Baby Indigo

I've babied three seedlings along all summer!  They've not grown very tall or wide, but they're still increasing a tiny bit at a time.

 The biggest one pictured below.

Thanks, Kate, for the seeds! 

I'm hoping for a great stand of dark purple false indigo someday!

Cuttings

I had hoped to put up a 'cuttings' photo once a week when the spring finally really came.

But the best laid plans and all that, you know - stuff!

Here's one to enjoy, even though none of these flowers are in bloom any longer.

Peonies (pie-knees not pee-on-knees) star in this show with Wine and Roses weigela and a few stems 

of the blue false indigo (baptisia) mixed with speedwell.
The combination is almost patriotic!

Oh the creamy dreaminess of a peony bloom!

***

Side Note:

My Bible reading this morning was in Mark, chapter 13. 

I think Mark might be my favorite gospel, although I hate to commit to picking one. See verse 33 through 37 for the big message which Jesus does not hesitate to repeat and emphasize:

STAY AWAKE!

(keep watch / stay alert)

I have to admit in the business of everyday summer life, I get spiritually sleepy. 

Isn't it odd that while extra BUSY I can be SLEEPY at the same time? 

Imagine a frantically animated sleepwalker and you might get pretty close.

The Mary/Martha Lesson is applicable here, I think, if I may mix Bible stories within such close quarters and not offend. Martha was busy, busy, busy doing, let's face it, necessary stuff, yet the Lord said Mary was the one who chose the "good portion". 

So I've knocked myself in the head over here. I've shaken myself back to a higher state of alertness, and I'm making more time to sit at the feet of the Lord.

Join me?

Garden Failures

I tend to only take photos of successes. 

But just so I never forget, and to give you fair warning -

here are the celosia (boooo hisssss) I planted for some annual highlighting this year. 

In my own defense, they were $0.50 per cell pack. 

Pretty cheap annuals, but definitely NOT worth it. That's it!

I'm swearing off celosia for good. 

*Well, except for cockscomb, celosia cristata.

Who can resist those fluorescently brainiac beauties?

Other garden failures for this year, since I'm making my garden confession:

- planting my limelight in too deep shade. they don't look like this at all.

- putting annual blue salvia in a container. they got MUCH too big and fell all over the vinca, 

causing them to mildew in the ugliest way.

- planting that other salvia in containers and thinking it would all turn out differently this year 

just because i chose purple and melon. that's it!!  

I'm swearing off (that other) salvia for good!!!

- nicotinia - how dismal. maybe it was positioned too close to that other salvia.

- and sadly, my most shameful confession.

i tried delphinium again, this time in a container. 

OK ... and 4 (FOUR) other plants in the garden beds - they were on clearance. 

now they are menacing brown clumps of former stems, landscape eyesores.

that's it!!!

but no. i can never swear off delphinium. 

my ridiculous cottage garden ambitions will not allow it.

maybe someday i'll learn the trick to raising delphinium, but until then, i'll have 

 false indigo to keep me company.

How Miss Saigon Got In My Cart

'Miss Saigon' Dutch iris bulbs. 

The name sucked me in, but the photo on the bag 

forced me to find room in the grocery budget for these.

If they don't come up looking EXACTLY like this - 

then I'll dig up every one and dump them in the Walmart parking lot.

The majority of the bag went into a summer container, a few in the patio garden, and a couple

out in the border garden, as a reserve. 

So far, I've only gotten a few teasing signs of life in the container, nothing more. To tell the
truth, I've forgotten exactly where I put them in the border garden, so those probably
won't survive the summer's hoeing. 

ANYway, at the same time, I finally had THESE!!!

*

Thanks to the seedpods Kate generously gave, and many frustrated attempts 

at sprouting false indigo. I've had two or three thready stalks for the last two years, and I expected them to 

be completely gone after the winter we had. But this year ... there's a big stand out there!
Turns out they're sturdy and long-lasting in an arrangement or small bouquet.

*Several American Indian tribes have made use of the plant for a variety of purposes. The Cherokees used it as a source of blue dye, a practice later copied by European settlers. They also would use the roots in teas as a purgative or to treat tooth aches and nausea, while the Osage made an eyewash with the plant.