Serenity in the Garden

   'Summer Beauty' Alliums  contrasted with 'Victoria Blue' Salvia in a planter - photo by Jan Johnsen Plant 'Millenium' or 'Summer Beauty' Alliums in the spring or summer.   Both of them provide gorgeous, butterfly attracting flowers starting in July -  deep green foliage, profuse display of pink to purple flowered globes.   Tough, reliable and deer resistant! Allium  'Summer Beauty' really is a summer beauty with light pink-purple globe flowers in mid-July through mid-August. The leaves are slender and deep green.  It is hardy from Zone 4-9. Photo by Laura McKillop - Allium 'Millenium'   Allium 'Millenium' blooms about a week later and has slighter deeper purple blooms and is a bit shorter,   to 12-20” tall.    It is less hardy - Zones 5 - 8. Allium 'Summer Beauty' and 'Millenium' are fool proof, blooming plants that look great with many other summer perennials like helenium and globe this

So you want to plant a native shrub that tolerates half shade (shade in afternoon), has big blooms  in the summer and has great Fall color? Oh yeah, and it should be compact, fairly minimum maintenance and grow to -20 degrees F. And it should be reddish/pink. RUBY SLIPPERS OAKLEAF HYDRANGEA is the answer.  Monrovia - Ruby Slippers close up Its 9" long flower clusters start out  white, then gradually change to pink and then red, growing above the beautiful oakleaf foliage, which also turns an amazing mahogany red in the fall.   It grows to just 3 1/2 ft. by about 5 feet wide.  Zones 5-9. Developed by the U.S. National Arboretum in McMinnville, TN in 2010, the compact Ruby Slippers is a cross between  Snow Queen and PeeWee hydrangea and does not grow higher than 4 feet.   It is perfect for small residential gardens (such as mine).  It also does well in planters and containers - perfect for balconies and decks!  And if you have a larger area, y

Serenity by Design   Simplicity, Sanctuary & Delight In this engaging  powerpoint, I offer intriguing design ideas for enhancing any garden.   Learn why East is considered the ‘auspicious’ direction, how to use a ‘Golden Rectangle’ to create harmony outdoors, and which colors uplift our spirits in a garden. A very popular talk enjoyed by all - accompanies the book, ‘Heaven is a Garden” (St Lynn’s Press, 2014)    Plant Handout comes with the talk. The Spirit of Stone – Ways to Use Natural Stone in the Landscape  An illuminating and beautiful look at creative ways to incorporate natural stone in a landscape. The ‘spirit of stone’ offers tips for using sustainable stone in garden design, how to design a stepping stone path and ends with secrets of ‘reading’ a Japanese rock garden. An inspiring and popular talk - accompanies the new book, ‘The Spirit of Stone” (St Lynn’s Press, 2017)  Handout listing pla

milk carton gardening   Do you have simple summer garden memories?  I sure do.  And I hope the kids of today will have them too. I hope they remember the simple pleasure of growing carrots in milk cartons, tomatoes in large cans or maybe hollyhocks al ong old fences and lilacs at the corner of a house. We should reclaim these simple things as part of our ordinary life. Hollyhocks Honeysuckle Maybe you have some  memories like this:  It  might be the 'weed' that smelled like licorice ( anise hyssop), Blue Fortune Anise Hyssop The buttercups that you put under your chin,  buttercup reflection under chin - go here for more: Eat The Wee ds the honeysuckle that you could suck a teeny drop of 'honey' from, honey from honeysuckle - for more: Instructables  the sweet smell of roses as you walked past a certain house,  roses on trellis source: Nantucket today  the bright yellow Coreopsis that seemed to

alliums in the garden - Jan Johnsen   The idea that we are living within a world swirling with unseen energies is not new.  The Chinese idea of Tao comes closest to what mystics, tribal peoples and modern day physicists explain as the basis of all life.   The Tao, as Alan Watts writes, is not God “in the sense of ruler, monarch, commander, architect and maker of the universe,” but an “intelligent rhythm” (Watts, “Tao: the Watercourse Way” P 40): “The great Tao flows [also “floats” and “drifts”] everywhere To the left and to the right, All things depend upon it to exist, And it does not abandon them. To its accomplishments it lays no claim. It loves and nourishes all things, but does not lord it over them.             A flourishing garden spotlights this intelligent rhythm and is our everyday “repository of life …….with no claim to its accomplishments”.  Alan Watts uses a watercourse as his principal metaphor for the Tao.       A stream, he says, can

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,  There is a rapture on the lonely shore,  There is society, where none intrudes,  By the deep sea, and music in its roar:  from   Childe Harold, Canto iv, Verse 178 by Lord Byron

Bubbling Urns - A Summertime Joy a fun water feature ! Its 92 degrees outside right now. Sweltering. The air hangs like heavy drapes upon the landscape. There is no breeze. The garden quietly endures. So what can you do to lighten the oppressive atmosphere? ADD A BUBBLING URN -  a  recirculating water feature Japanese style bubbling urn by Jan Johnsen Why do this? Because the sound of water and its dynamic presence ( ask the great Dr. Emoto) add life and energy to a stultifying summer garden...  Bubbling urns and fountains bring sparkle to your garden. You can build a recirculating water fountain cheaply by buying parts in a hardware store or more expensively by going to a pond supplies vendor....I am not good at hardware so I buy kits. aquascape Bubbling Urns are set atop an underground reservoir that keeps re-circulating the water. Once the urn fills with water, the water spills over into the underground basin, which pumps the water back up