September has gone almost as fast at August did. Still, there’s been a little more time to enjoy the garden.
Most of my Tickseed are blooming strong, but I have a real soft spot for the pink ones.
My favorite mum is coming into her peak. She’s absolutely amazing when covered in blooms
The varying types of Black-Eyed Susans I have are always strong this time of year.
I cut back the Yarrow that had finished a couple weeks ago, and now I’m getting a second flush of blooms on some.
Same with the Widow’s Tears – I chopped off the seed heads from the faded blooms and now we are back in business. Deadheading can keep many flowers going, but I didn’t realize it worked with either of those. I was just trying to tidy up a bid.
Deadheading will keep these cosmos going until the first frost. Can you believe that’s just one plant? It takes my breath away every time I see it.
I planted some sunflowers late in the summer, and now they are finally blooming. They are just small ones but cheerful none-the-less.
I fell in love with this gorgeous dahlia at the start of the season. I put it in a pot with some petunias and it struggled all summer. But now it’s thriving! I’m definitely going to try to keep my Dahlia tubers over winter. I think the crawl space will be dry and cool enough for them.
There’s probably only a few more weeks of really good blooms left, but I’m going to try to enjoy every one!
You can always tell when the temps drop around here.
Rupert starts nesting in the bed blankets.
He’s also been coming down to sit in my lap in the evenings before bed. It’s not that he loves me – he just wants the extra body heat – so he’s willing to fake it.
The quilters who read this blog will probably recognize the name Tula Pink. For the non-quilters – she’s a fabric designer who creates wild designs in crazy electric colours. She’s one of my favorites.
I made a big quilt out of her Pinkerville line, and have two other collections (Sketchbook and Tiny Beasts) tucked away in the stash.
But there’s one of her lines I’ve always wanted to get my hands on – Tabby Road! Happily, Tula has been doing what she calls Deja Vu – limited runs of old lines – and in August, she brought back Tabby Road!
Isn’t it wild? And to make it even better – she took that pink cat print and put it out in MINKY!!!!!!!
Naturally I HAD To get some. It’s all sitting in a box in the sewing room – just waiting to be sewn into something AWESOME!!! Mom has some Tula in her stash she’s been dying to use as well, so we’ve decided that October will be Tula-ctober! We’ll each be working on a Tula top throughout the month!
Lemmy is SUPER excited about this one! And so am I!
The big project of the weekend was putting together the scrappy 16-patch/QST top.
On Saturday, I was up early, and in the sewing room by 10 am (usually it’s noon most weekends).
I had a rotating cast of characters helping throughout the day as I sewed all the blocks together.
It was not without a hiccup or two. Those QSTs have to be positioned a certain way, depending what row they are in, and I did get a few of them messed up. But it didn’t set me back too much and by 3 pm, I had the last row sewn on and the top was complete!
I really am thrilled with this one. It was a great scrap buster, with a fabulous result. It finished up at 70″ square, so it’s a nice sized quilt too!
I’ve got these fun polkadots for the back, and I’m thinking a plain black binding will wrap it all up nicely! Sadly, we have plans for next weekend, so I think this will be the only project I complete for WIPtember… but still – it’s one project less than I had, so that’s a success!
A decent, if not huge amount of progress was made on Mr. Moth.
I filled in the centre of the yellow flowers, and got the first colour of the left side branch completed. There are two more colours to add to the leaves, then I repeat it all for the opposite side.
Progress has slowed on the sofa sock. There were no long, boring, but convenient work meetings this week so they did not get as much love. I only have about a half inch left to do on the leg though, so I’m pleased with that.
I still think I’m on track to finish this pair by the end of the month. Then I think I might just make a pair for me!
Most of the pictures you see of my garden are taken with my iphone. And while its camera is pretty exceptional and does have a few advantages over my fancy camera (portability, ability to get tight angles), in many ways it just doesn’t compare.
Here are a few of my favourite images I’ve taken over the summer (usually while waiting for the birds)
This is reason number 1 why I’m reluctant to completely remove the asters from the garden…
And this is reason number 2
They are absolutely AMAZING when they start blooming.
They are just masses and masses of flowers. I’m really hoping doing a Chelsea chop next year makes them a little more manageable.
And these two aren’t the only asters I have.
I have this lovely bright magenta, as well as a more medium pink (but sadly don’t seem to have a picture of). Both of them were put in this year, so they aren’t as established as the other two – so they are being pretty well-behaved so far.
And… the asters aren’t the only flowers blooming in abundance.
That Cosmos in the island garden has just exploded with blooms.
Such beautiful blooms that will go right to the frost as long as I keep deadheading – which is easy enough to do as I stroll through my garden each day.
The only place I planted marigolds this year was in the veg beds.
And though the veg are mostly done, the marigolds are just spilling all over the place, keeping Edible Alley from looking like barren ground.
Of course, not all the veg are done.
The Cucamelons are absolutely THRIVING. They cover almost one 1/4 of the squash tunnel and are looking so green and vibrant.
And of course, providing plenty of little snacks too.
I thought the regular cucumbers were close done too – but I picked five good-sized cukes on Wednesday – and will probably be picking two or three more today. (No pics though because apparently I’ve been slacking.
Back on the flower front..
All the sedum is in full bloom and just a mass of tiny pink flowers. When we moved, I brought two small clusters from the townhouse and put them both in the catio. They are both HUGE now, and will need to split up next spring. For now, they are a favourite of the bees, and between them, and the Smooth Aster, the catio is literally buzzing with activity during the day.
Such industrious little creatures.
The Mums, of course, are in their prime. I’ve got one more, dark red one set to bloom.
I’ve gushed on and on about my Tickseed (Coreopsis), but this one I added early this year….
is just blowing my mind! I can’t recall the name, but it’s taller than all my other varieties, and could almost be mistaken for a False Sunflower. But just look at that amazing cascade of blooms!
It’s called Moonbeam, and while it’s quite as floriferous as the other one, it’s pale yellow flowers really stand out in the garden!
And of course, I treasure each new rose bloom I get.
Soon enough, the gardens will be sleeping and I’ll be dream of the plans for next year.
While I live in a small town, I still live in a town – not in the countryside – and it never ceases to amaze me of all the creatures that visit, or call my gardens home.
I’m happy to announce that I have met a FOURTH tree frog!
It took me a whole day to find this one. I could hear him chirping from somewhere in the backyard. I searched and searched, with no luck.
Then the next morning, I was out picking raspberries – and there he was on one of the canes!
I can’t get over how small these guys are! It’s easy to see why they are so hard to find!
The hummingbirds are everyday visitors now and I managed to get a few more shots.
Just look at the length of her beak!
She definitely puts it to good use.
I don’t often take picture of the sparrows, because, let’s be honest, compared to many other birds that visit my yard, they are a little bit boring.
But they’ve gotten very used to me hanging about the yard with my camera, and I can get withing a few feet of them before they fly off.
They do have cute little faces.
I love the Mourning Doves too. They just always look so polite and sweet.
Though this pair were getting up to some sort of antics on my roof.
Never polite… but always beautiful…
I’ll never tire of taking pictures of the bluejays.
Now that I’ve got decent pics of the hummingbirds, my new obsession are the Goldfinches
I hear them in the yard all time, but the best shots I’ve been able to get so far are the above far away shot in the top of the Maple..
And this one of a male and female on a coneflower seedhead. They love the coneflowers, and I have lots of them, so I’m hoping for some better opportunities.
Butterfly counts are still on the low side, but there’s a couple new to add this year.
I spent the better part of an afternoon chasing around this Painted Lady. She was quite elusive, but really wanted to be in the garden (there’s so much here to eat!) so I managed to get several good shots of her.
This Eastern Comma was not so accomodating
This was the best shot I managed to get of it before it flew off, never to return. At least you can clearly see the little white mark on the hind wing that gives it it’s name.
And I showed you a pink-edged Sulpher before – but that as at a local nursery
This one was in the front garden taking advantage of the Queen of Hearts butterfly bush!
And… you know how much I love these guys.
I was working in the front gardens when this one flew by and landed right on the grass in front of me. You can get a good look at those clear wings in this pic!
And there’s definitely no shortage of spiders here.
The above are varying types of orb weavers and are fairly decent-sized spiders – ranging in size from nickel to quarter-sized.
The beautiful one on the far right is living on the back of the shed. And I think I managed to catch her in an intimate moment.
She was playing footsie with this smaller, but similar spider who I assume was male. He wasn’t her prey, because he left not long after. I think I might have caught the end of her rendezvous.
Now the orb weavers are pretty easy to spot, but there are some you have to look much harder for.
Crab spiders are teeny tiny spiders that like to hide in flowers. They are quite often very close in colour to the flower they hide in. As you can see, this one managed to catch a snack.
As did this one. And you can see his colouring is perfect for this false sunflower.
Dragonflies are another common sight around the garden. A neighbour down the street and around the corner has a large pond.
It’s not as common to get pictures of them though. They move so fast!
Another thing there’s no shortage of in this garden is bees.
Bumble bees…
Carpenter bees
Teeny tiny bees
And of course, honey bees. There’s no shortage of honey bees around here as about a 10 minute walk away is Munro Honey – a commercial honey producer.
And last, I’ll leave you with two of my favourite garden visitors…
Preying mantises and Grasshoppers – both fascinating in their own ways.
All creatures, great and small, are welcome in this garden!
Wandering Cat Studio 