Dirt Under My Fingernails

Orange Prelude (solid fluorescent orange, early bloomer)
When I Dream (ruby outer petals with firefly-green throat--my favorite--reminds me of the old Crystal Gale song, too)
Siloam Star (yield-yellow, small front daylily)
Red Ribbons (tall spider lily, graceful as a Ghanan--this one is gorgeous and Harvey's favorite)
Strawberry Candy (pink and peachy-red with deeper red "lozenge" center--the "prettiest" but not the coolest--see above)

These are the 50 new daylilies we've planted in front of our house. When I Dream, Siloam Star, and Strawberry Candy are blooming. This gives us 9 daylily varieties total, which is enough. We have over 350 blooms right now--wish you could see it!

We (well, I) laid out, and then we (well, Harvey) planted the hosta garden (new side garden) and added ferns dug at Harvey's family farm. Caladiums are coming up "a treat," as my great-grandfather would say, but my bleeding hearts, well, didn't even break the soil, and our hydrangeas are sporting beautiful leaves but puny little mopheads.

We bought the new daylilies and hostas from a lily farm outside our town. There were HUNDREDS of blooms--not only daylilies, but cannas, callas, stargazers, Asiatics...doubles, triples, bicolors, tricolors, spots, streaks, spirals, variegated foliage (callas). I felt, well, plain in front of such a riot. We don't even have freckles, although Harvey has a very cute mole on his right cheek.

I wish the field above was ours--but we don't have that much sun for a full-on garden spot. (The photo's from a place where we've ordered bulbs before). Shade gardening is much harder to plan. Hopefully these hostas will be as beautiful in the ground as they are in the sketchbook.

I miss the barenakedladies/magic lilies at our other house. Maybe we can find some and transplant.