Peonies and Rain

It's a given...or so it seems - when the peonies bloom we have thunderstorms and water pours from the sky. It rains buckets...cats and dogs...and sometimes just steady, light rain. The majority of our June days held showers or thunderstorms this year, making it hard to get decent photos of the peonies before they flopped.

Some days there have been glimpses of blue sky between the clouds.....

....but more often than not, the skies have been gray. If you click to enlarge the photos you'll see that there's a border of peonies across the front yard.

The largest, most spectacular Peony blooms are in the Lilac Garden. The yellow flowers are Evening Primrose (Oenothera) and the silver foliage is artemisia, which is a pretty filler, but needs to be thinned ruthlessly.

All my peonies are passalongs and, unfortunately, the names weren't passed along with the plants.

At the other end of the Lilac Garden the same light shade of pink blooms beside huge magenta flowers.

The background shrub is Weigela, and the red in front is self-sown Sweet William.

I actually photographed this first peony bloom on June 15th, but forgot to include it in my Bloom Day post.

Foxglove is still blooming, but the Columbine flowers are gone, leaving dozens of seed heads to be cut off before they pop open and spread themselves liberally.

I love this weigela!

Sweet William is a very easy care plant, and simple to move around by division or seed collection. This clump is in the Driveway Garden.

Campanulas are adding their lovely blue to the mix of colors at the moment, with Verbascum at their feet,

....and lemon lilies behind them here.

A few lovely white Campanulas are mixed in.

Down in the Fence Garden the Foxglove are still looking good,

...but the pretty white Lupine is finished.

I was pleased to see several beautiful blooms on the two white Peony bushes this year.

There's the tiniest touch of magenta on the edge of the center petals.

I still haven't managed to capture a decent photo of this border with most of the bushes looking good. The blooms are either drooping or dropping their lovely petals on the ground.

This lovely bloom has two glorious shades of pink.

This smaller flowered magenta Peony has the most delicious scent of all.

And it stands up well against the elements.

Oh look, there's a glimpse of blue sky!

Not so on this evening! I caught this golden light through the front porch as the sun was setting during a cloudburst. The air was warm, and mist swirled up toward the sky, creating a spectacular effect...breathtaking beauty indeed!

The pouring rain didn't deter this tiny hummingbird (click to enlarge if you'd like a closer look).

The first male arrived here on May 14th this spring....3 days later than last year.

His red throat is hard to capture with the light shining on it at just the right angle to make it show.

I saw the first sweet little lady on May 18th. It's very good to have our tiny friends back.

The abundant rain certainly makes everything grow fast, including the lawn and weeds! I'm having a very hard time keeping up with everything, especially with days like yesterday, when the rain poured down for most of the day.

We've also had a visit from our son and DIL and our two little grandsons, which was wonderful fun, and a nice respite from the garden chores. But today we're seeing snatches of sun, so it's back to work, and hopefully I'll get something accomplished between the rain drops.

Oh dear, I spoke too soon and the rain is pouring down again now.....

One good thing about the rain is that I've had plenty of chances to wear my Muck Boots and I've found I like them so much that I wanted to mention them again. This is totally voluntary. It's not often I find a product I like so much and want to share. It was such a pleasure to do business with them, and they didn't request this as part of the offer (just a link in a post), but I want to put a link to the Garden Shoes Online site on my sidebar just to say thank you to those good people for these wonderful shoes.

Thanks so much to all who have visited and left a comment on my recent infrequent posts. So sorry if I haven't managed to visit and comment in return. I'm working on it, and hope to catch up with you all eventually! Isn't it ironic that when the most is going on in our Northern hemisphere gardens we're often too busy to visit each other?

Wishing all my American friends a very

happy Fourth of July,

and may God bless our country!

P.S. The rain has stopped and the sun is shining again! I'm off to the garden right after lunch, but I'd better hurry! Hope to see you soon!

Appreciating the Beauty

There's just so much beauty to appreciate with spring bringing color back to the landscape, flowers to the gardens, leaves to the trees, birds, bees and other critters, large and small to keep us entertained....
My camera has had quite a workout these past couple of months, but unfortunately, I haven't been able to squeeze in much time to post or read blogs. However, I want to share some of the beauty with you, so here is a look back at May.....

Just after Bloom Day these gorgeous pink tulips opened fully,

along with the creeping phlox,

and the combination delighted us from early morning until late evening for the rest of the month.

The last petals are falling now, and sadly, the show is over until next year, although the phlox are still blooming,

And so it the dainty Aubrietta.

I love this pretty pastel mix of colors.

The Dynasty tulips looked more orange in some lights, and in others, more pink. They have both colors in the large blooms.

Angelique gets the prize for the longest blooming tulips. She's still going, but is beginning to fade now.

Such sweet double blooms.

Down in the Rock Garden they paired nicely with the Basket of Gold perennial allysum.

Hannah was enjoying the morning tour of the gardens with me, along with Jasmine, who was just out of the picture.

These frilly blooms beg for close-ups!

I like the Basket of Gold against the rocks.

These dark Johnny Jump-ups popped up next to another rock.

It was hard to resist taking lots of shots of the pink and purple mix. Isn't that a beautiful blue sky?

May certainly was a month of purple! Alium is still blooming in several gardens, but the biggest clump is in the Driveway Garden.

It's a relative of the onion, but much prettier....clusters of purple stars!

I've seen it in a gorgeous deep purple, paired with this lighter shade, in a garden I pass on the way to work. It's someone I know.....I wonder if they'd be willing to share....maybe I have something they'd like.

Johnny Jump-ups (viola cornuta, aka Heartease) are just the right color to tuck in next to them.

Chives, a smaller look-alike, and another onion relative, are beginning to bloom now, as well.

Centaurea (perennial Bachelor's Button or Cornflower) is still going strong.

The white tulips bloomed with the lilacs.....

...up in the Top Driveway Garden.....

...along with a clump of the purple iris.

Isn't this the most delectable color?

You may have noticed that I find myself taking lots of photos of those peacefully grazing cows :)

We are so enjoying seeing them in the pasture! (click to enlarge any photo)

The Rose/Clematis Garden gets plenty of morning sun....

...and in this garden the iris are almost finished, but the peach colored Beverly Sills began blooming today. She'll have to wait for another post because I haven't tranferred her photos from the camera yet, and this post is already too long.

The lilacs really deserve a post of their own because they were so glorious this year, but they'll have to squeeze into this one.

My dear husband has planted a row of several different colored lilacs over the past several years, but they're still small. The larger ones are 3 varieties of the common color.

They're finished now after what seemed a very short period of time, but it was actually about 3 weeks.

This old lilac has been here for a very long time. My husband thinks it was here when they moved into this house when he was a little boy.

It was prettier this year than I can ever remember noticing before.

I'll have to save pictures of the bleeding hearts, and more, for next time.

I really am hoping to find time for blog reading soon, and hopefully then I'll catch up with you and see what you've all been up to. Meanwhile, I'll just wave at you from here, and assure you that I haven't forgotten you. In fact, I think of you often!

I hope you're enjoying your gardens as much as I am.