It looks like July is the month when my garden is in it’s glory!  Most things are blooming now, although a few things are not.  I’ve yet to have my blueish and pink hydrangeas blooming but the plants themselves are getting big.

The Annabelle Hydrangeas have bloomed!

The veggie garden is growing day by day!

The herbs are coming along nicely (garlic chives, cilantro, rosemary, oregano, chives, Italian parsley).

The side garden has hostas in bloom.

This is a new section I added - in place of some of the hostas.  It has grasses, Lily’s, sedum, Canna and a Holly bush.  Looking forward to the holly bush in the winter as it is evergreen.

The butterfly bush has purple flowers (hard to see) and the Autumn Joy Sedum is huge!

The Daisys and the yellow Yarrow.  You can barely see the Ivory Halo Dogwood’s beautiful leaves - I need to do a little thinning here.

Pretty pink Phlox.

Beautiful Coneflowers!  To think, I yanked the one in front out of the garden because I though it was a weed! I’m guessing that’s what I did the previous 2 years and why I couldn’t get my Coneflowers to grow back!  Ha!  Good thing when I yanked it out - the soil that came with it came out looking like the shape from a pot of some sort so I stuck it back in the ground.

The long view to the left.

Long view to the right.

View as a lunch guest!

I need to figure out how to add some curve to this garden space!

While I did this…..

Ross did that……

I finally put down tile on the floor by the basement and back door.  Ross had other home improvements in mind.  As I was working, he asked me if he could have a peephole in his door so he could look out.  I told him to ask his dad.  A short time later I heard a scratching noise.  When I looked in his room he had a toy screwdriver and was scraping around the marker line on his door.  He had drawn a large rectangle on his door and was trying to break through.  I explained to him that this wasn’t a peephole and that considering how large he was trying to make it, he could surely see out but we could also see in very well. See the blue above it?  A piece of construction paper so he could cover the hole and you couldn’t see in.  Least he’s got a plan.

The certificate makes it official!  Ross has officially graduated from kindergarten.  He is now a big 1st grader.  All that’s left is to pick up report cards on Friday.

My kindergarten graduate and me!

Ross and Miss Bultinck - what a lovely, wonderful teacher.  Thank you, Miss Bultinck, for taking such good care of Ross this year!  We love you!

Then.

Now.  In the corner by the fence (closest view) there is a Pieris bush that flowers, can’t see it in this picture.

Then.

Now.  The tall plants in the background are Annabelle Hydrangeas.

Then.

Now.

Closeup.  The ball type plants are Autumn Joy Sedum.  The smaller balls are from last year, the larger ones are 3 years old.  A butterfly bush is behind one of the large Sedums.

More closeup.  The yellow yarrow was added last year it is much larger in this photo - about 3x the size!  Behind the yarrow is an Ivory Halo Dogwood.  To the left of the dogwood is Spirea Little Princess - the picture is from 2 weeks ago, it has little pink flowers all over it now.  All the greenery behind, in front and to the side of the Yarrow are daisys - they’re starting to bloom as well.

Another closeup.  Dianthus in the forefront and Coneflower foilage beind in several locations.  No blooms yet, but soon.

I am loving the garden at this point in the Spring and there is still much to bloom.  I will need to thin out and remove some of the hostas as they are huge this year too.  I’ll update some more when more is in bloom!

Memorial Day 2010

We remember all who have given their lives so that we may have our freedom.

My dad was in World War II, and my brother Ray (above) was in Vietnam.   Two of the bravest men I know (miss you dad).

With the warm weather here this weekend I have the itch to go shopping.  I can’t wait to head over to Lurvey’s for some annuals for my pots and for the garden.  The colors always make the yard look so pretty.  Next stop, Home Depot for plants for the veggie garden.  I will plant a variety of tomatoes again this year as well as peppers.  All did well last year.  I am thinking about adding eggplant and zucchini this year.

The garden is pepped and ready to go, I just need to add the plants.  I love this time of year and am excited to think that when I am done with grad school perhaps I will land a job teaching right away (positive thoughts!) and will be home for the summers from now on.

This summer will be crazy busy with school and all but I’ll make time to care for the garden.  I will post pictures soon to show how far it’s come.  I was just looking at the photos from years past and what a difference!  Pics soon, I promise.  What are you doing this weekend?

I am constantly looking for ideas to incorporate in Ross and Francesca’s rooms and I love the look of Pottery Barn and Land of Nod. Mainstream, I know, but cute none-the-less.  I was looking at the Land of Nod website and just now realized they offer wallpaper. Could have been that way for a while - I just never realized it before.  I like the idea of Land of Nod offering wallpaper, as I like their asthetic. These two are kind of cute and can be found here http://www.landofnod.com/wallpaper/kids/1.

I’d like the alphabet better if it wasn’t the Greek alphabet and if it was offered in more color choices.  The frame one is cute but a little to busy for my purposes.  What I especially like is this one below.  At first glance it’s nothing special, but as you read what it is - PRESTO.  It’s textured to look as if it’s bead board, and it’s paintable.  Super cool.

I’d love to see Land of Nod offer more prints, maybe some cute florals.  I would also love to see what Pottery Barn would do with a wallpaper line - for kids and adults.  I think that would be awesome!  I know the design purists would probably cringe at the thought but for those of us who like the look of these stores, it would be an easy solution to a design dilemma.

Ross made this for me today.  In case you can’t read this it says:

I NO iT iS NOT MUDRSDAY HeRe iS YOUR MUDRSDAY PRESENTS.

Best.Present.Ever.  And, he spelled everything all by himself!  I love this.  He even took the foam dots from the middle of the flowers and used them as spots on the giraffe.  I am one lucky girl, I know all you other mudrs out there can relate.

Sometimes they fight so hard I think one of them is really going to get hurt.  And then, there are moments like this.  They love each other so very much and Francesca will give Ross a kiss and a hug “just because”.  Or Ross will join in a tea party simply because he was asked.  It’s times like these that make me forget about the times when they are swinging and kicking at each other.

This past Friday was Cub Scout Fly Up night.  Ross earned his Tiger Cub Badge - a big accomplishment and he was very proud.  Ross also had his very first loose tooth.  It was loose for awhile, the Saturday before flyup he went to the Bulls game and I thought he would lose it that night.  He didn’t.  In fact he held onto the tooth with all his might- he ate around it - he did anything he could to avoid losing the tooth.  Friday at the Pack meeting, one of the older Cub Scouts kept trying to pick him up.  He bumped Ross in the mouth and out came the tooth.  And Ross did what any boy would do with his first tooth.  He threw it away.

When I asked him why he threw it away, he said it was broken.  I then looked in his mouth to see if only part of it came out - nope, it was all gone.  Best I can figure it was so small that it looked to him like it was just part of a tooth.  We went home and wrote a note to the tooth fairy, explaining what had happened to the tooth and just where the garbage can was so she could retrieve it.  She must have found it because when Ross woke up the note was gone and a dollar was under his pillow.  Hopefully, he won’t toss the next one.