While there are many wonderful plants in my garden, today I’d like to sing the praises of one I only discovered a couple years ago.

Yarrow has so much going for it. It’s a native plant (though these above are all cultivars). The polliinators LOVE it. It bloom allllll summer It has a very pretty, feather, fern like foliage. It reseeds, and competes well with weeds, as it’s a wildflower that grows in grasslands.

The medium pink on the top left made the move from the Townhouse. It was my very first yarrow. The lighter pink in the top middle was a nice surprise from the previous homeowners. It was growing in the middle of the back lawn, but of course, repeatedly mowed down (though I could see the leaves in the grass). When I built the borders around Edible Alley, it took full advantage of the open ground and made itself right at home. I was thrilled to discover it’s beautiful colour when it bloomed. The red and the white were added last year, and are both spreading nicely. And the two yellows are both new this year. I just adore the peachy yellow of that one on the bottom right.

If you come across yarrow in your travels, I highly recommend adding it do your garden!

June is about to give way to July, and to me, July is always the month of the Lily.

As you know, I have a vast collection of day lilies

And this is just the start – there are many more to come!

I did battle with the Asian Lily Beetle this spring and prevailed and now my Asiatic and Oriental lilies are starting to put on a show.

And there’s many more to come with these too!

But that’s not all that hot and summery…

I’ve got two, big Red Hot Pokers standing proud in the front yard.

And of course, there’s still lots of beautiful roses blooming.

We also have False Sunflowers, Shasta Daisies, and Black-Eyed Susans.

And many coneflowers of course!

And how about Hollyhocks? I’ve got this beautiful inky purple one in the backyard.

Or what about this miniature Hollyhock? So sweet!

And there’s so much more to come. July is always a great month in the garden!

As you know, the main reason I built the catio was to keep the kitties safe from the dangers of the wide world. But another reason was to keep the wider world safe from the kitties (mainly the bunnies and the birds).

But that doesn’t help when the birds fly INTO the cage of doom!!! It’s not usually an issue. The birds perch on it all the time. But other than a pair of Juncos Burton got the first winter we were here, we haven’t really had an issue with birds actually landing on the ground inside. And I deadhead the coneflowers in there so the finches aren’t tempted by the seed heads. (Butterfly casualties are another issue, but there’s not much I can do about that).

But… on Sunday, apparently one sparrow didn’t get the message. The video has a happy ending if you’re worried about watching.

It’s a little hard to make out everything from the security camera angle, but I think you can follow the action.

It doesn’t look like Lemmy has mastered the kill strike yet. And the sparrow flew away pretty steadily, so I don’t think there were any injuries. Lemmy must have just pinned him.

He was rather perplexed when poor birdie flew away!

One of the things I love best about this house is the sunporch. Not just because it’s a great little spa for my houseplants in the summer. It’s also a wonderful place to sit, and knit and enjoy a good thunderstorm!

With a ginger cat to “help” of course.

Eventually, Lemmy decided he’d done all he could and moved to inspect the storm a little more closely…

And I was able to finish the first sock!

Maybe I’ll get lucky with another storm this weekend, and be able to get a good start on the second one.

While the weather was decent on Sunday, Saturday it was absolutely sweltering. I managed to spend an hour and a half weeding the catio yard in the early before I had to give up or risk heat exhaustion.

So… I came into the nicely cooled house, got a BIG glass of water, and set to a project I’ve been putting off too long – a June quilt for Burton’s chaise. We have all the months except May, June, and September. May was far too busy with gardening, and June was quickly slipping away!

For June, Burton decided he wanted something bright and cheerful. What’s more bright and cheerful than a big, bold butterfly?

The pattern is Social Butterfly by Lella Boutique and it uses two fat quarters and some background fabric. (I used a scrap for the butterfly body, but in the pattern, it’s the same print as the coral in mine). And as you can see it’s a nice BIG block. I only needed to make one, and add some borders to have the perfect size for the chaise.

I left the quilting of it until Sunday, (Nothing fancy, just stitch in the ditch, and a few straight lines), and sat out on the porch to do the binding.

The quilt is only 30″ x 22″ so it did not take any time at all to sew down that binding (which was another scrap from the stash. )

The back was some leftover flannel from the back of another quilt. It certainly doesn’t get more cheerful than that!

And it looks perfect on his chaise. Of course, the real question is – what does his Lordship think of it…?

It think it’s a hit! (Trust me – that’s his happy face!)

I know I said there wouldn’t be any TNT this week because I was headed to Mom’s for the weekend – but there was a little bit of a hiccup… I had been on the highway for about 10 minutes (about 40 minutes into the 2.5 hour drive to Mom’s) and Wilma decided to be a bit of a diva….

The engine started shuddering and hiccupping… and the Check Engine light came on. I know enough about vehicles to know it likely wasn’t catastrophic, but it DEFINITELY wasn’t a good idea to try to get to Mom’s. I got off the highway at the next exit, and limped her home. Dave put his scan tool on it, and determined it was misfiring on one of the cylinders – apparently due to an issue with one of the rocker arms in the engine. It’s not the end of the world – the issue is very fixable, and it’s covered by the warranty. Hopefully it will be taken care of this week.

But it meant I wasn’t going to make it Mom’s and get my quilt done. I was disappointed, but it’s not like I don’t have lots to keep me entertained here.

And as I said yesterday, the heat wave finally broke Sunday morning, so I was able to enjoy a lovely afternoon on the porch with my stitching.

I only spend a couple hours on it, but I was able to get Mr. Moths squishy body and fluffy antennae done!

And I got a chance to put another needled minder to work. Mom gave me this one when she gave me the gnome. Isn’t she cute?

While I might not have loved the obscene heat and humidity (which thankfully broke on Sunday), the edibles sure did…

Top: The baby pumpkins and gourds are all doing quite nicely. Bottom left: The zucchini have exploded. Bottom right: The cucamelons are taking their time and are still quite small – but apparently that’s pretty normal. They get a little bigger every day.

My potatoes have the prettiest little flowers! And you can totally see their relation to tomatoes, and other night shades in the blooms.

The snap peas have really taken off and are climbing the strings nicely. I expect to be enjoying fresh peas in about a month.

The Japanese cucumbers are only just starting to climb, but I expect they will really take off soon.

I got my bean towers in and the beans are filling in nicely. There are three types here- two green and one yellow. The idea was to see which one I liked best and focus on it next year… but I still have a tonne of seeds left, so unless one is horrid, I’ll be growing them all again next year.

The carrots are really starting to looks like carrots now. I’m so glad I bought the pelleted seed. It meant I was able to space them easily, and I don’t have to worry about thinning them. The garlic I showed yesterday shared this bed, and now that its out, I’ll plant up the empty half with more carrots so we get a second later harvest.

The broccoli is looking nice, though I’ve seen a few Cabbage Whites flitting around so I’m going to have to keep an eye out for eggs and caterpillars. I’m new to broccoli so this is definitely and experiment for me.

And last…

I’m already in a battle with the Squash Bugs – I’m removing eggs daily. And so far, despite their efforts, my squash are thriving!!!!

Just look at the size of these leaves!

Because the weather has been so gross, I can’t really spend more than 20 minutes or so at a time in the garden right now. The weeds really need to be brought under control again, but there was a task I needed to get to first…

Harvesting my garlic

It all came up beautifully! And you can see, I’ve got 14 lovely-sized bulbs (they filled half of one of the square raised beds).

I plan to take two of the smallest to Mom for some fresh eating (she’ll be able to use them up quickly before they rot).

The rest I tied up in bundles and they are now hanging in the sun porch to dry and cure for longer storage!

Not a bad haul for about 10 minutes of work last fall!

The summer colour is really starting to show in the garden.

It feels a little early for Coneflowers, but I’m not going to complain. They bloom right to the frost and are one of my favourite long-bloomers.

The Tickseeds are starting to bloom. As you may recall, I have several variants. I thought I lost all the pretty pink ones I had (they are a little more tender), but they just took their time coming back. None are blooming yet, but it won’t be long.

Stella D’Oro has the honour of being the first day lily to bloom. Stella D’Oro is one of the most common Daylilies next to our wild orange “ditch” lily. It’s a smaller Daylily, and it will bloom all summer long. It also needs next to no maintenance, making it a popular choice for commercial and office property gardens, which is where you see it most often around here.

“Tiny Double U” is the first true Lily to bloom. It’s not a big lily, but, makes up for it with colours and blooms – as you can see by it’s bold orange, and double flowers. It’s multiplied beautifully over the last couple of years, so I’ll probably split it up and spread it around after it’s done blooming.

I’ve got Blanket Flowers throughout the gardens, and they always bring a smile to my face.

I love the combination of the pink Pincushion Plant, and Pink sage at the foot of the walkway garden.

And is there anything more cheerful than a yellow rose? Right is Mellow Yellow, centre is Good as Gold, and left is a miniature yellow rose.

Long time readers will recognize Chicago Peace. It starts out a gorgeous deep coral, and blossoms into a big blousy bloom of pale pink and yellow.

The Marguerite Daisies (left) and False Sunflowers (Right) are cheering up the border around Edible Alley. I had to get ruthless with the Marguerites because they tried to take over their corner of the border. They are so cheerful in bloom -and a mega pollinator magnet.

Blue can be a hard colour to get in the garden (most “blues” tend more towards purple). but this blue Delphinium nails it. It’s such a stunner.

Every day I take a stroll through the gardens to see what’s new… and every day I’m delighted. And there’s so much more to come!

Like many of you, our weather has been disgustingly hot and sticky this week. This kind of heat hits all the cats hard, but it definitely hits Burton the hardest. But he’s a smart boy too – this chair back sit directly in the path of the downstairs air conditioner.

Stay cool my friends!