Flowerbeds done and simplyfied!

 We put ten pickup loads of bark in our yard.  

This load is call "fines", it was what we put in the flower beds. 

 The front corner of our yard next to where Hogsetts lived.  Looking
from the street.

 The little flowerbed by our sidewalk, next to the house.
These are pink coral bells from mom and dad;s yard.

View from the corner of the driveway.  This was all full of grape hyacinths, 

bulbs, perennials miniature roses and a big tree that we had removed. This is 

from the street.

 My Shasta daisies near the front door.

 We took out three rose bushes, one mugal pine, and one barberry that were near the Shastas.

One more shot of the flower bed by our neighbor. It was  totally covered
with plants, I just keep digging and digging and digging flowers out.  Most
of them went in the trash (sob) but I was able to find a home for some of them.
I didn't get a good shot of the bleeding heart that is by the gate and the spurge that is by it.
There are day lilies, shasta daisies, coral bells, arbis, yellow sedem, veronica and holly hocks, each
ready to bloom in turn from these little daises to the perennial asters.

Another view of the bed by Hogsetts corner.  The peony if from my dad's yard, he got it from his mother.  The dasies are an early spring daisy, have them is two other flower beds, they are from Debbie Redford.  The tall yarrow that is about to bloom is from my sister Cynthia's yard and so is the perennial aster that will bloom in the fall.  I have a mallow from my mom, coriopsis from the nursery that LaVar Jensen had. There is a galardia from Sandy Hansen's yard and it will bloom soon with red, yellow and orange daisy petals (love it!).  This is a day lily from Jackson Perkins and a windflower that will get as tall as the yarrow.  That is the result of thinning and thinning and thinning out flowers.

 This is probably my favorite flower be right now.  It has wonderful curb appeal.  It is on the other side of the driveway next to our new neighbors. (yeah)  I call it my friendship garden.  Almost every plant is from a friend or family.  The Stella da oro came from my dad's yard after he passed away.  I brought one plant home and now I have it every where and I have given a start to lots of friends. The perennial geranium and Japanese Iris are from Ester Barlow, that little blue grass is from my sister Gwen Butler,  I bought one coral bells and I have divided it several times,  it is one of my "signature" plants, it is every where. 

This is the friendship garden viewed from the street.
These are jupiter's beard, I got them from Mary Winterton. They
stay in bloom a long time.

Same bed, different view.  The variegated Iris is from Janet Hogsett's yard.  Janet
was a dear friend and neighbor for 22 years, she invited me to come and get starts from her yard before
she passed away.  There are little pink strawberry ground cover from Janet, as well, which can't be seen very well on the right hand side of this picture.  The yellow Iris is from Verla Hope, I have known and loved her since I was a girl.

This view of the friendship garden is looking toward the street.  Hollyhocks, hastas, yarrow, Japanese iris all take turns blooming and add variety and color through the seasons.

This is the west side yard view coming through the gate into the back yard. All the plants, except the trees are ground covers.  I manage them by sprinkling Caseron around the to stop them from spreading.  I also sprinkle Caseron along the edge of the grass to keep it from growing into the flowerbeds.  Caseron is a preeminent that is used around woody plants like trees, shrubs and roses.  But it has saved my life here. 

 Standing in the same spot, looking slightly to the right is another wonderful

perennial bed that has different flowers in bloom all season.  This is where I planted my first coral bell, I love them. The peonies came from Marilynne from her mother in law, that orange poppy is supposed to be a red one from Jackson Perkins, and the daises are from Debbie.  I love daises! I have more that 5 varieties in my yard, if you count the galardia.  In my friendship garden, there is a double daisy and a fringe daisy, and the last variety is the little princes which is on the other side of the pool.  I love it that they all bloom at different times and over lap, so that we almost always have some daisy in bloom.

 This is our latest addision to the west yard, it is a dogwood, we planted

three of them along the fence and put a bright orange large bark under them.

That lime green and orange are wonderful together.

 This is the flowerbed on the west of the pool as seen from the back.  We don't quit have it cleaned out

on the day I took these pictuers as can be seen in the picture below where the grass is

just about over taking every thing.  It is all done now, but I don't think I will be posting

more pictures, I think it is possible to get the general idea of what the flower bed will

look like when it is thinned out and has bark on it.  It will look like the picture above.

 Now this is the red poppy that I ordered from Jackson Perkins.  I can

have been unable to propigate it.  It is the only plant I have, I wish I had 

one red poppy to go with each white daisy plant!

 I can't believe I didn't get a shot of this with the other flowers around it.

 This is in the very back of the yard.  We also don't have

this bed cleaned out yet in this picture.  Dillon Grigg helped us

with this flower bed, we really thinned it out, replace the wood divider and put

bark down.  The little kids love to walk on the stepping stones, it is fun to watch them. 

The only plants we saved were the shasta daisies from Marilynne and Irises from Debbie.

This is coming around the back on the east side of the pool.

This flowerbed has always given me greif.  I always

have such good intentions to blend annuals with perenials and

let them do their thing, but then I always have to apologize for how

bad it looks. I had Dillon take EVERY THING out, I had flags on the plants I wanted

to keep and the ones to discard.  SO...these are my favorite plants that I just can't live 

without: coral bells, Stella da oro, and little princes daisies.  That is a peach iris in the foreground,

and the plants look a little peaked from being transplanted, but they will recover and it

will be a nice, neat tidy, organized, well behaved flower bed!

 This is supposed to be my shade garden of hastas, but we lost our

shade tree this year.  I hope they make it.  This bed is much prettier

than the picture.

 This is another view.  It is between our deck stairs.  In times past I have filled it with

 shade annuals (impatiance and colias), but I don't plant annuals anymore unless it is in pots.

 This is a little spot between our fire pit and the tramp.  Again thinned,

thinned, thinned.

A close up of "dad and grandma's" peony.  I love them, but they 

don't stay in bloom very long and they can't withstand the rain and wind.

Mass planting of Jupiter's beard on the other side of the tramp and 

between the tramp and the swing set.  They bloom for a long

time and hardly take any care.  They are showy, but don't make a good 

cutting flower.

I am so excited to get play ground bark for this play area!  It looks awesome.  We

keep the weeds away with Caserone!

 I lovely picket fence that Glenn and I built before Kimberly got married

is supposed to surround our vegetable garden. I  love it, and I love these

flowers that are by the gate.  They are the only flower in the yard

that I have planted from seed that have survived.  They are a perennial bachelor button.  

They have a long blooming period also and they foliage is fern like and very interesting.

 One the East of the house going toward the gate to go to the front yard.  This used
to be all flowers!  We are loving the simplification.

 One the East side of the house coming though the gate.

A view from inside the garden, I can never remember the name of this plant!