October in the Garden

Fall has arrived, and we have had so MUCH RAIN...so not only has "Fall Planting" been stalled, but so has good picture weather. These shots are from early Oct. Everything you see now has been since pulled out....

Here we have the nice browns and blacks of Echinacea seed heads next to the bluish linear foliage of a Yucca

The "drying on the stalk" seed heads of Quail Grass or Celosia...this year they had poor nutrition in this spot so the flowers were not very pink, lots of the white, and they were curly.

This greatly benefited the leaf color though! Love the magenta with this purple "wild" Ageratum

See that Sulphur butterfly in there?

Nice combo, Tartarian Aster with Quail Grass foliage

The Monarchs found the Tithonia I planted for them..success!
Tithonia beaten down by rain

Perrenial Sunchokes blooming, very tall!

Harvested Sunchokes, yum! We had a light Sunchoke soup, these are earthier and slightly less sweet than a Parsnip, much preferred, and look, from our own garden!!!!!

wild Ageratum in a light purple/ whiter color

Glowing purple Ageratum

Tools of the trade

wild Asters...ahhhhhhhhhh.

Flowering Tulsi Basil (Holy Basil) and Lemongrass

More pretty Tusli

Our very happy Motherwort.

Thistle looking plant is Artichoke

The Herb Garden section (will be changing)

Sweet Potatoes, and Green Onions in the Side Kitchen Garden

Plants we need to get in the ground before Winter...

Blooming Chocolate Eupatorium at the edge of the Woodland Garden

Saturnalia Itea getting it's Fall color over some Creeping Charlie the dreaded weed, I can't help loving the round geometry of it though...

Hydrangea Involucrata 'blue bunny'

Coleus 'sedona' flowering

Faerieville in the Forest Faeries Children's Garden (the big iron, and glass table is waiting to be removed)
Chloe cleaning her domain

Our favorite window box combo yet for this shady spot...it has: Columbine, Strawberry Begonia, and a Sedum from our friend Paul Little...emarginatum, I think.
Violet loves these cozy leaves she just raked into a pile

AWWWW, yard work makes a girl tired!

Burning the woodpile, at last it's cool enough.
Chris got hot feeding the fire, and sadly I forgot to photograph the woodpile pre-burning, but Chris demonstrates just how tall it was and about 12' wide...oh we are so glad to have it as ash now!

Memphis Maple Massacre cont'd, and Fall Prelude

(ok folks, for some reason today i cannot type above the first photo? so, all captions will be under the photo it is referring to! strange...)

Bye Bye Silver Maple

Tools of the trade

A bunch of wood with heart rot, some actually hollow logs (will be used for planted troughs, stay tuned...) and some logs to be used for fire wood, plus big stump becomes table in children's woodland area (pics soon)

My favorite Lumberjacks...so handsome!


Hats off to a job well done!!!!! Unfortunately I didn't get any pics of Chris up in the trees hand sawing the whole darn things down..(i know. he's hardcore) or my dad with his fancy knots roping the trees where they were supposed to fall (10+ yrs tree felling exp. ~ who knew?) They made an awesome team, and I am so proud of them. Now the front Meadow Garden is totally under reconstruction. IT is now FULL SUN, and has more room to expand!



Pretty wild Ageratum

Pretty Wild Elephantopus

Toad Lily, Tricyrtis 'Tojen'
with Hosta...



A different Tricyrtis (Miyazaki)

Toad Lily pics by Chris

The last of the yum! Chinese Cabbage


A pretty tangle of "weeds"


Flowering Native Nettle (less sting~ and less food/medicine value, but oh so lovely)


Fig loves limestone

Petit Nigra ~ Dwarf Black Italian Fig is the best tasting fig ever, IMHO


Sweet Potato digging time in the South!


In need of renovation: The Big Food Garden

Lots of potential, the after Harvest mess...


Our new little Water Lettuce...thanks, Diane Meucci!


We've had 3 weeks of rain.every.day.....i keep wondering did I fall asleep and I'm dreaming I'm in the Northwest??? cause this is unreal! But the Hydrangeas love it, look how perky and vibrant it is!

The Curly Willow is growing like mad in all this water (we're bracing it to straighten it)


And look...so much water the thing is sending out roots in the air!!! Fascinating!