Summer shade flowers

The shady garden mostly blooms in spring, with a few plants waiting until fall.  But these polemonium are just now blooming, a welcome shady addition. 

Other blooms that are hanging on from spring include hellebore, geranium, huechera, corydalis, and astilbe.  Impatiens, begonias and fuschia will of course continue until frost.  But one of the most interesting is this arum.  It bloomed in spring and the leaves died back leaving this fruit stalk behind. 

Hammock

Robby and Candace gave Jerry this hammock for his birthday.  Yesterday we got it all set up and we love it.  It really does hold two people, although getting in is a bit like getting into a canoe.  : )   We like the way the colors blend with the fence and the windmill, and the dead cherry tree branches make a nice partial cover.  We laid out in the early evening and watched the hummingbirds buzz between the cherry tree and the feeder, and the crows chat in the huge cedar tree next door.  Next up, star gazing. 

Summer tidy time

Last evening I had a chance to get into the back garden and tidy up for summer.  Amazingly, many of the spring annuals lasted all through June.  I wanted the larkspur in particular to have time to reseed before I pulled them out.  Now all tidy, the garden is looking much better.  Typically I would be whacking plants back hard to give then a good chance at rebloom from mid-August into fall, but this year things seem late and I did not see the need.  I did remove an annual red coreopsis, much to Jerry's dismay, but I left some and that one was smooshing my salvias.  

Summer bouquet

Green beans

I was reading Sunset's The Edible Garden this week while we were traveling and learned something I have battled for several years.  I plant bush beans rather than pole beans.  I discovered that they are determinate plants that bear all at once, in a week or two, then are done.  Crazy!  How did I miss that, and continue to plant them and try to make them produce and wonder what I was doing wrong?  Next time I am planting pole beans.  I love green beans!

Summer bounty

Chocolate cosmos actually smells like chocolate!  It is a bit persnickity about drainage and cold weather, but I have kept it going several years in a pot.

Back to the garden, I am delighted to find new plants blooming.  There are about 60 different flowers right now.  A few like the larkspur are on their way out, others like the echinacea are just gearing up for a four month run. Polemonium is budded up; this is a second try, so I do not know what to expect. There are a few, crepe myrtle, anenome, eupatorium, aster, yarrow, penstemon, and so on that are still to come.  Quite the promise of abundance. 
Likewise, for whatever reason, the tomatoes have set by the dozens this year!  The cherries are gone, but we are picking blueberries, apricots and plums.  The nectarines won't be ready for a few more weeks.  I spied two pumpkin plants already six inches tall.  The lettuce has bolted (gone to flower and thus to seed), but I was able to cut salads from November into June.  Altogether the garden is looking productive, thanks to that long cool May weather.

Potato crop

Here is what I got from one pot of potatoes.  Not much, and the second pot was less.  Too bad!   I think maybe they had too much water.  Only one plant, one seed potato, grew in this pot, and then it just died this week.  Something ate the leaves in the second pot.  Small crop but it made a tasty dinner  ; )