Day at the Farm

Here are more pictures of my cheery morning glories.  So pretty!

I went up for the day to do a little work before the Thanksgiving holiday.

• I cut back severely the Four O'Clocks in the bed by the dining room.  They were really encroaching on the Marie Pave roses growing there.  I also spread some mulch to smother the tiny little weeds that are trying to pop up. 
• Cleaned up and spread some mulch in a bed in the shady part of the Star Garden that was a little weedy.
• Trimmed the Almond Verbena so that no little branches brush up against you when you pass by.  I walked around the Star Garden and cut away anything that was brushing against me as I walked past - the red cannas, salvia, Vitex.
• I cut away all the flower stalks of the Philippine Lilies in the Circle and throughout the gardens.  Those things can make the place look really unruly.
• I raked away the leaves in the Shade Garden that were covering all the lily seeds I spread over the last several weeks.  Bert blew the leaves off the driveway right on top of where I'm trying to grow lilies.  Sometimes we are at cross purposes!
• I cut down all my gingers in the ginger bed so that my daffodils just popping up won't be over-shadowed.  I've read conflicting information about cutting back gingers before the greenery dies off on its own.  Since they won't bloom again on the same stalk one account indicates you can cut it down.  Another account says the greenery should be left in tact to provide energy to the bulb (it's not technically a bulb, but whatever).  I don't know what the right way is, but I cut them all down , so it's done.
• I planted 3 Delphiniums in the Rose Garden in the bed with the Duchess de Brabant.  I've never grown delphiniums.  I bought plants rather than try to grow them from seed.  If they do well I will try seed next time.
• I planted two blue barleria cristata (Philippine Violets) in the Greenhouse Garden.  There was a bed that really needed something in there.
• I planted six blue Columbines in the Greenhouse Gardens.  I just love Columbine.
• I added some compost to two beds in the Vegetable Garden and planted some 1015 onions.  And I filled a pot with soil and planted four onions.  I set the pot out in the Star Garden.
• Spread some double peony style poppy seeds in the Rose Garden.
• Watered here and there.
• Walked around a lot in the Rose Garden and the Star Garden.  Cleaned up here and there, pulled weeds.  Pulled up the last of the zinnia plants in the Rose Garden, threw the flower heads in various beds for next year's flowers.  I pulled ripe seed heads off my Fireworks Gomphrena and threw them in various beds for next year's flowers.  Pulled up Tickseed seedlings in places where I think they will crowd other plants, particularly my iris.  It's astounding how many seedlings of Coreopsis I have in the Rose Garden.  I could pull up hundreds and they wouldn't be missed. 
• Cleaned the oven.
• Bathed poor Buddy.
• Sprayed pesticide around the house.