Is it a flower, a plant, or...?

What do you see?

I was just telling Bethany about this flower/plant while we were watching "The Muppet Christmas Carol".

Now what do you see?

If you didn't see Gonzo before, do you see him now? The "nose" on the flower is a bit straighter than Gonzo's nose; in fact, a few years ago I took a picture of this same type of flower/plant and it looked more like Gonzo. I don't know if that photo was on the stolen laptop, my other camera, or if it's filed away on our back-up disk.

It doesn't matter, because with a little stretch of the imagination, I think you "get the picture" (pun intended).

Fall at the Gardens

I went to Meijer Gardens yesterday. I haven't been there since August and wanted some good autumn photos. What better place to take them?!

Here's a sneak peek at the Japanese Garden, set to open June 2015.

 Inside and out they are showcasing mums. However, outside they haven't fully bloomed, so here's a good photo of the indoor display.

 Here's the Michigan farm.

 This statue is by the farmhouse. 

 I like the palette of colors and the reflection in the pond.

 That's the statue of Eve by Rodin. I like how she's framed by the trees.

 This is inside the gallery, the showcase for ArtPrize at the Gardens. This piece is part of the wall.

 Here's a different angle to help you understand it. 

These bricks are made from clothes, pressed into the shape of a brick. They were then stacked to look like a house that had been damaged. You can read the artist's statement here. I hope you'll take time to read it, she makes a fascinating statement.

I hope you enjoyed my visit. (And photos! I know, I'm shocked too!)

Two-fer

Be sure you go back (scroll down) and read yesterday's post. I wrote it today. I just didn't post-date it.

Today, after church and Bill's Big Breakfast, I worked on the gardens. I weeded the garden on the south side of the house.

Then I went behind the garage.

Yikes.

 This is the before.

I have completely neglected it. I don't see it, so it doesn't exist, right? This is partly why we want to move the garage back closer to the property line. We don't need this garden. It's not a secret garden so much as it's a jungle.

It's Atticus' hunting spot.

It's a tree farm. Want a Redbud? We'll sell you one. Or several.

Since we probably need a permit for selling trees on a small, urban lot, I just attacked the wild garden with a shovel. 

There were plants in there!

And lots of weeds. And lots of vines. Aggressive, thick vines.

It's also our dumping ground for large limbs (since the neighbor behind us doesn't like it when we burn dry wood in a container). Those large branches, etc are still back there. 

As you can see I did get a lot of it cleaned up.

Now it's time to relax. It's a holiday weekend!

What happens when you give the youth your camera

You get lots of selfies. And shadow photos. And really, really good pictures.

I'm impressed.

I'm also surprised that there are so few selfies. I expected more.

These pictures are from our trip to Meijer Gardens on Thursday.

Now I have to chose which ones to share since they took 97 really good pictures!

Shadow pictures with the plants.

 Everybody around the Marshall Fredericks fountain.

 Drew, Brian, Caleb, Jasmin and Taylor with Fred and Lena Meijer.

Drew and "Mad Mom"

 Pippa, Jasmin, and Francine.

 Can you guess which three took the shadow picture?

 Checking out the sculpture from all angles (this is from the ground, they all went and laid under it for a new perspective).

 Anyssa and Francine.

Checking out the koi in the pond

 Can we roll down the hill?

All together! Three, two, one… roll!

I really did enjoy seeing the gardens from their perspective. I wish they had taken more pictures! 

Very little

Maybe this is why I don't normally blog on the weekends; I got nothin'.

It hasn't rained in weeks. Bill hasn't mowed the lawn since I was in Cincinnati.

We've kept my flowers alive, which I've shown you here.

I'm working on my running. The 5k is in one week. My goal is to run it in under 45 minutes.

We've been working on the guest room, scraping and scraping paint. There are three double hung windows in the room. Bill pulled off the sashes of the two that are ganged together and striped those. He'll pull the third one off, strip it, and then take them to the hardware store for new glass.

See? It's a little dry on the writing front.

I'm really enjoying my book, "Clara and Mr. Tiffany". I especially enjoy looking at the Tiffany window in our church. I know the book is fiction, but when the author talks about the glass detail, I have to assume she did her research. Or I'm just being a romantic. Either way, it's good.

That's about all that's happening here. I'm too lazy at the moment to get the cord and the camera and show you pictures from Hell. I promise I will. Just not today.

The flora and fauna

I just watered the flowers and realized it's time for an update. The last time I posted pictures was here, on June 24th. I guess it was time for some recent photos.

The flowers, they have grown.

 The petunia is really happy. This is just from one plant!

 The overall front garden, from the driveway. 

 Osteospermum.

 The lavender is blooming!

 Here's the front garden from a different perspective.

 Let's see... there are four petunias, a dahlia and bee balm in there. 

 An artistic shot of the daisy.

And here's the back bed. The dahlia is blooming! Again, that is only one petunia. Those things are really happy this year.

A fun day at Meijer Gardens

Last week we met friends at Meijer Gardens. I didn't post pictures then, so I'll share them today.

 The waterfall.

 Pretty flowers.

 Queen Bee.

 I have another photo just like this from seven years ago. Skylar is a little taller now. 

 The pond with shades of green.

 Aunt Em and Skylar.

 We saw a chipmunk,

 and several turtles,

 and a family of swans!

Skylar's hanging with her peeps, Mr. & Mrs. Fred Meijer.

It was a very fun day, and it was fun to hang out with the Robinson's.

my flower garden *with pictures!

I'm going to go out and take a few pictures of my garden and flowers. I planted them Memorial Day weekend and took photos then. I want to show how much they've grown (or lack thereof). It's been raining a lot. They will probably take off later this week. I'll take more pictures.

I wanted to go ahead and write otherwise I may forget. If you're lucky, I'll post pictures later tonight.

*Here you go!
In order we have:

the herbs from the greenhouse

 Same herbs in their pots

Herbs now 

(The flower pot with the seedlings is cilantro growing from seed. I just planted them last week!)

The herbs had to be separated to get more sunlight on the deck.

The dill is out of control. Need any dill?

 Now for the front yard.

The front flower bed right after it was planted.

 The front flower bed today. 

Note the cocoa mulch that has been spread. It keeps the slugs away. With all this rain, that is important! I wouldn't have any flowers today if I hadn't put down this mulch.

 It also makes it smell like chocolate after it rains. That is definitely a pleasant smell.

 Up close Tiger Lilies with Husker Red Penstemon in the background.

Now for the back flower bed. This used to have a rose planted in it. I absolutely loved the color of the rose (peachy orange to a yellow, my favorite combo). It had not bloomed much in recent years. This spring, I pulled the rose out because, well it had died. It came out very easily and there was not much root to it. I think the location was not ideal and it had not been cared for as well as it should have been (both by us and previous owners). We'll try roses again once we build a new garage. 

In the meantime, I planted a dahlia (far right), two petunias (middle), and a dianthus (far left).

 Here you can really see the dianthus doing well. The dahlia is also growing, but it doesn't have any blooms on it yet. I should give it some plant food.

 There you go. I hope you enjoyed the pictures. Like I said, with all this rain, things should start to take off. I will take more pictures as things continue to bloom.