Why I Oughta...

All the way back in Spring of 2018, I planted a couple of ferns on the northside of our screened porch - in a spot that is in (I think) total shade all day long.  It felt like the right spot for ferns and hostas - at least as a temporary measure until I figure out the path/pavers that will run alongside the little bed.  One of them was an Autumn Fern.  The other is this Japanese Painted Fern.  Last September - almost exactly a year ago today - I posted a photo of this fern that was trying to establish itself after a rough Summer .  It was showing just.a.little.bit of growth then, but I was hopeful that this fern was going to make it.  The photo at the top of this post is from this week - and you can see that this Japanese Painted Fern has really come back and is spreading itself out in a big way.  I had a Japanese Painted Fern back in Elmhurst - that came back for a few years (when it wasn't smothered by mulch!) - so this isn't my first one of these varieties that ha

Just like the pair of rhododendrons on either side of our back stoop , our small (but growing!) Saucer Magnolia multi-step tree in our front yard is preparing itself for hibernation by setting buds this early Fall.  This Saucer Magnolia tree didn't flower this Spring - which was a disappointment - but grew (according to my tree height inventory) by almost two feet in height .   I documented the first year of flowers - in Spring of 2018 - here .   This year, the tree leaves stayed green and didn't get any Sooty Mold like it has had in previous years .   I'll try to document the buds after all of the leaves fall off this Fall/Winter to provide a comparison against what the naked tree looked like in February of 2018 here .

At the beginning of the season this year, I planted three small Gold Cone Juniper shrubs .  And they took off with the wet Spring and put on a great show .  After reading all about these particular juniper shrubs, I decided to 'wire them up' to ensure that they don't suffer from splaying based on snow fall in the Winter.  By June, I had wired them up and they looked great .  Then, we hit the hot part of Summer with July and August.  And the shrubs are showing signs of stress.  I'm posting this photo in the [ garden diary ] here on the blog to show the emerging brown spots on some of the shrub.  It is on the 'backside' mostly, so I'm wondering if it is both water/drought-related, but perhaps also sun-related?  The backside gets less sun than the front.  I also wonder if the 'wiring up' caused some of the stress?    I've done this dance before in the Fall - are the trees/shrubs that are showing signs of stress going to make it through the Wi

Early Fall brings sad news in the backyard:  my little Emerald Falls Weeping Cedar is gone.  I can comfortably call it now.  Planted in May of 2018 , it was a tree that I'd been dreaming about for a while.  I baby'd it all last Summer and by the end of August of 2018, it was looking plump and happy .  Then we had a hard Winter.  And the tree was stressed this Spring.  I was looking for any positive sign - even thinking that young, immature cedar trees occasionally turn brown - but that ended up being a true sign of stress.    But by May, it was fighting on: showing signs of new growth and pushing the brown out to the extremities.  Alas, after watering it with a soaker hose this Summer, you can see the pile of needles laying on the ground there.  This one is dead.  And in the tracking of things, this Weeping Cedar is the third tree I've lost this season.  Other ones are:  a small Canadian Hemlock and the Weeping Flowering Cherry tree .  And eighth total tree tha

Walt’s Favorites pic.twitter.com/rhBjQrbwtI — Matt (@HorizonsOne) July 28, 2019 Found this stuff from the Walt Disney Family Museum  via a tweet from @HorizonsOne here  that I thought was worth shining a light on with a blog post. This is a handwritten list of "favorites" from Walt Disney in terms of what he wanted to eat - and the note says that he did this to help his housekeeper Thelma Howard .  The "Jello - All Flavors with Pieces of Fruit" is the one that jumps out to me.   Don't know why...but I love everything about this.  I posted about another little display from the Walt Disney Family Museum that we saw at the Carthay Circle Restaurant in Disney's California Adventure from our trip in January this year. 

I've covered Halloween inflatables here on the blog over the years - but they've mostly been about Menards.  Like this Blinking Owl from a few years back .  Or these two big inflatables that Nat allows me to put on the porch for a few weeks the past two years.   This year Menards has gone all-in on Jack Skellington, Sally and Oogie Boogie from 'The Nightmare Before Christmas'. But, I've been going to Home Depot a little bit more regularly than I was in the past and discovered their Halloween section this season and am delighted (and surprised) by all the Beetlejuice stuff there.  The biggest piece in the whole section is this inflatable, animated Sand Worm that you can see in the photo above. The center-most worm moves - and you can see it in this brief video below: That's not the only Beetlejuice item - they also have another giant Sand Worm, but this time, it has a screen on the face of it to broadcast movies.  They claim to use 'projection

List of 20 "great shade plants" via Garden Design - story here . I've written many a post about shade gardening and how my mother was a 'shade gardener' and therefore I, too, am a shade gardener.  So, whenever I come across a piece online about shade gardening, I pay attention.  I recently saw this Garden Design story that highlights 20 plants that do well in the shade .  Their list of 20 includes four trees, ten flowering plants and six foliage plants for shade - and it is those that I think are worth posting here for my reference.  Six Foliage Plants for Shade: 1.  Hostas 2.  Coral Bells 3.  Ferns 4.  Caladium 5.  Coleus 6.  Japanese Forest Grass The companion to this list of great shade plants is this slideshow that talks about shade garden design .  Posting this, too, as part of my landscape inspiration collection.