“Her green mind made the world around her green.” ~Wallace Stevens, Description Without Place
The world around me is finally greening up. The leaves are starting to unfurl which is always a sign of more song birds coming. This week, like clock work, the male hummingbirds and Baltimore orioles arrived and found the feeders. Soon the females will come and get to work making their nests.
But it is my native plant garden that is bringing me so much joy right now. It is slowly coming to life. I weeded the two areas we dug out last year. And my husband dug out phase 3 so I could begin to move the tightly packed plants around giving them room to grow.
In the new section, I moved and planted Joe Pye, red twig dogwood, anise hyssop, wild geraniums, butterfly weed, echinacea and black-eyed susan so they could grow and spread as they are want to do.
I also planted Virginia bluebells…
….and bloodroot in all three sections.
In the first section swamp milkweed, monarda and boneset are coming back. I also added wild columbine and Jack-in-the-Pulpit. Not much to see yet but little green patches.
In the second section we have Anna hydrangea, amsonia, coreopsis, echinacea, wild geraniums, tiarellas. marsh marigold, Ohio spiderwort, NJ Tea bush, Solomon’s Seal and Christmas ferns growing back.
I am hoping to complete phase 4 this month, next to phase 3, and move a few more plants out of section 2. I also want to include some late bloomers like helianthus and aster for the monarchs when they move through on their way south in the fall.
The areas are small enough for me to have fun designing, and not too big for me to manage.
While I was out walking this past week, I spied trillium in the old woods (on the other side of the woods behind us). What a treat. I have walked this neighborhood for 2 and a half years and never saw them. But there they were. I went to the woods edge and saw them up close. My heart was so excited.
This is the trillium I grew in my old garden. It never naturalized but I did not plant it in a woodland. I much prefer it in nature, in the woods carpeting the forest floor.
In other areas of the garden, more grape hyacinths opened with my miniature tulips, Little Beauty. I love the blue and rose red color of these.
They seemed perfect to put in a vase and bring indoors.
With this sweet, simple vase I am linking in to the wonderful meme, In A Vase On Monday, at Rambling in the Garden.
All the pictures shared in this post were taken with my Nikon Coolpix or iPhone camera, and manipulated on my iPhone using the apps, Pixlr and Prisma. You can follow my progress with #the100dayproject in my Instagram and Facebook feed.
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