For Mother's Day

I made two bouquets for Mother's Day this year, one living and one traditional. Oddly neither went as planned but both turned out very nice O.o

This was the living arrangement. It was meant to go into a wicker Goodwill basket I had but darn it they wouldn't all fit. Luckily I found an empty pot forgotten at the recipient's place :) One of the little ones I babysit helped me put it together for her mom, it was fun. I didn't have enough of the right seedlings in my stash so I picked the big yellow gerbera up from a garden center, the alyssums I grew.

And this bouquet was for my momma, cut from our own garden :) Calendula, amini rose, ranunculus, zinnias, cosmos and a couple of California poppies. Oh and a sprig of parsnip, I just love their leaves....

And that's it for now, hope you had a nice Mother's Day too.

Landscaping Finished!

Well it took about a month and half for the major work and another 2 weeks for the lawn and other plantings - but my parent's new yard is all done! Pretty much - there will always be more tweaking to do....mwuahahahaha... I realize I don't have an overall pic yet to compare with the last picture taken before work started, but I'll get one this weekend.

First the new flower beds (that aren't roses that is):

 

You might recognize these two from a previous entry. I am so pleased with how well the sunflowers, statice and calendulas are doing! I even squeezed some zinnias in at a later date. Dad complained they would all die or look terrible because they were too closely planted. Jaja Da :) I do agree that I put the statice too close together but since they're annuals I can fix that later. That's another thing I realized a couple days after planting - this entire bed is annuals. Oops. Well, that actually works out since I started some butterfly guara from seed and that will need to go somewhere eventually :)

The bed with the blue butterfly runt is doing very well also. You can see that it is happily recovering from my almost killing it by pruning...in fact I had to prune some of the new shoots so it doesn't grow too densely. Dad's old shasta's are in there and about ready to bloom, the Sea Shell cosmos are already there (and mom really likes). The cupids darts seem to be doing fine, they should bloom next year.  

 

I had a lot of help from John on this bed, he helped me to till and amend the soil and to sort out a bunch of clay clods. This time I tried letting the tilled soil sit for a week before planting so the fertilizer and stuff could settle. I don't think that really helped though :/ This bed has had a had a lot of trouble so far and mostly my fault I think. The top pic is when I figuring out where things should go and the second is about a month or so later. There were originally larkspurs, delphiniums, Isaac House scabiosas, white candytufts and bluebells. Later I tucked in some zinnias and catnip to replace some cancytufts and a bluebell that didn't make it. The scabiosa and candytufts had a real hard time in here, transplanted too soon or getting too much sun.

And the last one. In the rear right are hollyhocks; a couple of Carnival ones that I started last year and hope to see lots of blooms out of this summer, and a couple of Indian Summer that can mature next year. Most of the rest of dad's shasta's (keeping a backup in a container for that accidental annual bed), a celosia (there were 3 but two of them didn't make is *sigh* I replaced them with Bright Lights cosmos) and lots of ranunculus along the front. You can just see in the corners in front of the bed where I was able to clear out a space for my foliage leaves (that's what I'm calling them - lost the name tags for them and can't figure out what the heezy they are). The above pic is about a week after planting.

The flowers tucked between the planters and the fence are doing okay. The longer stretch has portulaca, ranunculus and calendulas. The ports are pretty insignificant so far but I have high hopes for them. The calendulas are really making up for them for now! My sister's abandoned geraniums are doing nicely in another area.

 

My dad decided after all the planters had been set in place that the front portion of the driveway should be replaced because of a couple of long cracks in it. When he told my mom she said if he was doing the front he should do the back because there were even more cracks and portions had settled to drain towards the house (nevermind I told him that last year and he shrugged me off). So that added another week of loud noise and inconvenience...but was worth it. After that was done my dad asked me to use the 20 cans of leftover paint from the last 10 years or so and do the fence. Then he said "you paint one board one color and the next another and another" - this is something very out of character for my dad (I checked him fo alien implants). It is the kind of wonderful idea they normally tell me I'm crazy for. It was great fun! John helped me out with the painting also. You can also see my container garden has been relocated from the grassy sideyard to the backyard...I have new big plans for it >:) 

 

And just this past weekend it was pretty much wrapped up with a little retaining border around the avocado tree to hold the deep watering in and finding a spot for the big blue butterfly bush which has also recovered. It's doing well with creeping jenny and purple allysum.

I am momentarily bummed, there was an awesome shot of the lawn a couple of days after they rolled it in and now I can't find it to show you! Oh well. Lastly, the Felis silvestris "White Panther" approves:

now if it would just stop "fertilizing" the roses...

Manhattan Beach Botanical Garden

Last Saturday I went to a composting workshop at the nearby Manhattan Beach Botanical Garden in Polliwog Park. It's been there for I think 10-15 years and beautiful. It features many California native plants and other non-invasives that grow well in our climate. If you don't know what you're looking for it can be a bit elusive, I knew it was somewhere there for years but never went in because I didn't know where to look. It also doesn't have it's own true street address and the street side entrance is not the most promising:

To find it go down Manhattan Beach Blvd, turn north onto Peck avenue and it's just past the intersection with 12th Street on the right (and before the ramp down to the pool). If there's curbside parking by the entrance go for it, if not just keep going down and park in the adult school lot on weekends. Walk through the gate in the pic above and then hang a quick right into the garden. The first time I stepped into it I was like "whoa".

It's a big change from the cruddy street outside!

The above pic is one of my fav spots there, it's so serene and I love watching the birds come to their feeding area. They've really tried to create a wildlife habitat and done a great job with only about 200 square feet. There are all sorts of flowering plants with good seed, running water, a bat box, and many trees and bushes.

(this wildflower paring reminds me of Fern's recent color combo idea)

The garden is divided into different theme areas - Beach Bluffs, Bird & Butterly Habitat, Meadow, etc. and each plant type is well labelled in at least one location so you know what you're falling for (except the desert plantings, it's newer so they havent gotten to it yet):

And the information boards they have are well laid out:

Oh and the compost workshop was worth waking up for :) There were at least 40 attendees, it was sponsored by Waste Management the company that collects trash in Manhattan Beach. The ladies leading it really made composting easy to understand and not intimidating at all! Traditional and worm composting bins (including a pound of worms to be mailed to you!) were for sale at bargain prices subsidized by the city (but only for MB residents O.o ). A nearly 3 foot cubed yard bin for $35, and a 3-tiered worm bin including 1 pound of worms for $45. They gave non-residents info on other nearby cities subsidizing compost bins and LA County subsidized bins (not as great a price but still good). You might want to check with your local trash collector and see if they offer something similar. I think I'm going to get a friend in Redondo to order me a discounted worm bin through his city's service...

Okay, that's it for today. In the next few days I will finally have a landscaping update and general status of my containers :) Perhaps even an instructible....