Friday

 Woo...what a day or maybe I should say morning.  It was all the usual stuff and the garden walk gave me a whole lot of ideas which lead to a whole lot of work.  

                    Another Benary Zinnia.  It's getting exciting.  I am guessing the next one is white.

It was apparent that the common milkweed was taking advantage of space.  In fact, I would say they were covering half of the garden.  That needed correcting.  Milkweed just keeps looking the same once it starts to grow.  Nothing much changes.  And I've heard that butterflies like to lay their eggs on fresh green leaves of common milkweed.  The facebook Monarch group says this summer butterflies are few and far between right now.  Who knows what will happen in a month or so.  So, I moved on to getting fresh green leaves by topping off the milkweed.

                                                            The snap dragons are coming.  

So the shovel took care of clearing some milkweed and the clippers took care of tops of the milkweed bringing down their size and allowing what they were hiding to be seen.  I loved recreating space and moved a few plants that needed a new place.  And after working for about three hours with clippers, rake and shovel it was time for lunch.  The ground has been fluffed again.  That is such a great help in keeping weeds in check although I must say that Preen has done it's thing as well.  The butterfly garden with a few tomatoes and cucumbers also in that space looks pretty spiffy. 

                                                    Slowing down but not quite finished.

Doug reported that we needed to do a drugstore run and then it was lunch time.  

                                        All fluffed and looking good.  There is room to grow.

After sitting for a spell, I didn't want to get up ever again.  Well, perhaps for a while.  Bushed in Carmel is what happened.  So I slept, messed with my iphone and watched a little TV.

Now this is exciting.  In the bud there is a flower.  The Daliahs are beginning to bring a bit of excitement.  What color? How big? 

Doug worked on the tree again finishing up all the cutting and got two big blues ready for the garbage. There is more wood for the community of three burn pile.  All of my morning work went into the third big blue proving that we both have been busy.  The hope is that this habit that leads to big blue fills is broken for a while.  

                                                It would seem the theme is snap dragons.

Supper on the patio and a final run through the garden checking on the transplants.  All are doing well.  The birds are back in business with their peanuts and suet.  Fingers crossed for the rest of the evening.  Could we get lucky?