Love for the Garden – Mid Spring

This post is going to be pretty picture heavy because it’s all about what’s blooming in my garden right now (mid to late April). It is so beautiful, and there is so much going on it really stimulates me and calms me at the same time. I feel that I am (almost) unbelievably fortunate to live here and to take care of this garden. Please join me for a mid-spring tour…

As you pull up to the driveway, phlox greet you on the left. There were some daffodils blooming as well, but they have finished for the season.

On the right, the front bed is starting to fill in with hostas, blooming azaleas, daffodils, hellebores, sedum, and more!

New fern fronds are pushing up all over too:

The front of the house is also starting to come alive with more color as the azaleas are starting to bloom, and the pink dogwood is big and bold.

I think I may need to cut back the nandina just so I can see the pink azaleas blooming behind them. The camelia to the left of the stairs has been going crazy with blooms for the last two weeks too:

And here’s a view of the front yard from our Dining Room window:

I love looking out the windows! You can see there are some white dogwoods blooming in the median across the street, and our Japanese Maple out front has filled out with leaves. It feels so good to have leaves on the trees again.

Now going up the side yard from the front:

With leaves on the trees, we have dappled shade again which I’m sure our shade loving plants are wanting as the weather turns warmer.

And here’s a view of the same side yard from the back looking towards the front:

Continuing down the yard, we come to the vegetable garden. It really has a cacophony of other flowers growing, including wood poppies, sedum, phlox, daffodils, iris, azaleas, a dwarf crape myrtle, roses, and I’m not sure what else. We plan on putting in a few tomato plants in the cages, and hopefully find some room for peppers, zucchini, cucumber, and herbs. Whatever we don’t have room for in the garden, we hope to put in containers on the deck.

Here’s a view of the vegetable garden from the deck:

Now walking down the slate path, here’s a close up of the wood poppies.

They have gotten quite large, and stand about 18″ tall now.

Continuing down the path, we come to the first set of stairs going down to the lower terrace, where I have another Japanese Maple growing:

Looking up from the bench at the bottom:

It is so nice to just sit and enjoy the view.

There’s even stuff going on behind the bench:

There’s so much texture and color back here. Another Japanese Maple, hostas, wood poppies, azaleas, ferns, daffodils, spirea, and more trees and shrubs that I don’t the names of (yet).

Closer to the stream, there are some nice arrangements with hostas in planters:

And even though it’s now late April, I still have some daffodils blooming:

At first I thought there were just a few varieties, but as the month wore on, I realized there are several different kinds of daffodils out there, including this pretty all white variety:

There is a lot going on in the lower level:

The azaleas are just starting to bloom, and the whole hillside is covered with them.

Mr. Lucky and I finally got the bottom baths cleared out. I pulled weeds, and he raked up the leaves.

Going back up the other path:

At the top of the hill, which is at the bottom of the driveway, the Crimson Queen Japanese Maple is blooming. (I thought it was a Dragon variety, but I found the information card in the box she left).

The flowers are really small and delicate looking:

What a view from the top of the driveway!

There’s another path from the driveway around the back of the house, where I am so happy to see the purple oxalis coming back:

It’s amazing how much comes out day to day. Here’s a view of the backyard from over a week ago, and the azaleas are barely budding.

The weather has been nice enough that we’ve been able to enjoy eating and relaxing out in the “sky room”. I would just leave the windows open in the house too if it weren’t for the green pollen that is everywhere and coating everything at the moment.

I’m so glad I could share my garden with you!

 

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