I love to garden, watching tiny seedlings grow and bloom into beautiful flowers is so special. I also love growing my own vegetables.
In the early morning or evening I love to just go outside and spend time in the garden. I take around my little empty pot and gather spent blooms, and dead head flowers that are done. I water all the plants thoroughly and refill the birdbath. I help the trailing flowers catch on to the trellis and twirl them around the stakes in the garden. This is my special place.
This is a very peaceful and quiet time for me. Sometimes I reflect and sometimes I just enjoy listening to the birds sing their songs back and forth. I am proud of my garden and the stories that it tells.
This year I have been able to find some gently used treasures to add to the garden. Including non-garden items in the garden adds a whimsical touch and a sense of beauty. I have a few items that I have found from antique places that I intend to clean up a bit and plant some low lying ground cover in.
I also know that lighting is really important in the garden. A few years ago we installed metal poles in our garden and then hung solar globe lights in the backyard. I love these lights and they create a beautiful warm glow in the evening. This year I got little fairy sprig lights that are small globes on a spray. They add a delicate sprinkle of light to some of my planters at night.
Along the picturesque Lachine canal in Montreal lies the beautiful, historic Atwater Market. I have been to this market many times with my daughter, who is studying in Montreal. The market is within walking distance of her home and it’s open seven days a week.
I’ve been to the market in all seasons, except for Spring. My daughter told me, “Mum you would love the market in the Spring, there are flowers everywhere!” I made it my mission to visit her in the Spring this year so we could go to the flower market together.
When we got to the market, I saw a few of the flower and plant vendors. I thought to myself, this is lovely. And then, as I turned the corner, the entire length of the market was lined with booth after booth of beautiful blooms. I was in awe! To be honest, I was a little overwhelmed. I wasn’t sure what to look at first and I certainly didn’t want to miss a thing.
Oddly enough we had gone with my daughter’s friend (who doesn’t have a car) and we quickly filled our car with her beautiful plants. The car was filled to the brim with little room left for more. We looked at each other and laughed, and I confessed that I honestly wouldn’t be upset to come back. We drove her friend home and then made our way back to the market. On the drive back we talked about which booth had what and what had stood out to us the most.
On our return we went to specific booths, as if our first run had been a recon mission. We picked out the flowers that we had felt a connection to, especially blooms that I hadn’t seen before in Ontario, and shades and colours that were just that little bit different. The veggies were also beautiful and lush.
As an avid gardener this made my heart completely full! It was a majestic sight and one that I will soon not forget. And I can promise you that this will become one of my new yearly May adventures!
One of my favourite things to do in the Spring is to visit some of my local garden centres. It is a time in between the seasons when you aren’t quite ready to put flowers outside but it is a great source of inspiration. I find that it gets me thinking of great colour combinations and gives me the opportunity to see those pops of colour that we have all been missing during the winter months.
Visiting a garden centre is also a great activity for a rainy day. Garden centers are not only a great resource for inspiration, but they also sell pots, seeds of all kinds, gardening tools, and lots of garden accessories. If you love plants there are also a great selection of tropicals and house plants that can add a fresh pop of green to your home.
My Mom and Dad love to listen to CBC Radio as the background of their day. My grandparents did this too, and so does my Aunt. They regularly share interesting little tidbits that they hear from the day’s stories. My Mom likes the gardening segment in particular, and she always shares the advice with me. Though she always wonders why they don’t give more time to the gardening experts; there always seems to be so many people with questions, and never enough time.
A couple of weeks ago she mentioned that one of the CBC gardeners suggested leaving your perennials intact. This apparently allows bees and insects to overwinter in the dried out stalks, as well as providing homes and food for wildlife. It just so happened that the week before, my Mom had helped me cut back some of my perennials in our backyard. If we’d known this then, we might not have cut them back. I then realized that our new bee and butterfly garden, still full of wild flowers, would be the perfect spot to leave untouched for the winter.
Our pollinator garden project has been a huge success this year. Perhaps there are already creatures in these hollow, dried out stalks and the flower heads with their shrivelled up petals, setting up for the winter.
The garden did its job in the summer months by producing beautiful blooms and nectar for the bees. Now, as we prepare for the winter months, it is providing a safe place to rest. So I will leave my dried up stems and stalks for the winter this year, and I will smile because it makes me think of my Mom and how she shares her stories with me. That makes my heart happy and puts a smile on my face.
It is time to be thinking about putting the garden to bed for the winter. As the temperature drops and the weather begins to cool, fall clean up begins.
Today in the vegetable garden, I cut back some plants and harvested my root vegetables. It looks so empty now, but I left the kale in hopes that it will continue to grow as the temperature gets cooler.
The process of putting the garden to bed offers a chance for reflection on the year’s growing season, evaluating successes, failures, and considering new approaches for the next year.
Elsewhere, some plants are slowly dying, but some are still blooming beautifully. The bee and butterfly garden is still thriving. It is safe to say that this new pollinator garden was a huge success! I will start trimming the perennials tomorrow and scatter seeds for next year.
Although this process of harvesting and cleaning up seems like the final phase of the year, gardening is a year-round activity that involves planning in Winter, planting in Spring, enjoying the fruits of your labour in Summer, and preparing (like today) for the next season in Fall.
Good night for now, my sweet garden!
There are a lot of reasons to do companion planting in the garden. In this container I have planted a pear shaped yellow tomato, basil and marigolds. I also have a larger raised bed with a variety of other tomatoes. Including sweet one hundreds, heirloom, black cherry tomatoes, and grape tomatoes. I have added marigolds and lots of basil in this planter as well.
Companion planting allows the plants to reap benefits from each other in the same container or space in your garden. The main reason for doing this is pest control. In this instance the pests that may want to eat your tomato plants don’t like marigolds or basil. This is a simple non toxic way to control garden pests from eating your vegetables.
Basil is also good friends with tomatoes. Last year was the first year I planted them together. It was lovely to smell the aroma of the basil while working in the garden. This also led me to discover one of my favourite lunch time snacks. Start by taking a Rye Crisp (or similar cracker) and spreading hummus on it. Then slice up cherry tomatoes and place them on top. Then add a few fresh basil leaves, a drizzle of balsamic and a sprinkle of fresh sea salt ! Delicious!
Some other easy companion planting combinations are corn, beans, and squash or onion, peppers, and garlic. Radishes, cucumber and oregano are also another choice. As well as, rosemary, carrots and lettuce.
It is indeed worth looking up what pairs well with other plants in the garden. This is important because some pairings are not good with each other and will affect your productivity in the garden. A simple search of companion planting will result in a lot of information, which you can then use to get the most benefit in your garden.
Happy gardening!
Some flowers just speak to you more than others. The dahlia seems to be one of those. It has such intricate petals and is so lovely. There are so many varieties to choose from and sizes of flower. Some are even as big as a dinner plate!
My daughter lives in Montreal, and likes to go to the Atwater Market. It is such a beautiful market that is open year round and has the most amazing breads, produce, flowers, sweets, and more. During the spring the parking lot becomes a green house/garden centre and many growers sell plants, vegetables and hanging baskets. It is a sea of green with pops of vibrant colours everywhere, it is simply stunning.
I unfortunately didn’t get the chance to go this year, but my daughter was able to pick up these two beautiful dahlias for me. I love their rich yellow colour and they were so healthy. They have become a welcome addition to my backyard. I decided to plant some lantana with them as well for an additional pop of colour. I have planted them in pots and will see how they do, I may have to upsize the container if they are doing really well.
Do you have dahlias growing in your garden? Maybe this post will give you inspiration to try them, I guarantee you will love them!
This Spring I have been diligently working to improve our front porch. Slowly, I’ve added some new things that make it a place where I would want to sit and have a cup of coffee or tea, a place where I would like to stay a while.
Porches hold a special place in my heart. My grandparents had a front and back porch, both enclosed with lots of windows and filled with beautiful light. We would visit and have tea and eat homemade cookies on these porches. They were so well loved, and I have so many great family memories of them.
I wanted to try to recreate some of what I loved about those spaces on my own porch. Adding an outdoor rug, new pillows, and new plants has made a huge difference. It’s already starting to feel warm and welcoming.
My latest addition is these planters. I wanted to create a ‘living wall.’ Living walls are usually secured to (non-living) walls, but this one will hang and create some privacy at the open end of our porch. It will continue to grow and fill in as the summer progresses. I am hoping for healthy, lush, trailing plants that will fill the space.
I started by attaching a cedar board to the ceiling of our front porch (with the help of my husband, this is definitely a two person job). This provides a place to anchor in the screw hooks that will hold the new hanging baskets.
I then filled the baskets with a good quality soil, and planted a variety of trailing plants that I bought at my local garden centre, mostly different kinds of ivy. The hanging baskets and inserts were purchased at my local Dollar Tree. I plan on adding some baby spider plants that I currently have rooting in the house for a little more filler over the next coming days.
Overall, I am super happy with how this project is turning out. I am excited to see how my ‘living wall’ fills in and to watch it progress throughout the Summer. I will keep you posted on how it’s doing. Happy gardening!
I have always wanted a potting bench for my backyard garden. A place that I could transplant seedlings. The opportunity to store my gardening tools, display flowers and treasures from the garden, and a general outdoor work surface.
This was a weekend project that my husband and I did together.
We used cedar to create this bench. Cedar wood is very nice to work with, and it also holds up well to the outdoor weather.
We used tools that we already had in our garage to make the cuts we needed. The next step was to screw the pieces together to form the potting bench. We made the top deep enough to be able to have a good work surface, which was important to me.
I wanted somewhere to hang things like, twine, gardening scissors, and other gardening tools. We had some left over chicken wire which was the perfect thing to attach to the top portion using a staple gun. We also reused some old Ikea shelves for added storage on the top as well.
I think this is a great addition to my backyard gardening space. I love the way it turned out, it is absolutely perfect!
One vegetable that I have grown in my raised garden bed has been kale. I have dabbled with a few different varieties but my family and I prefer curly kale.
A few summers ago I tried dinosaur kale but the texture was just too tough for my liking. I seem to have great success with growing the standard kind of kale so I have gone with that.
Kale is so versatile because it can be eaten both raw and cooked. When you eat it raw, it is best to wash it in a salad spinner. Then remove the vein in the middle, and chop with a knife. I place my chopped kale in a bowl. Then add a small amount of olive oil to the bowl and gently massage it. This breaks down the toughness of the kale leaves. I generally leave the kale leaves to sit while I prep the rest of my ingredients for my salad. Kale is a good base as a salad and can either have vegetables or fruit added to it.
Kale is also fabulous cooked and used as a replacement for spinach. It is excellent in soups and stews and even adding it to pasta dishes for extra vitamins. I am able to freeze kale from my garden as well. It just easily goes in freezer bags to use another day.
Last summer, I planted kale in my garden and was able to continue harvesting right up until January. The year before had been December for the last harvest. I have a running joke with my Dad and Mom. It has become a challenge to see just how long the kale will last. It just seems to keep producing! Maybe next year it will be February? The funniest part is that my Dad never liked kale for his entire life until I started to grow it, now he comes with a ‘kale bag’ and we fill it up weekly.
This year, I didn’t get a chance to remove the kale plants before the snow fell. So I left them and didn’t really think about it anymore. Then the snow started to melt and Spring began to spring. Low and behold the one kale plant started getting green and looking pretty good! I removed the other plants that were definitely expired. The old kale plant had new growth and was looking really healthy.
I just harvested several great looking leaves from my lone kale plant from summer 2022. I did some reading and apparently there can be 2 year old kale. It has a sightly tougher texture. It may not last the entire season; however, kudos to me because now I don’t have to buy greens at the grocery store.
And so ends the tale of the kale!
