Planting Flowers

Sunny Sundays are made for planting flowers. So that's exactly what I did. I'm on a mission to see if there's any green in these thumbs of mine and decided a beautiful May day presented the perfect time to start. So here's what I did (with Butter supervising from our big front window, of course).

First I filled the big planter that runs along the front of our house with miscellaneous flowers and plants that drew my eye at the greenhouse (right).

As I just alluded to, I'm a gardening rookie. So I have no idea whether I planted the right plants or whether they're in the right soil or whether I can keep them alive (cross your fingers!). This spring, I'm just giving things a try. Then, if I have any knack for this at all, I'll actually try to plan out what I'm going to plant, maybe get to the point where I fill containers with hardy perennials and native plants as opposed to random flowers that I fancy.

But until then, bear with me and don't laugh at my amateur gardener's faux pas. Please and thank you.

In addition to digging into the soil in the planter, I also created this nifty little container. The dahlias were so darn pretty, I couldn't help buying them. Guess I'm a sucker for color:


(There's a great fern in there but somehow it doesn't really show up in this picture. So just take my word for it—it's there.)

I'm trying not to spend a fortune (gardening can be expensive!), so I took advantage of some pots left in the garage from the previous owner. Now that I look at the picture, they aren't exactly lovely. So don't look at them. Just focus on the pretty pink petunias:


Wait a second. You're looking at the pots, aren't you? I thought I told you not to! (Maybe I'll paint them soon. Then again, maybe not. That's character, people.)

I also had to plant this lovely lavender I bought from the farmer's market on Saturday. I'm a sucker for anything lavender and couldn't resist (plus, I had to replace the plant I had from the Des Moines farmer's market that didn't survive the move).


This guy will have some buddies after Wednesday's farmer's market, when I'm going to buy a tomato plant and some herbs to grow in containers out front. (If only I had a big, sunny backyard for growing all sorts of vegetables ... she says wistfully.)