I also have a lilac bush. It is two years old. I bought it on a whim, because lilacs are my favorite. It's still in its pot and doing very well. It even bloomed in the spring. I cannot wait to get it in the ground.
My poor buddleia. I had it sitting on a table outside the camper with some of my other 'rescues'. It got blown off the table in one of the bad storms, landing upside down. When I got to it, it was badly broken. I clipped the dead stuff back. Then someone (TIM!) dropped a boot on it, adding insult to injury. I was beginning to think it was cursed, but it is growing once again.
There's probably 8 or 9 pots of stuff and I tend them all carefully when I go there. Mentally I plan how I want the garden to look, over and over again. I want a wall of flowering shrubs, and I want them edged in the hosta I have propagated from here, and in front of that, my flowers. Low rock walls, the pile of stone waiting patiently over by the greenhouse. I have solar lighting picked up at various end of season sales and set aside. I have my birdbath. A sun dial I'd bought for my parents and took back after their deaths (Come grow old with me! it says). I bought a stone frog and a duck to nestle in amongst the hostas. My bunny gentleman waits patiently to discover where he will stand in all of this.
Lots of dreams. Lots of things to be done. I am collecting the pieces and parts and everything waits to be assembled once the house is built.
Yesterday, I watched a glittering swirl of yellow leaves come down in the wind. The seasons are changing. The end of summer used to make me so very sad. I'd try to hold on to those long summer days. I don't anymore. Fall will come, regardless of my thoughts on the matter. After that, I will endure winter, dreaming dreams of gardens unplanted.
Seasons come and seasons go. We are swept along with them, aren't we? I find myself thinking of seasons past, of children grown, of people gone from this world, the places that I used to know. My mind goes back and forth between the past and present and the cloudy future
I'm not sure that any of this has a point, but it is what I am pondering on this day as I sit between two seasons, waiting to see what unfolds.
Your rescued plants love you! Linda in Kansas
ReplyDeleteIt makes me happy to see them thriving. Some of them really did seem to be lost causes.
DeleteI do the same thing back and forth. And I do a lot of the what ifs to. I am so happy for you and Tim getting your house closed in before winter. As you talked about your garden it gave me a mental picture. My husband was the gardener and everything else just about around the outside. I mowed grass most of the time. Now I have lawn service. I lost a lot of desire to keep things up when my husband passed away 8 years ago. We had a beautiful garden and yard; I gave away a lot of it and the Florida heat killed some of it.
ReplyDeleteIt is hard to believe that it has been 8 years already. Probably seems an eternity for you, Ellie.
Delete'Seasons come and seasons go'. Don't give in to old age Debby, this project of building your house is keeping you both young.
ReplyDeleteOh, I'm not giving in to it...it's just that lately, I've been very aware that it's coming anyway.
DeleteSitting waiting here too.
ReplyDeleteIf nettles grow where you are, have some by the buddleia...the flowered will be good for butterflies and other insects, and they lay their eggs on the nettles
We do have nettles. I was thinking to plant a stand of milkweed I collected a jar of seeds last year believe it or not ~ and for that very reason!
DeleteI don't think I have to wait for autumn. It seems to have arrived early here.
ReplyDeleteIt has been getting quite cool at night, and the heat we had earlier in the month is gone. Last night, we were at a tenant's house watching the roofline for bats, drinking beer and talking. She had to go inside to get a wool shawl.
DeleteYou can't beat western Pa if you enjoy the change in seasons... I love living here. Debby, good for you, rescuing those plants.
ReplyDeleteWell...you may not have noticed, but I'm a bit of a tightwad...
DeleteMy mind is going back and forth very much at the moment. Hopefully a funeral will cure that somewhat. I like that you have such grand plans for the future. Planning a garden must be a wonderful thing.
ReplyDeleteI was driving back from the store yesterday. and it occurred to me that I have an 'ikea life' right now. I've got all the pieces and parts. Some assembly required. The garden is fun though, and it is my own.
DeleteYou'll get there in the end, bit by bit. And shrubs will put up with no end of ill-treatment.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good trait to have when dealing with me. :)
DeleteYou rescue both cats and plants. 👍✔
ReplyDeletePlants are a lot less demanding. Cats think they are the boss.
DeleteAre you going to plant them before fall? You can always move them afterwards. I know here, plants don't survive in pots over the winter. Lilacs are my favorites as well. I have one that blooms twice in the summer and it's blooming right now. What a lovely gift as the leaves start to turn and fall.
ReplyDeleteI plan my garden and then every year, that plan changes:)
I will winter them in the greenhouse. There are too many vehicles and tractors and work going on. These plants are to put in around the house, and we cannot plant them until we are sure that we will not have to dump more dirt around the basement foundation. It has settled quite badly, and Tim is moving some more dirt to pack around the foundation today.
DeleteWhat fun to plan a garden, with lots of good plants that have already shown their durability!
ReplyDeleteThey have to be durable to withstand my 'care'.
DeleteSo much of your musings in today's post sound like lyrics to a song about the seasons changing! You expressed it very well. I would sketch out a garden plan so your ideas don't get lost in the business of the building! So much for you to look forward to, Debby!
ReplyDeleteOh gosh, one of my entertainments is to mentally design my gardens while I try to fall asleep at night. It's what I do! (Cheap entertainment!)
DeleteThere is nothing quite so satisfying as bringing back a plant from the brink of death and to see it thrive. For me, at least.
ReplyDeleteAugust is a strange month, I think. It is a month where here, at least, we are so weary of summer and yet we know that before the weather changes, we will be so much wearier of it. We are in the dog days and it often feels like all we're capable of is lying under the porch, trying to keep cool. Well, not literally. But.
And yet, at the same time, there is a feeling of change too. Hard to explain.
August has always been one of those times when you feel things coming to a close, and other things beginning. I always find myself pondering what was, what is, what will be.
DeleteI like the term "cloudy future." We make plans just as you've bought the plants you like. You thought the plants were gonners but they survived.
ReplyDeleteSad thing is the only thing that I did was make sure they are watered and placed to get the appropriate sun.
DeleteBuddleias and forsythias are notoriously tough, as you have seen! I love resurrecting plants, as you know, though I prefer it when someone else have left them to die -- not me! :)
ReplyDeleteI thought of you yesterday when I threw out a cyclamen. It just wasn't going to thrive for me. I thought, "Steve could fix this".
DeleteWe don't get distinct season changes around here. The only sign of fall I've seen so far is Goldenrod. It started blooming near our pond at the end of July. But what's weird is it shouldn't be blooming until September or October! Meanwhile, the heat goes on.
ReplyDeleteIt has gotten down right chilly at night here. That is something that you will not hear me complaining about. William is headed to the UP in Michigan for a week. He's packed up and ready to go, and that includes 3 sets of warm clothing and hoodies.
DeleteWhat a green thumb you have! Your garden will be beautiful.
ReplyDeleteOh dear...i just got rid of the said carcasses of 3 house plants...
DeleteI love lilacs and planted three of them about seven years ago. They started off about a foot tall and one of then is now about three feet tall.it is supposed to grow eight to ten feet tall. I suspect it is using all its energy to propagate as there are a dozen other sprouts now. But darn I would like my eight feet tall wall of fragrant lilac blossoms.
ReplyDeleteFt Drum New York is comprised of farms taken over by the military during WW2. The houses are gone now but standing witness to them still are the most massive lilacs I ever saw in my life. 10 ft tall and more. Patience, grasshopper. It will happen.
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