in the past few weeks I have written and ditched several posts here. Sometimes it can be a challenge  to try to stay fresh and ineresting while also maintaining life  outside the garden.

In an effort to catapult myself out of the doldrums, i am going to be writing a series of posts that are actually part of one of my presentations called “The Best Fall Garden Ever “. The goal of the presenatation is to teach tips and tricks,from  plant selection to maintenance that will ensure your garden in August , September  and into October and November even is just as inviting and interesting as your early summer space. 

In New england it is the greatest thing we can do for ourseves as gardeners to extend our season.

Each post will appear on  Friday, starting this one June 24  with  some June  chores that will help you out later on.

other topics will iclude:

annual vines

top longest blooming perennials ( sun and shade)

my top picks for can’t live without late season plants

container plants on the cheap that look amazing in the late season

my top picks for easy to grow annuals that lengthen the season

shrubs for autumn interest

trees that make Fall sparkle

hips, berries, seed pods and seed heads

Places to visit to see Fall Garden inspiration

and anything else i feel like jabbering on about.

I hope you follow along !!!!

last week there was sort of a lull in the garden. Once growing season starts these lulls are few and far between and seriously last a couple of days at most, although they feel like eons to me.

Well, I left here for  3 days and came back to a bloom-splosion! Columbines, azaleas, clematis, daisies, calycanthus, lilacs, lilacs, and more lilacs, , the red horse chestnut tree, catmint, bearded iris all over the place, geraniums, honeysuckle, verbena,  moss phlox, the many ajuga varieties, baptisias , lupines;the list goes on and on

the garden looks amazing and the fragrance is divine wherever you go.

these are the times i am glad t be a gardener

Wil and I visit a lot of gardens, it is his favorite activity 😉

This weekend I dragged brought him to Trade Secrets in Northwestern CT , which is often described as the “Northeast’s garden event of the season” to shop at all the vendor booths on Saturday and view the four gardens on tour Sunday.  The vendors are usually quite high end with unusual garden antiques and plants and the gardens are most certainly not your typical suburban plots to say the least.

In the 6 years of this blog I think I have yet to  write a post describing another garden , although in the course of that time I have seen probably hundreds. I seldom take pictures when on tours either. I think that it is because I know that these places are meant to be enjoyed in the moment, and most certainly the one thing they all have in common is that with each passing day they will look quite different than they did today.

having your garden on tour always brings up the fact that, if you are public in anyway, either in books, a website, or via  Open Days , your visitors have set images in their mind of what they will be looking for. That can make you crazy as the flowers grow, bloom and sometimes disappear altogether on their own course and you can control none of it. Add in the fact that we gardeners are always changing things up, shuffling things around and re-staging areas  and no garden ever looks the same year to year. If, for instance you see my presentation on vines and then come looking for the scene of one of the photos/combinations that may have inspired you, chances are very good you will not see it. Every year I change the vines I grow, mostly to trail new things to keep my presentations fresh and updated, but also out of boredom.

That is a very long-winded into to the original point of this post…..to see the “Moments” I captured in the gardens we toured Sunday. If you want to read about their history origin, planting schemes, and owners you can read the many books by the owners who are designers and writers or use google 🙂

The first garden was that of Michael Trapp, a dealer in hefty imported garden accents/statuary etc whose formal gardens were intended to enhance the  incredible views on the property. My favorite moments

-This little scene where the tips of the alliums where touching the bottom branches of the carefully espaliered apple tees

-the Montana like big sky , here broken by the barn , silo and cupola

-this little nook near the reflecting pool to sit and chill

On Carolyne Roehms’ Weatherstone estate , there was much to take in and it was all very spread out. My favorite moments

– In the willow edged parterre there were  what I assume are flowers for cutting (peonies, roses, alliums, and tulips were prominent now) These tulips just happened to be catching the sun behind them during our visit

– a very formal and striking veranda by the pool

-and my favorite of all, the white pine and other seedlings trying to grow atop a moss covered cement pillar that was anchoring a gate 

At Bunny Williams, this pretty pink trillium caught my eye

her property is incredible….new design studio perched on a hill overlooking  the world below

( drool), a to die for pool house with just a big enough kitchen and bathroom area to avoid being ostentatious (double drool)  , a converted barn with a huge hearth and attached sunroom ( triple drool)

but those things , although beautiful, are not in my future.

A stand of copper beeches under-planted with a huchera of  the same foliage color may be though

I adore white tulips, and these planted in the box parterre  (anyone who is anyone in northwestern CT has a parterre) were dreamy.

Our last stop was Lion Rock Farm, where we could have spent a million dollars on their  garden ornamnents, stakes and planters. Cool stuff indeed.. It had a pool enclosure that was , to me, just perfect.  One side was a stone wall that looked like a ruin , the back was a pool house  and covered sitting area and the last two sides  were vine covered pergolas…..just…..wow

So, there were my “Moments” of this past weekend. Now I am off to create some here in the Burrow

Wil and I just got back from the northwestern part of CT where we attended the Trade Secrets  show. Trade Secrets is a two day event with fantastic plants and gardenalia for sale by many niche tradespeople,  dealers and plant growers , followed by a tour of four very high end gardens located in the vicinity. I fully intend to write a little something about our visit, but due to the fact that we stayed at an Inn that conveniently forgot to mention the fact that a large wedding would be happening in a tent outside our room  and that ad the ensuing after-party would prevent any rest from happening, we are exhausted and  i am unable to think clearly.

We were actually supposed to stay through Monday, but bailed , and I am glad because the weather is forecast to be 35 tonight and there was lots to cover and bring in which i just did .

Now I give you photos of some of the tulips that were in bloom in a few of the gardens and at White Flower Farm ( where we took a little side trip) before I head to my yoga pants and the couch to watch Gardener’s World then hit the hay.

last fall I planted some new tulip bulbs. I rarely add more than a few hybrid tulips  here and there because I am kinda meh about them usually,

I mostly stick to the little species tulips in the garden  because they are more  apt to return year after year and also have much less of that ugly dying foliage to try to cover up as they fade. But on a whim I guess , I threw a few bigger bulbs in. I know for a certain I planted ‘White purissima’ . They belong to  the fosteriana group which is typically  better at  persisting ( at least for a few years )after planting. Beyond that I can’t remember a thing about the tulips I added.

Yet blooming now is the one of the most delightful tulips  I have ever encountered.

It starts out  with just hints of green and pink on the petals

When it is opening  streaks of dark pinky- red  appear and deepen , so  lovely against the creamy white

As it opens further the bloom is spectacular , the streaks fading to a  more muted  color and the bloom ruffly and sweet

I cut one to bring inside and placed it in  a bud vase , it makes a  wonderful and long lasting cut flower

the scent is the clincher though, it is delightful and presently filling the air in the whole garden  area where it is growing

can we talk about how I lost the label??  can we talk about how I may never get to grow the hundreds of these I would most definitely add to the garden?

I guess I should get over it and just get to enjoy this beauty in it’s one great moment .sigh

in april it gets a little tough to be a member of my household. Space, always at a premium here, becomes in demand by the resident gardener in a way that tends to annoy the family . With no greenhouse to start seeds and such, the need for growing space  requires  me trying to form a tricky balance between available sunlight and a place to eat your breakfast.

I start my many of my dahlia tubers in April so I will have at least a few blooming in June , and although at this time these very big and thirsty plants only need a small pots to get going in,  the pots need sun and that means they get a place in front of my sliding door where they will get lots of it, and as a bonus make coming and going difficult as well creating the added challenge of getting anything out if the baking cabinet . 

Our big window in the living room is another great source of all day sun, so several trays of seeds will circulate in and out of there, and the plants that are overwintered there , like the very large and thorny bougainvillea , will get moved closer to the chairs so TV watchers can enjoy the occasional poke .

In years I am starting many new seeds ( which ,if we are honest, that is every)  trays and pots  take up every window sill, and some take a prominent position on the hearth  under grow lights .

As if things were not bad enough , I need to clean and organize the trug that holds my day to day tools ( soil knife, by-pass pruners, gloves, etc) so that is sitting on the kitchen table patiently waiting for me to find time

new plants that need hardening off cycle in and out of the kitchen 

the plants that summer outside are chomping at the bit to get out into the sunshine

many of them need cuttings taken  , and some already are overdue for potting .

eventually all the mayhem gets to a point that it even bothers me, luckily by then it is usually time for everything to head outside

as soon as we near the end of our “3 kids in college at the same time”  years, I am starting my campaign for a greenhouse.

It s garden bloggers bloom day,  but there will be no diary of flowers here ……today was the first day I got to spend from sun up to beer o’clock in the garden and work was the name of the game.

Now, instead of feeling super-dee-dooper behind, I feel just regular behind.

The dogs garden got a spring clean and a few perennials divided and moved.

I painted my bench

A few of the garden ornaments got brought out, but most did not make to their place yet

and I cut up a dwarf alberta spruce ( the playhouse will be sadly leaving soon)

Still left to do is the rock garden, which is silly beyond measure as all of the earliest bloomers live there , and about 50% of the back 40.

geum trifolium trying to look fabulous despite the mess around it

What prevented me from starting where I should have is the fact that we are still working on the pool re-do and the fence is going in this week. These projects make a terrible mess.

when the posts were being dug I got a reminder of what we call “soil” in these parts

sandy sand

I asked the nice fence guy in my sweetest voice if he could pretty please be as careful as he could amidst the emerging plants. He looks like Super Mario or maybe Luigi and  has the kind of smile that makes his eyes sparkle , so it was hard to get mad at him when he said in his Super Mario voice “Well, you gotta do what you gotta do”.

Here is the tiniest of sneak previews of  one of the sides

The gardening season has begun early this year, too early for this gardener who enjoys her months off and would prefer things stayed as they always were  without disruption of the natural rhythm I have grown quite accustomed to.

I see on social media that gardeners are out gardening, flowers are jumping the gun, ….. someone apparently yelled “GO!” while I was still perusing garden magazines and catalogs in front of the fire.  I am not ready.

I pulled out my garden log from last year, there was ( as there usually is) snow on the ground and still two storms yet to come as of this date.

While the gardens here may still be very far behind many I am reading about in locations that are a tad bit warmer,they are still way ahead of their normal schedule

We  have iris reticulata , including the lovely Katherine Hodgkins blooming in the rock garden ( in the last photo, where you can also see the stalks that were left after some flower picking with my great nieces on Easter Sunday)

Katherine Hodgkins

few hellebores, (  no photos ) siberian squill, and in more sheltered locations the tete a tete daffodils are bloomingthe pussy willows are also at the peak of perfection  for picking. In a few days the chionodoxa out back will be in full swing as will  a few more varieties of daffodils, with hyacinth and tulips not far behind. I have gone out in the few moments of spare time I have had to clear off leaves and dead stuff from around the early bloomers but there is so much more to do and with no remaining snow cover there is no way to hide the messiness.  Oh well, it will get done when it gets done.

This weekend I will be speaking twice at the Western MA Master Gardeners Symposium ( on Clematis and Hydrangeas)  in Holyoke and I can’t wait! Western MA is a much easier commute than where I usually speak,  and meeting some fellow MG’s will be a treat.

Next week I will be at Tower Hill in Boylston for the Home Hort series and in Concord  “Hydrangeas for the Northeast” on 4/4

The rest of the month:

Peterboro NH “Shrubs for Year Round Interest” 4/11

Boxboro Evening Garden Club  “Grow it! Cut it! Arrange it! ” 4/12

Hopkinton  “Design with Vines” 4/19

Bridgewater  ,MA   “Get Ready! The Spring Garden” 4/27

and I will be at the Garden Federation of MA  Programs Forum on 4/13  at Tower Hill in Boylston and  4/19 at Elm Bank in Wellesley