When The Sun Shines Through the North Window

Summer is actually my favorite time of the year.  I'd rather have it be 85 and humid, rather than 20 and snowy.   I know a lot of people disagree with me, but I love summertime. 

For about two months from the end of May until the end of July, the sun rises early enough in the morning that it actually shines in the north windows of our house.  It's pretty neat to see the sun shine coming in my office window at 6:15 a.m.  It's sort of mentally invigorating. 

We've had a lot of hot weather this summer, but we've also had our fair share of rain making everything nice and green and really helping out our garden and plants.  On the 4th of July, we had 4.5 inches of rain.  Five days later, we had 3 inches of rain.  And a couple days after that, we had another half-inch. 

This week, alone, we've gotten over 5 inches of MORE rain.  After being rather dry in May and June, the water table in the ground is very high, but the hot weather is still baking the top layer.

With all that said, and more for the entertainment of my sisters who like to see what we've done with the yard each year, I've taken some pictures of our yard to show how our flowers and plants look this year.  If your "give-a-shit" factor is low for this, you have my permission to skip the rest of this entry, provided that you promise to come back and visit again on Monday.

First of all, here's our back berm loaded with perennial wild flowers and a few bushes.  Cindy thinks it's a jungle, but I think it's kinda neat. (As always, click on the picture to get a larger image.)

And here are our tomato plants this year.  We had some decorative brick left over from our landscaping from last year and I wanted to make a border for the small garden we have.  I was actually going to use wood barriers, but Cindy said, "Why don't you use some of that brick that's out back?"

Duh!  So I did.  It took me about a half hour to do.  It actually turned out pretty well.  We only did a couple of tomato plants this year - one plant of Better Boy tomatoes, and the other just cherry tomatoes.  We had so many tomatoes last year that we were sick of 'em by the end of August. 

We're hoping they're more manageable this year.  We've gotten some of the cherry tomatoes and, so far, they're great.  I picked a couple of the Better Boy tomatoes last weekend.  I've been on the road all week so it will be interesting to see how they look when I get home.   

Here's part of my herb garden along the back of the garage.  We have regular basil, lemon basil, lime basil, oregano, garlic chives, and dill weed back there.  I also have an old tub by the back of the house that has parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme growing in it.  By the way, you may be able to see my small red pepper bush growing in the pot in the background.

Here's the back of the house with all the petunias, the baskets and the herb tub.  I got the idea for the herb tub from my brother-in-law.  The lady across the street was throwing out an old wash tub on her curb one day and I asked her if I could have it.  She said, "Sure, as long as it doesn't come back to me!"  Now we cut off herbs and take 'em over to her. 

We've had one helluva time getting anything to grow around and under our big maple tree up front.  One year, Cindy planted over $120 worth of begonias trying to emulate something she saw when we were out in Omaha.  But the maple tree just sucked the water out of the ground around it and the begonias just never grew.  So, she decided she was going to plant perennials and ground cover and it's turned out great.  There's a little color to it in the spring, but for the most part, it's just cover for the summer months.

One of our north side window boxes with the sun shining on it on an early summer morning.  Like I say, this is my favorite time of the year.  I like to get up first thing and walk around the yard and look at all the plants.  Even though I may have done the same thing the night before, I always seem to find something new or different during my morning walks around the yard.

We lost nearly every one of our rose bushes that were planted on the side of our garage.  We had a couple of cold snaps in the winter, but we had them covered up sufficiently.  However, we had a warm March and the rose bushes began to bud out.  Then in early April, we had three or four days of a hard freeze and I was told by a guy at a greenhouse that's probably what did 'em in.   This is a picture of last year's rose bushes.  I didn't even bother taking a picture of the rose garden this year.  We've sort of let it go to hell, although Cindy been trying to weed it out now that she's feeling better.

We did have luck with the rose bushes close to the house on the east side.  I'm thinking that the warmth of the house along with the morning sunshine probably helped those roses out.  Here's a nice close up of one of my favorite roses.  Notice the navy blue tinge along the outer sections of the petals.

Here's another one just getting ready to open up.  I really like the yellow ones, but I had a couple favorites that we lost in the rose garden.  We'll have to start from scratch next spring.  I'm bummed because some of those rose bushes were getting to be big and tall. 

Here's a couple shots of the back berm.  With all the rain, the grass in the yard just greened right up - almost as green as it was when it first came back in the spring.  And the flowers and plants in the berm have just gone nuts, too.  Like I say, Cindy thinks it's a jungle, but I think it looks pretty cool.

Here's the east side of the house with all the flowers and plants.  We actually did lose a couple rose bushes along this row, as well, but they weren't as established as the other ones that lived. 

Here's a close up shot of the window box on the east side.  Cindy does a great job with the flowers in these boxes.  We didn't have the window boxes when we moved in five years ago.  I thought they'd look pretty neat, so I designed them and got all the cedar wood planks to build them.  Cindy's dad came down and we built them, painted them and hung them over a weekend about three years ago.  Actually, they're over-built - but that's the way Cindy's dad is.  The house would collapse, but the flower boxes would probably still be intact.

And here's a picture of the front of our house with the wild roses and Cindy's flowers that she planted up there this year.  I know most of the people in the neighborhood think we're nuts, but they sure do complement us on how great things look when they stroll past the house and we're out in the yard.  It's a hobby - an expensive hobby - but I really do like how the flowers and plants look.  I'm sure we'll keep doing it for a number of years.