After the Storm 4-29-2024

We had super heavy rain in waves from about 8pm until a bit after 11 last night. We were lucky. We were under a tornado warning – with Greenwood actually mentioned as ‘in the path’ but – other than it becoming ominously quiet at one point – the bad stuff passed by us. I watched the TV coverage until I could see the yellow and red blobs, along with associated tornado rectangles, had passed us. (I need to do a harvest of the lettuce and spinach this afternoon.)

I walked around the yard this morning to see if we had any damage. I found one rose bush branch was broken off, but that was all. The garden is still looking good. They certainly got the watering they probably wanted, and then some, but all looks good so far. (The lettuce plants here are head lettuce, and the heads are forming!) I’ll bring some bungie cords to put around the supports to give the tomato plants more to hang onto.

I’m planning to go out later – weather permitting – and see what needs more support, rearranging (in the case of the tomato branches) and what needs harvesting (lettuce and spinach.)

The clematis bloomed suddenly. The blooms are looking a bit battered after the storm, but I’m hoping they’ll perk up. I’ll bring my husband out later, since these are his favorite.

And this is the first bloom of our Stella de Oro lilies. You can see there are several buds, so I’m hoping we’ll have a nice display.

My sister-in-law sent me some phone apps suggestions that might help me identify my mystery perennials. I added them to my phone, and hope to make the time to see how they work later today. She also sent me a Kindle book on flowers and veggies. Isn’t she wonderful?

Weeds vs Flowers

This is a line of three 8-foot-brick planters that divide the top of our driveway area from the front yard. There are lot of perennials in there, but they are in a death fight right now with the weeds that have exploded in the last few weeks.

My husband always looks at things, throws up his hands and announces the weeds have won, there is NO way the flowers can have survived, we might as well just burn it all and start over. (This is only ONE of the reasons that HE mows the grass and I handle the flowers.)

Yesterday I weeded the first of the three planters. I cut back the rose bushes, cut out a lot of dead stuff, weeded, and then cut the overgrown greenery from the irises and the Stella de Oro flowers at the opposite end of the planter from the taller rose bush. Things are much better now. In fact, when I insisted my husband come and ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ last night, he was ‘astonished’ (his word) at the difference. :0)

Here’s another view of that planter.

Here is today’s project – the middle 8-foot planter.

A little daunting at the moment, but I’ll tackle this as soon as I finish writing the blog posts for the day.

I hope that your weather is such that you can spend time outside, soaking up a bit of sunshine, breathing in the air, and enjoying life.