Port Potager

May and June are the prettiest — and most aromatic — months in the garden. Here’s a taste of what’s busting out all over this month: Alyssum , miniature petunias, cosmos, pansies, and sweet potato vine. Coleus, miniature petunias, impatiens, and heucherella.  Peonies, snow in summer, veronica, and Siberian iris.   Irises.

Despite the cold, slow start to our spring, flowers are blooming all around us. Many of the flowers I've planted this year were selected for their scent in addition to how they look, and now it's clear that this was a great decision: Catching the scent of flowers on the breeze is one of the best parts of being outside in the springtime. Here's what's blooming now: Irises , which smell like violets. Actual violets (which, unsurprisingly, smell like violets). Chamomile , which smells like apples. Stock , which smells like cloves and baby powder (which is to say, they smell wonderful enough to make me break my rule against fuchsia flowers). A close-up of the white stock shows how nice they look, too. The lilac is a bit past its prime in the looks department, but still smells great. Sweet woodruff , which smells like vanilla and fresh-cut hay. Heliotrope , which smells sort of like grapes or fruit punch. ...

Yesterday I wrote about the half of the perennial border that runs along the driveway . Today we'll walk around the corner to see the rest of it along the path that leads across the yard to the front door. Around the corner from the climbing roses, Siberian irises, and sedum ground cover is some white salvia. Behind the salvia is some red bee balm, which is just starting to bloom. The bees love  this section of the flower garden! There's also a male holly busy and another smallish peony (I really like the way these look even when the bloom is over, so I have a lot of them). Across the front is a wide swath of hardy mums that will bloom in the fall. Like I said, there are a lot of chrysanthemums here. Behind the mums are white lilies, Shasta daisies, and the female holly bush (that's the one that will have the berries in the winter). Beyond the holly the border widens near the front door. Across the back is a boxwood, rhododendron, and a big clump o...

Perhaps you recall that last summer I spent a month in Costa Rica . During that time, Kirk took care of the garden by himself. He did a great job keeping up with the vegetables, but there wasn't any time left for just one person (with a day job) to keep up the perennial border. So this year it needed a lot of work. All the weeds that weren't pulled last year went to seed, so I had my work cut out for me in that department. There were also some plants that didn't make it through the winter and others that were in serious need of dividing.  The best part of summer vacation is having the time to get lost in an outdoor task, and that's just what I did this past weekend. Or maybe week. It's nice to forget what day it is, too. Anyway, here's the result of the perennial border overhaul. This section will take us from the garden gate along the driveway to the corner of the bed.  Immediately outside the garden gate at the top of the driveway is a cl...

When I wasn't at the ball fields for the kids' baseball games this past (long) weekend, I finally was able to tackle a project I'd been meaning to get to all spring. The weather decided to cooperate (mostly), and I buckled down got to work on updating the perennial border.  The harsh winter we had wasn't at all kind to some of our perennials. Several plants that normally wouldn't have trouble overwintering died back to just a few scraggly stems, or bit the dust completely. Some casualties included both artemisia, some stonecrop, the carnations, and most of a heucherella (if you're really interested in the evolution of the border, you can scroll through previous posts about it to see just what I'm talking about). This left me with some holes to fill this year, which I did my moving some existing things around and buying some new plants. My hatchback full of plants include a white peony ("Mrs. Edward Harding"), three white salvia (...

Happy summer solstice! The flowers in these bouquets have definitely rounded the corner from spring to summer as well. Fewer formal garden bulbs, more free-form wildflower types. Poppy, salvia, and yarrow. Roses. Peonies. Delphinium, lilies, blanket flower, and rose "Golden Celebration." Salvia, blanket flower, and yarrow. Salvia, lilies, delphinium, and yarrow. Foxglove and lupine.

When it rains every day, it's hard to get out to bring in flowers — way too messy when they are dripping wet. Only two new arrangements this week, even though there are lots of flowers in bloom outside. Foxglove and peonies. Delphinium, valerian, globeflower, yarrow, and columbine.

Tropical Storm Andrea dumped a ton of rain on us last Friday, which did a number on the perennial border. I expected this: Peonies are gorgeous, but they don't do well in the rain. In general, the white flower garden requires more fastidious deadheading, because white petals turn to brown in a blink.  Knowing that the rains would clobber a lot of our spring blooms, I made sure to snap some photos before  the rain. Early June is one of my favorite moments in this garden: Here you can see that some giant white peonies are already flopping over. I have them in a hoop, but I don't think it's a tall enough one to handle the weight of these flowers. You can also see red climbing roses poking up above the peonies and small white geraniums. These need to be trellised, and should eventually fan up the side of the window. On the corner of the border you can see another rose bush trying to climb without a trellis. When we build one, it will go up the corner of the...