the farmette in July

Spring is vibrant and bursting with the early pinks, yellows and blues of the growing season. Autumn throws upon us the purples and golds. But July is the month when the flowers in the farmette fields show off all the best of the year's colors, textures and combinations. July here shines!

I'm up very early. As always after a return from Europe. 5 a.m. and I'm done with sleep for the day.. The better to see what's outside!

Ed had warned me that it was a green jungle out there, that everything is dense, that several of the lilies had already burst into bloom. He was sort of right, but not entirely.

It is true that we had an unusually large amount of rain this spring and too few sunny days. An early heat wave pushed everything forward by a week or so, but now the temps are moderating. So what does this kind of a year do to the flower beds?  Well, as he said, it's densely green out there. Last year there was a drought and the lilies and phloxes were restrained in their stem and leaf production. This year? No restraint. But we could use more sunshine hours to pop those lily blooms out and bring out those strong colors. Still, this is a picky picky assessment. For the most part, it's been an easy year to be a flower grower. Well, unless you counted on the spring peonies to stand tall for you. The rains did knock things down a bit in June. And of course, all the rain meant that there was an EXTRAORDINARY amount of weeding to be done. Still, it's been good out there!

Let's take a look at what's blooming on the farmette on the first day of this beautiful month:

Looking good!

But I do need to weed. A lot. And I need to clean up the already spent day lilies. So I get to work and I go at it for a good three hours before I give it a pause.

A pause for breakfast. On the porch. With Ed. And the no longer flea infested cat. (I pick a small bunch of flowers for the table. I never like to deplete the fields too much, but here's a wee bunch -- living proof that I dont just grow lilies!)

Perhaps the stars in the garden right now are the alceas --- hollyhock by common name. There have been years were they stubbornly refused to throw flowers. This year? Splendid!

Too, the lavender field is stellar! Absolutely beautiful.

And Ed is prodding me to pick radishes. I grew them from seed, did not thin out the extras and I have a total explosion out there. We will be eating lots of large radishes.

 

 

We survey the stuff together. His tomatoes are doing well so far!

We pick a handful of wild blackberries...

 

 

 

And go on to the meadow by the peach orchard. It's producing the most amazing assortment of flowers...

I should do some more work out there, but I have errands. To pick up the car (in the body shop for the ten days I was away). To visit my mother. To grocery shop.

[My mother is doing as can be expected. Still tired, still not very happy, perhaps a little more resigned to the fact that she's not going to bounce back to where she was even just a year ago. And of course it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy: the more tired she is, the less she wants to move at all, which makes her even weaker.]

Home again. Groceries put away. Laundry, lunch, laughter. All that. Just happy to be back.

In the late afternoon I bike over to Steffi's House to see how the young Polish couple is doing and to check on the outside mess that has yet to be dealt with by the construction team. Result: the newborn baby is lovely and the the plantings are all positioned to go in! Soon I hope. We could all use a little more green stuff in that block and a little less mud.

Evening. The mosquitoes are not that bad! The birds are singing up a storm! And once nighttime settles over the farmette fields, the fireflies do a magnificent dance for us, showing their spark, their beauty, perhaps joy too? Because it is so great to be alive and dancing at night! (Or sitting on the farmhouse couch again...)

with love...