Another indoor week

As if the hot weather is not enough to send one scurrying indoors, this week we have had to contend with poor air quality, thanks to some wildfires. Today offered a break from the bad air and it was supposed to be "only" 85 degrees out, so I slaved away a bit in the "meadow", clearing out some weeds and mulching the coneflowers. The temp actually reached 90(!), and I could not help but think, "Only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun...."

Joe pye

Even with a large yard to draw me outside, I sometimes don't take time to look around. This week I've witnessed Mama Hawk teaching her two youngsters to hunt, hummingbirds visiting the fuschia, a monarch amidst the milkweed, possible fox or coyote scat in the front lawn. I just have to pay attention.

'Golden Tiara' hosta

I have ordered a couple of landscape designs in my lifetime. Recently it occurred to me that the designs show the plantings from a birdseye view, and not how the plantings will look to a person standing nearby. For example, the shrubs and trees in the backyard provide a variety of greens and visual textures, but they need something more, some other colors. Ditto the natives planted in the front of the house - pretty when they bloom in the spring, otherwise a lot of green that also looks kind of weedy.

Begonia

After the last go-round with the landscape, I told my SO that if this does not work out, I'm putting everything back into lawn. But I'm not doing that, obviously. I keep making changes instead, mostly additions.

Sunbathing

Because what would I do with myself if I didn't have the yard?

Love the one you're with

I have IBS and sometimes get really bummed about all the foods I can no longer enjoy. Most of the time, however, I focus on what I *can* eat and have discovered some new and yummy meals (air fryer tofu, anyone?) Ditto the bugs in my yard. Several times a day I check on the bees on the bee balm and every evening I make a point of watching the fireflies. If one takes a moment to look around, there are more insects to enjoy.

Like this ladybug on some milkweed.

Or this white-striped black mason wasp. (Photo from Wiki - I didn't want to get too close until I found out whether this guy was friend or foe.)

This volunteer butterflyweed attracted a black swallowtail. (For some reason, the red, white, and blue flamingos keep their heads buried in the aster.)

So there *are* some 6-leggeds in my yard, just not as many as I wish for.

This is one view from my deck. In the foreground, joe pye and queen of the prairie, in the rain garden swamp milkweed, in the back coneflower, milkweed, cupplant, sunflower. This is the kind of color I would like to see all over my backyard this time of year.

Volunteer sunflower

Cupplant

I continue to attack the weeds. Most of the backyard is under control except for the corner pictured above. Yesterday I worked on one of the beds in the front yard, for about two hours; there was a LOT of clover. Always more to do.

An indoor week

I haven't had an ear infection since I was ten years old, but I apparently have one this week. That and the heat have kept me literally under the weather this past week. I watered a bit, but that was about it. The weeds are taking advantage of my absence.

While confined to the house, I started watching Garden Fit. It's a combination of great gardens and ergonomic exercises to help ease gardening aches and pains.

This is what I see when I look out one of my windows into the backyard: in the foreground fuschia, then Queen of the Prairie, then coneflower, and way in the back milkweed. Pinks!

My "ditch" daylilies get a fair amount of shade, so are behind most of the others in this area. Once I get the yard waste cleared away from the back fence, I may divide the clumps and move some out there.

In fact, I have a lot of plans for what to do with the open areas around the shrubs. Bees still visit the monarda on the south side of the house; that would be a nice addtion, maybe interspersed with the daylilies. That's the thing about gardening - there is always room for improvement and experimentation.