T L life by days: Sun, flowers and planting......

Today that large glowing object in the sky has shown it's bright and shining face...for a few hours. It was nice not to have it rain all day. We are suppose to have a few days of nice weather and then some rai

n again. (But early Sunday morning it looks like rain again.) I am going to try and get as much of my flower planting and gardening done as possible. I have bought a bunch of flowers for the pots and flower beds. It has been raining so much that I have had to wait for it to

dry out before I can get anything in the ground. (At least, I have not had to worry about watering all those little containers.) But first, I have a few things that will have to be done, or worked in, as I go. I need to cut the stems from the old fashioned iris as they are now done. They were gorgeous this year. I think that every fan had a stem with flowers. Much nicer than they have been in the past couple of years. I also have to move a couple that have gotten themselves away from where I want them. An other digging project is to dig up a clump of surprise lilies that are taking over a spot that I had a beautiful bunch of Shasta daises. Unfortunately, they fell to the hands of an over zealous helper who mistook them for weeds two years ago. They look like dried stems in the early spring and got pulled up. The surprise lilies(You get the leaves in the spring. They die down and then in

the middle of the summer the flowers pop out of nothing) have started to take over that spot and I want to try snapdragons there and look for another big daisy plant. And of course weed as you go.... (One of my stress relievers.....to reach down and touch a living, thriving thing....to grasp it tightly......and yank it completely out of existence.....! Much like making bread by hand!) Since it was a nice day, or at least as good as we have had for a while, we went to an auction. Not to hot....not too cold....and not raining! There was a lot of junk and very little really good stuff. Luckily, there was nothing that we could not live without.....and nothing that our kids (they will be glad to hear) 'might' need! We stayed for a while but decided to get

home and get some work done.

There was plenty to do. The least of it was getting the yard mowed. With all the rain....it was really growing and needed a good mowing....without having to use a pontoon boat to do it! Tom got the lawn mower out and was going to see how far he could get before having to quit because the ground was too wet. I got out the towel and shovel to get after the flowers.

This year I have decided to try and get snapdragons to grow again. I have tried this before with no luck. My Grandmother Buxton and Grandma Dorothy used to have beautiful snap

dragons that were knee high. I have never had any luck with them. But I don't feel too bad as one of my best friends has never had any either and she has beautiful flower gardens. For a start, I just want them to last through the summer.

I have also bought inpatients, marigolds, petunias, dianthis(which I have gotten to winter over and get an early start), allyssium, saliva, and wave petunias (the kind that spread). I bought some new gloves and wanted to try them out. They worked great! They are made of neoprene and did not get soggy as I worked in the wet dirt and yet I could feel through them. I am

going to have to buy another pair.

I bought 8 packages of Asiatic lilies for about 75 cents a pack and got them all in the ground. Only one of the bulbs was bad! I am hoping that they will get started quickly as some of mine are already getting ready to get the flower buds on the stems. I also got the saliva in the wheel barrow and front bed under the tree. They are suppose to be a 'full sun' plant, but I have put them in under the tree for years and have had the best of luck with them there. I have tried them in the flower bed out in the full sun and they did not do well at all. I guess that you just have to try out each plant and see where it does best. (Maybe I will try some inpatients out in the planters that are in the sun most of the day.) I also got some of the pots done. (In looking over what I have bought...I may have to look for some color other than the pinks....some dark purple or reds might be needed.)

In a small amount of time we got a lot done....from mowing, to weeding, to removing, and