Rainier Valley Gardening Blog

Goat in Diana Vinh's garden

Thank you to everyone who helped make the 2010 tour a great success! I’d love your comments on the tour if you hav=d a chacne to go this year.

I’ve posted a few of my favortie pictures here on our Website, and the full album is here. Please be sure to check them out!

Raingarden Demo

It is amazing what just a bit of direct sunlight will do for plants and seeds. I can’t hardly believe the drastic improvement in my garden over the last week. It’s almost like a different place.

I feel like the best way to describe the amazing changes and how happy my garden looks is just to post the pictures. So here they go:

Strawberries–all three varieties have berries…and they’re changing color

Squash and Zucchinis–the leaves are reaching for the sun and there are blossoms

Radishes–they have hit the point that I need to thin them out or they are all going to look weird like pink carrots

Lavender–it is sprouting and growing into an amazing bush

See the full blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com

A big thanks to our earl sposors. You can check em out here http://www.rainiervalleygardentour.org/Sponsors.html.

This weekend is Mother’s Day. We spent a great day with my mom and then came over to Port Townsend to visit Chris’s mom. It was really fun to hang out with the fam, spend some time in the sun and the go mingle with the locals in downtown Port Townsend. Right off of the main drag, Water Street, there was an arts and crafts fair going on. All sorts of stuff going on from jewelery makers to oil painters working live in front of you.

 

One of the artisans we came across was Cindy Mangutz. As it turns out, she was Chris’ neighbor growing up. I’ve got to say, she is the most welcoming and amazing person to talk to. You’re thinking, “what in the world does this have to do with anything?” Well I’ll tell ya: Cindy and her husband Steve create sustainable art. In her own right, Cindy is an incredible artist with a huge expanse of work. Today, I saw a different side. She and her husband take art, function, sustainability and horticulture and blend it all together to make some incredibly unusual pieces.

Using wood coming from their property, they’ve created some amazing things. What caught my eye the most were two chairs. One was a beautiful maple chair, meant for the indoors, that was perfectly crafted and begged to be sat in. The other was a chair with a flowering seat. Thin cedar branches woven through the structure, this piece of furniture was also home to a living bouquet. The chair was structurally sound and visually appealing, but meant for the garden. I was jealous that another visitor made the purchase before we could, but we’ll see what the future holds…

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

If you recall, I was moaning about the euphorbia that I’d transplanted because I uprooted it incorrectly. Remember that? Yeah, well anyways, it’s doing amazingly! I’d cut back the really tall stems that had flowered and died after the transplant and now, the new growth is incredible. The stalks are strong, the leaves are healthy and I can tell that it’s happy to be in its new bed.

The other plant that I’m so excited about is my climbing hydrangea. It’s a silly thing, and it’s just my impatience showing through, but I’ve been waiting for it to do anything besides be the same height with the same leaves for a year. Today, I’m proud to say that it’s got flowers and has already grown about 4″ inches this spring. We’ve had so few nice days that it’s off to a slow start, but I can tell that it’s got big plans for the summer.

In my posting about trying to get all agro up on this, I’d mentioned transplanting some strawberries. I didn’t talk about the fear that I had of bringing in some Northwesterns in and how they react. Well, it’s been unexpected. At first, they looked really sad and smashed and some of their leaves turned orange…but there was a miracle! They grew new leaves faster than I’ve seen any other plant and now they’ve got some of the most incredible blossoms. I can’t wait to harvest!

The last of my encouraging words relate to a forsaken ground cover that I hand my hands on, ready to pull because it looked moldy and weak. Well, it is thriving, blooming and spreading. Snow in Summer is what I almost pulled. I’m so glad that I didn’t because it brings a really bright punch to a dark corner by the fence. I’m hoping the Snow spreads and fills in around the maple tree growing above it, but I’m not counting my chickens before they’re hatched.

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

Yesterday was Earth Day. That means that everybody was supposed to be a little more conscious of their surrounding world and that they are supposed to start a new chapter in their life in regards to how they impact the planet.

For me, this meant running. It’s free, it’s in the open, you get to see the scenery without any barrier (like a car window) and there is fresh air rushing past my face. I enjoyed my run so much that I am going to make the effort to do this three days each week…in place of the electricity-wasting exercise equipment.

Besides the exercise factor of running, I really enjoyed being out and about in my neighborhood, not just in my yard. There are so many trees and gardens in bloom right now that as I run, it kind of feels like I’m trekking through an impressionist painting. You know how impressionism can be quite blurry, but you know what it is and you know that it’s beautiful? That is what I see when I run. I don’t think that my brain can process images at the lightning speed that I move (very slow lightning).

Anyways, my Earth Day running experience was really inspiring and encouraging. I hope I can keep this up. I’ll let you know how it goes.

PS: I know that this isn’t related to sprucing up your garden or home, but it’s about self improvement too.

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

So, remember how I’d talked about the garden next door and the lady who’d moved out? Well, I’ve decided to take on her abandoned garden as my own. I can’t let the poor plants be taken over by the joint forces of weeds and pine needles.

Yesterday, I spent my afternoon doing prep work to bring Golda’s rockery back to its original, amazing state of beauty. I didn’t realize what I was getting myself into at first, but then once I started pulling up grass and carrot sized dandelion roots, I saw how intense the road ahead would be.

Towering above the rockery, are about 6 large fir and pine trees. This means needles…everywhere, and thick layers of them. I went through a little internal debate as to whether or not it was worth my while to remove them and expose the rock terraces. I decided to go for it and am glad that I did. I uncovered so many struggling plants: lilies, an artichoke, honey suckle and more sickly tulip and daffodils than you can imagine. Hopefully exposing all of them to light is going to inspire them to grow and bloom. I don’t expect the bulbs to produce flowers at this point, but maybe, just maybe they’ll make something next year (a miracle w/o pollination this year).

The one plant that I am the most hopeful about…peonies. They were able to make it up out of the needles, but they look really unhappy. Perfectly placed with the perfect amount of shade and sunlight, I think that I’m going to see some amazing flowers by the end of the summer. Watch for the pictures to start rolling in! In the mean time, I’m trying to come up with a great way to allow the poppies to take over the sidewalk’s edge, but it’s really difficult to thin out the grass from them. Any suggestions?

I have a lot more work to do. I have two more levels of terrace to complete as well as have of the street level strip and the terraced walkway. Anybody up for joining in on the fun?

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

With so much remodeling and new construction replacing old, people are throwing out all kinds of amazing things. If you watch craigslist, you’ll no doubt see in the “free” area listing after listing for old bricks and concrete blocks. Often the old bricks still have small chunks of mortar on them and the blocks are cracked or broken. You know how the old adage goes: one man’s junk is another man’s treasure.

I’ve taken advantage of this situation and been able to create some wonderful structures and organization in my small space. By lining my beds with borders of old brick, I’ve been able to add some visual interest as well as separate my ground cover from individual plants.

Where this is most useful and most evident is in my wildflower bed. I built up the soil a bit before laying the bricks in a “b” shaped pattern which gave the illusion of a slightly raised bed. Once built, I scattered wild flower seeds and let them do their thing. I told myself, I said “Self, if you see something growing outside of that patch, you know you can pull it because it’s not supposed to be there” and that’s just what I’ve done. I sound weird, but having this clear border has allowed me to keep the surrounding area weed-free without the fear of pulling something that I’d planted the prior year.

I’ve also been able to use the brick bordering technique to keep my ground covers under control. I’ve currently got some Northwestern strawberries mixed between two mysterious flowering rugs and all three groups are staying contained. It looks great how they just spill onto the brick. I can’t wait to see them fill their designated areas.

The last thing that I’ve used the old brick for has been to edge off my small plot of lawn. Grass is one of those things in life that you can fight with and think that you’re winning, but then it’ll turn around and show you who’s boss. I would love for the middle of my lawn to be perfect and beautiful, but the grass prefers to spread outward and be extra super green at the edge of the garden…where it then thinks that it has eminent domain. I solved that problem though and the hostile grass is now tamed. I dug a shallow, narrow ditch around the yard and laid brick in it. It has made a difficult border for the grass to cross and has had the bonus feature of keeping the soil in my garden berms from eroding into the yard. I love multi-functional design!

All in all, brick and blocks can have their place anywhere. Next time you see somebody getting rid of some, take ‘em, see how they can improve your space, and keep them from being put in a landfill.

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

I love having a positive outlook on life and everything that I do. My garden is right up there; it makes me happy and I get to see the results of my hard work. I’ll be honest though, there is something that gets me down.

Transplanting often times shocks plants and they look very sad and often dying for a few days or even a few weeks. There are a couple of ways to prevent this though.

1.) When digging up and moving:

The root or root ball is where the nutrients and water are going to be pulled into most plants. When you’re digging up that bush or flower, be sure to know how wide around it you should be entering the soil.

For example: I was gifted a euphorbia from my neighbor who is putting in a vegetable garden where her flowers all were. The plants around the base were pretty dense, so I tried to get as close to where I imagined the root ball stopping as possible. As luck would have it, I trimmed the roots a tad bit too much. I transplanted it to my garden to the perfect spot, watered it well, made sure it was secure, and then watched the leaves and flowers slump, whither and fall of the stalks. Not awesome. Some out of season pruning, a little extra rich soil added to the base and some love and attention have turned it around. There is new growth and the euphorbia is coming back to life slowly, but surely.

2.) When re potting:

If you’ve ever lived in a house and then moved into an apartment, it’s tough to adjust, right? Well, it’s the same concept for plants. While there are some plants out there that like to be root-bound, most that you’ll be moving from pot to pot or ground to pot do better with a little more room to grow. Also, some plants do better with soggy soil and some need it to be more dry, so take than into account.

For example: I had an unfortunate accident with some potted violets that were struggling. A windstorm happened and knocked the smallest of the pots off the ledge and it shattered in the driveway. While this sucked, I took the sad little violet and put it in a larger pot…and watched it take off. The new pot didn’t drain as quickly and it had room for growth. Today, it’s a crazy li’l violet and is rockin’ the suburbs!

3.) When separating from a bunch:

Take a few minutes to do a little research about the plant that you’re getting ready to thin out. Some plants love to be separated and thrive with the stimulation. Others show shock, just like euphorbia did. If you can find out a little about the roots of the plant you’re going to work with, you may be able to work a little magic and it’ll never know that anything happened.

For example: The iris is a great flower because of how well it does in both sun and shade (an really acidic soil). Its rhizomes (think ginger root) are right at the surface and spread horizontally, which makes it really easy to see where to pull up the plant from. You can look at a bunch, see where the narrowest part is, see how deep the off-shooting smaller roots go, and then successfully break it away from the rest of the pack. This is the case with the traditional Purple Iris, but other varieties may be a little more, shall we say, mysterious below the soil. Anyways, once you’ve been able to separate some irises from the bunch, it’s pretty easy to dig a small ditch just deep enough to fit the small roots and the rhizome, and then cover them with soil and pack it down. Keep them good and moist for a few days and they should do just swimmingly. If your irises do shock, just trim back the spear-like leaves and in no time you’ll see fresh ones shooting up from between the old ones.

I hope this is helpful. I’ve had some amazing luck and made some horrible mistakes, so I hope that you can learn from what I’ve already done.

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!

Every stinkin‘ time that I till the soil only a little bit, I uncover the most ridiculous rocks. Yeah, that’s right, I have some pent up frustration. You see, when we bought our house, we were the first ones to live there, to start improving it, to work in the yard since the developer threw in some plants and called it good.

Well, going on summer #2 now, and I’ve done a ton of work. I have expanded the original flower bed from an r shaped garden to a C shaped one on one side, and a J shaped one on the other with a Tetris shaped one down the slope from the J… Is that confusing?? Anyways, with each new bit of soil I move around in, I am delighted to find more rocks…and huge chunks of cement.

I have also uncovered some huge chunks of concrete. Most of these are too large for me to pull out of the ground, we’re talking, like, 2′ x 4′ x 1′ in size…ridiculous. What I have pulled out, I’ve disguised as stepping stones or hidden support rocks. I just have to find more ways to be crafty if I ever want to pull up the rest of the “buried treasure”. Thoughts??

See the complete blog at tidbitfixer.blogspot.com!!