time to visit a few things. 

These water iris don't last long, but are so pretty for a few days.

The "red" day lilies are starting to bloom.

Had planned to do a bit more in the top of this planter,  but the heat caught me.  If it cools off, I still may add something else.   This is Echinacea 'Double Scoop' PPAF - gorgeous!  All those spring bulbs are underneath.

Even the shade plants are cooperating.  This hosta has more than doubled this year. 

Hope things are pretty in your garden, too!

Flowers in the House

Finally!  It's flower time and time to invite you in for a glass of iced tea and a bit of floral fun!  

Our friends Elizabeth and Charles were here for the weekend, so we had more flowers inside than usual.

On the dining room table there's a pitcher of mixed flowers - Bee balm, salvia, snapdragons, cone flowers and yarrow with Solomon's Seal for greenery. 

On the coffee table, the only mophead hydrangea we have so far - Hydrangea macrophylla 'Bailmer' PPAF.  It's an everyblooming variety that I hope will bloom again later this summer,  but this was literally the only flower on the entire bush.

In fairness to the hydrangeas of the world, I also did a vase of the other one that is blooming.  This is another ever blooming variety, but somehow I have never felt any excitement about it.  Lace caps can be lovely, but this one hasn't much color and just seems dull. [Hydrangea macrophylla 'Lady in Red', with white and purple salvia, and angelonia.]

Finally, a few zinnias on the dresser in the guest room, just so they would know they were welcome!

So glad you stopped by.  Hoped to have a little sweet* to serve you ... but we ate it all this weekend.   Thanks to Jane for getting us organized and pushing us out into the garden to cut a posey or two. 

* 'Berry Shortcake Fool from Marie Viljoen's "66 Square Feet: A Delicious Life", page 99.  Plates were licked!

Wednesday Workdays

Not all the work is going on outside right now.  Changes are happening inside, too.

As soon as we got settled in our "new" house - 14 years ago - we put up valencies in the living/dining/great room as part of our initial decorating.

 A soft brocade fabric with lots of muted jewel tones.

We chose a muted print of  jewel colors in a "stained glass" print.  We loved the warm, cozy colors and it gave us a lot of possibilities for other fabrics and paint, but I knew from the start that someday I would also get "summer valences" to lighten and brighten for the summer months.

Over the past year, i returned to really, really wanting to get it done. 

In the magazines that pile up every month around here, I found lots of things I liked.  Mostly, tho, I realized that one of the big current trends is definitely for lighter, brighter colors and the use of lots of colors together.  And, that led to our "renovation".

They are really a Chinese type chrysanthemum, but have both a sunny feeling and a bit of sea creature - can't you see an urchin or even a many-tenacled octopus or squid?

We found a wonderful burnt orange and white print that pulls lots of summery color in to the rooms, while it echoes the shape of our sun/moon wall hanging. 

 

With Mitchell was out a couple of evenings, I spread out fabic on the dining table and cut, cut, cut.  And, then sewed, sewed, sewed and voila!

 

And, of course, I needed to pull it down from the tops of the windows into the main body of the room so a pillow or two followed.

 Now we feel positively modern ... and newly decorated!

Changes at the Pond, too

We were fairly lucky to not lose a lot over the past winter - damage on a couple of trees and some shrubs, and the loss of a season of hydrangeas, but over all nothing too bad.  Except for the Clethera [Clethera alnifolia 'Ruby Spice'].  

Fully leafed out and beginning to bloom in 2011, it was a beautiful, big shrub.

It was always the last shrub to leaf out, so I didn't pay a lot of attention when it seemed a bit slower than usual this year, and then suddenly last week I realized that absolutely everything else was fully leafed out - even the crepe myrtles.  Something was definitely wrong.  

Last weekend it looked like this:

Closer inspection showed that the trunks were in very bad shape - so bad that the entire older part was very dead.  Over the long weekend I cut it out, leaving the side shoots that had leafed out and hoping that time will help it fill out into a shrub again. 

See the damage on the bark?  All the major stems showed this.  I fear it's a disease and not just the bad winter weather.

That left a huge hole in the "landscape" next to the pond, so I spent the rest of the morning re-doing that whole area.  

The side stems are leafing out and I hope that they will thrive now that there is no competition.

 I moved iris, yarrow and ajuga to fill in the space and mulched it all in.  A bit of TLC and I hope it will look good - and healthy - in a few weeks.