*If you have a blog post about what you are doing in February for your garden please share it in the link party-details are at the bottom of post*
I started my first round of seeds indoors (insert excited “squee” here). I do love gardening. I love starting seeds, watching them grow and then seeing plants in the garden growing big and strong knowing I started them from these itty bitty seeds.
I started some vinca vine seeds, marshmallow (which is now tucked inside my fridge for the next 4 weeks), rosemary, lavender (also in the fridge), columbine (in the fridge), snapdragons, scallions & leeks. I purchased some seeds online from two different Etsy stores and Botanical Interests. I am really impressed with all the information Botantical Interests includes on the seed packs. Another favorite seed company is Renees Garden-I think the tomatoes I grew last year from her were the most delicious ever! I also planted Lavender seeds last year bought from Renee’s Garden and they grew into flowering small shrubs giving me lots of flowers in just one season! I don’t love the fragrance of the variety I chose but I they are still beautiful and the bees loved them. I am growing English Lavender this time around and I am hoping to be able to create an entire lavender garden one of these day. (The links in this post are just shared in case you would like to try what I purchased. These are not affiliate links-I’m just sharing for your information 🙂
This year I am focused on growing a cut flower garden. I love cutting flowers and bringing them indoors in various mason/repurposed jars and setting them up all over. It makes me so happy to cut flowers outside.
We have been in our home for 21 years and when we first bought the home our backyard was all shade. I mean a lot of shade. So I planted a rose garden out front and some veggies and it eventually became these very large front garden. Over the years there has been an upsurge of invasive weeds-the fast growing, vining, wrap-around-everything-can’t-dig-them-out-with-a-shovel type weeds.
And to be honest, I hate maintaining it. There has been a shift as well since trees in the neighborhood are taller that our front yard gets more shade than it did once upon a time. I am all about making things simple. I hate chores and projects and I want to enjoy my garden. It’s supposed to be something that restores me-not another have to on my list. So this year we are making some big changes.
Firstly we are digging out all of our roses and moving them to our backyard (which is now full sun). We are transplanting some volunteer rose of sharon plants along our driveway and ultimately (if we can) removing our butterfly bushes to a new garden in the back along with the roses.
It’s a lot of plants to move but I think they will thrive in the new location and it will give us the ability to dig out the mulch (it’s mounded pretty high) and add it to our compost bins and then work on digging down and hopefully digging out these weeds. It’s been nearly impossible to dig them out when they are really intertwined with the roses. Did I also mention that in my youthful excitment for an herb garden I planted mint….in the ground….yep. We have gotten rid of most of it using black paper but it’s still there. Beside the lemon balm I planted….in the ground…
So with the yard a blank slate we are hoping to plant some grass and then at least we can mow down the weeds as they come up in our already weedy grass patch.
I’ll be moving some holly bushes out of the backyard that we inherited with the house and also our apple tree. We planted 2 but sadly only one remains so we will be buying a second and moving them to a small garden area next to the driveway. In the space where the holly bushes and apple tree are is where the rose bushes and hopefully the butterfly bushes will be re-homed. We aren’t sure if we can get the butterfly bushes dug up. They have been in our front yard for years and years. I love them and all the butterflies that they attract but the location isn’t my favorite. I think they will look beautiful in our new back garden.
I am also going to be making a new vegetable garden. I moved the vegetable garden from the front yard into the back yard a few years ago. I love it back there. It’s great because the kids can play, it’s fenced in and private and I can just enjoy the gardening time. We built raised beds and I decided this year to make this my cut flower garden. I am going to be focusing on only growing the foods we love to eat and I am going to be using the fabric pots of purchased last year to create a new vegetable/fruit garden. I’ll fence it in (to keep the dogs and groundhogs out) and then transplant my strawberries, raspberries and blueberries into the ground but everything else is going to be grown in fabric pots. What I love about this is I don’t have to worry about crop rotation as I will refill the pots each season and I think it will keep everything a lot tidier.
I am hoping to take some video to share with you as we go about the process of moving everything. Eventually we are going to be growing some privacy trees along the back fence but since we have a lot to get done in early spring I didn’t want the pressure of planting 10 trees on top of everything. With any luck, if the weather is warm and we can get out there early we can still do the trees this year as well.
In the meantime I would love to hear what you are growing or answer any questions you might have. I am in zone 6 so I have a while before the ground is thawed and I am out digging. I am however working on making my own garden journal to capture this season in. I hope to have a flip through video to share with you soon.
Wishing you a beautiful day!
Until next time…
-Michele, aka The Dreaming Dilettante
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