Garden happiness 2020

 I've never been a fan of iris really because they only bloom once and take up a lot of space and their roots get all entangled, but these ones were planted before we moved here and I've enjoyed them more the last couple years. Really pretty color.

One thing about me that hasn't changed over the years is my love for my garden flowers. Texas has been a big learning curve for me that I'm only just beginning to get a hold of here as the climate is so different from anywhere else I've lived. 

It is simply too hot for many things to make it through the summer. Because my front yard is so shady I can't grow many sun-loving plants out there. I will eventually do some landscaping in the backyard where I will be able to plant those.

We bought these rosebushes at Home Depot on clearance because they were all kind of struggling. They've done great. Peter and I are overly proud of our bargin buy.

These aren't technically mine because they come over the fence from the neighbors, but I still enjoy them.

 Our first year in Texas of course I planted nothing as we were in a rental and I didn't have interest in anything about that yard. I mowed it and kept it neat and that was about it. Our first year in this house I planted nothing, but enjoyed what we had. It didn't feel permanent yet and we had moved around so much after I had put so much TLC into our yards I wasn't willing to put an emotional investment into the yard yet. The following summer we added a few plants, and then quite a few more the following. Last year I really went to town and threw in a bunch of stuff to see what thrived and what didn't. A lot of gardening for me is trial and error, and certainly so here where I've never tried things before.

This was the first gardenia I've ever grown in a garden. Never lived anywhere they thrived before.

 This was the spread I planted last year. I planted and planted to burn off the stress I was feeling at school at the time, especially clinicals. This was the hardest semester for me thus far in nursing school. My clinical instructor took a serious dislike to me and I came home almost every day feeling like I was going to fail out or I just wasn't cut out to be a nurse. I had to have my gardening. Some of my fellow students thought it was so funny I'd go home after a hard day and attack the yard and others understood because they were doing it too. I guess if you get it you get it.

Here is the bed this year. I planted more bulbs this year so I'm excited to see if those come up. The little gnome there is something my dad got me. 
As Sarah would say, these plants luh this rain.

This Chinaberry big tree hangs over the driveway and makes a huge mess all year but I don't care because I like it anyway.

My neighbor used to try to talk me into cutting it down. 

Fat chance. 

It smells so good when it blooms but the blooms don't last more than a couple weeks at most.

I sweep the driveway almost every day. The thing about Texas is there is no yardwork season. You do yard work all year, which I like most of the time. The leaves never end. Some of the trees drop leaves in the fall and the oaks push all theirs off to make way for the new ones in the spring. I do a lot of raking and my trick of mowing the leaves still works for me very well.

I mean, really. Who would want to cut down a tree in this yard when you can have sweet shade like this in Texas.

 Lately we've had some crazy thunderstorms and that leaves a mess all over the yard as well.

These are some pics from our storm on Friday. There was a bunch of fallen trees down at the park near out neighborhood. Then Saturday night we had tornado warnings all night and more rain, and then of course our lil' Nacho came:)

Perk of all the falling branches is that I was able to put this out.

The branches wilted in a couple days so I went out and harvested these. I haven't brought in roses from my yard yet because they aren't the picking kind, but this came out really nice for Easter. I think I'll plant some more that you can display for longer.

I never get tired of planting flowers or having plants in my house. 

In another life I'd be a botanical photographer.