Question Of The Longest Day (June 21, 2013) How Dirty Are You?

[vesper]

I hope Dan is ok that I am posting today's question. He is a rather good natured man with a great sense of fun, so I am sure he is OK.

How Dirty Do You Get In Your Garden?

At this point anyone who has a garden or plants, things should be starting to stick out of the ground! How much garden stuff have you done, and if you have pics, you are welcome, especially folks who have colourful flowers.

I got a little dirty and planted this. thanks to the rain, they are still alive. I have no idea what they are, but I like them.

((((( Warning... the pic was with my cell phone, hence it looks awful. )))))


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Some tailess cat sleeps in my garden these days. Not a stray, his owner lives near me. He likes my garden.

[danger_dan]

I hope Dan is ok that I am posting today's question. He is a rather good natured man with a great sense of fun, so I am sure he is OK.

No worries bud, it's not my thread, it's all of ours. We've all had a go at post the QOTD. Search back through the Tea Room pages and you'll see...

the dirtiest i get tending to my garden is a bit of dirt on my hands
the lady and i live in a condo and don't have a 'garden' but we do have a lot of plants.
we line them along our big long window ledge, which helps with the privacy too

we've got a few herbs, small ferns, and a couple of shrubs.
i know we'll have a huge garden one day...when i finally get off my a$$ and by some property out in the country

[hollyquaiscer]

They are iris's and they're gorgeous vesper.

[VeeVee]

I wish I had a garden! Can't wait to have a house and have a garden with vegetables and plants lots of beautiful plants!
Right now we live in a apartment but I have a few herbs, and flowers. My cilantro keeps growing and growing..I cut it to use in recipes and within a day it has grown so much...I can't keep up!

[hollyquaiscer]

You should dig them up this fall and separate the roots into 4 or 5 pieces and replant them. That clump you have will, in a few years fill in an entire 10 foot area. I so miss my garden. I had a wonderful yard filled with the most beautiful hosta's , iris's, lily's, ferns, bleeding hearts and number other perennials and annuals. Now, since moving to the condo because I was unable to keep up with the house and yard work I garden in pots. This year I didn't even put out any pots because of all the rain, everything would have drown

[Andit]

I'm in a condo, so no garden. Can't even keep plants alive here (must be that black thumb of mine...or is that the dog's? ). In other words, I'm squeaky clean.

[gracesmommy]

I love gardening! My kids and I planted a veggie garden again this year. Our strawberries have been turning red these past few days and are absolutely delicious. We also have pumpkins, peas, green beans, beefstake tomatoes, zuchinni, cucumbers and green peppers. I've got a few flower beds with hydrangeas, dahlias, lilies and a few impatients etc. vesper, your iris are really very pretty - one of my favs!

[alicia]

Me? Gardening? Eek.

Here are my forays at keeping any sort of greenery alive... I've killed bamboo by not watering it enough. I've killed cactus by over-watering and the roots rotted. Two summers ago, I had a beautiful basket of hanging flowers on our front porch - looked like the death flowers you'd see in a horror movie to signify the land was no longer sacred. The only thing that saved me was those water globes. Last summer I got those for my hanging basket and it worked. I could remember to fill those up, but otherwise... Nope.

It's funny though - I should be good at it. My paternal grandparents own a farm. My maternal grandparents have amazing gardens of every veggie possible, including 900 lb pumpkins. My Dad makes my parents house look inviting with flowers and landscaping. And I kill everything...

[anisa]

i try really hard to be dirty, really i do.

i like my dirty side to be exotic, a little off the norm. the more interesting the better.

i don't like it when it is totally normal and plain, just like everyone up and down the street.

i don't check out the neighbors and their dirtiness too often, i'm just not that type of person.

sometimes my neighbors share the fruits of their dirtiness with them, and i share with them. swapping is fun, i recommend it!

[danger_dan]

i try really hard to be dirty, really i do.
i like my dirty side to be exotic, a little off the norm. the more interesting the better.
i don't like it when it is totally normal and plain, just like everyone up and down the street.
i don't check out the neighbors and their dirtiness too often, i'm just not that type of person.
sometimes my neighbors share the fruits of their dirtiness with them, and i share with them. swapping is fun, i recommend it!

[lecale]

.

[vesper]

i try really hard to be dirty, really i do.

i like my dirty side to be exotic, a little off the norm. the more interesting the better.

i don't like it when it is totally normal and plain, just like everyone up and down the street.

i don't check out the neighbors and their dirtiness too often, i'm just not that type of person.

sometimes my neighbors share the fruits of their dirtiness with them, and i share with them. swapping is fun, i recommend it!

I think my face is so blushed, it's white! Yahoo!!!

[vesper]

Ha ha,

that is interesting about bathroom garbage pales... great idea!

The attachments didn't work... just so you know.

Yahoo!!

I used to be a verrrry dirrrty girl but I have since cleaned up my act lol

I used to keep a lot of plants indoors. I grew up in a house dripping with vegetation (so much so that my brother as a kid once took gardening shears to the plants around the tv so he could see it) When I first had my own place I experimented growing tropical food plants like pomegranate, papaya, coffee, etc. Some of these (like coffee plants) make great hardy houseplants and that got me thinking a lot more about using plants in decor rather than having a collection of weedy looking specimens.

If you have a brown thumb and still want to brighten your place up with some greenery, there are lots of great tough houseplants out there. Plants that can grown in the shade or in the light and that you can leave for a month while you vacation and come back to and still see green leaves.

#1 I would pick up some aglaonema (Chinese Evergreen) at Walmart or Home Depot or such when you can find them for sale in the mixed tropicals for under $10. They will grow in deep shade (e.g., far back in the room away from windows, or in a basement with just one of those ground level half windows...) though they won't be as bushy they still look nice. They also tolerate full sun, e.g., if you go to Las Vegas you will see them in plantings outdoors along the strip. They can tolerate 4 weeks without water, if you tend not to be on top of these things. The wild and original houseplant forms of this plant are not very attractive (a real 1960's look) there are many broad leafed, brighter green strains being bred, and that's what you are likely to find in the hardware store, etc.

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Put one of these bushy monsters on each of the side tables around your couch and you will totally transform the feel of your room. Hard to kill in so many different ways. Do check out Google Images to see the variety of forms of this plant...you can fill a room with them and still have ton of variation. Some of the varieties are patented and are huge, I mean $70-$80 bucks for a plant you pay $10 for at Wallymart, so WM is a very good value!

#2 pick is a ZZ plant

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This plant has an elegant curving form (more like the first picture) and swellings at the base of it's leaf shafts that store water (meaning this is another beauty you can forget to water for a month) About 10-15 years ago they were hugely popular with set designers, so much so that it seems they were in every ad and commercial. If you aren't into plants I guessed you missed that. You can find them again at Home Depot and similar. Tough, tough, tough

For these big specimens that come in straight sided 9" pots, skip the plant pots and check out bathroom garbage pails! They are the right size, there is a good classy looking selection in the $10 range, and they are a cheap fix until you can get a pot upgrade.

If you have a sunny window, baskets of hoya (wax plant) or pothos will grow and cover your window and shelter out the light and make for an interesting effect...get the plants to grow along led Christmas lights and you have a unique window treatment. Two more really tough plants, and hoyas will create intensely fragrant clusters of blossoms if they are happy enough. You only need to start with a tiny one, under $5.

So brown thumbs, think about that! Cheap and green!

Ha ha after all that I don't have a lot going on indoors these days. Outdoors we have a raised bed 2' high that is full of grape, roma and beefsteak tomatoes, cucumbers, green onions, cilantro...I salad/herb garden I guess.

Across the road is a naturalized area with raspberries and blackberries and there is another long row of the things up the hill from us. Towards downtown there is a depressed area and you can see all kinds of weeds, I mean WILDFLOWERS lol in the shaggy lawns if I head down to the bank. The best place to get catnip in town is in fact behind the bank...lol it's urban but nature is trying to take back control. My neighbours think I'm a freak because I keep on picking weeds like they mean something.

So I am no longer as dirty as I used to be but I still like talking plants!

[lecale]

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[Patty Smyth]

Ok I am sooooo dirty that after I work in the garden the water in the shower runs black.

I am always doing some project or another and I have "work clothes" that could get up and walk away on their own

I think this year has been my dirtiest ever !!!