Wednesday Vignette

My 'Forest Pansy' Redbud tree has started blooming. Like all redbuds, it blooms right on the trunk, and of course because it's growing in the PNW, it's also covered in moss. Because the tree is about 30 feet tall, I often miss seeing when it flowers. I'm usually so busy in the spring and most of the flowers are high up in the branches. But I noticed the pink flowers the other day and decided to take a picture to capture the interesting differences in texture -- the moss, the bark, and the delicate flowers.

'Forest Pansy' Redbud

Anna at Flutter & Hum hosts Wednesday Vignette. Check out her post here.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day -- April 2019

Hey, it's already mid-April, which means it's Garden Bloggers Bloom Day again. I neglected to do a GBBD post for March, because I was away and there wasn't much to show anyway. But things are starting to ramp up a bit now.

Here for your perusal are some quickly taken, badly focused pictures of what's blooming in my garden, along with a bit of rambling discourse about them. I didn't bother trying to do extreme closeups in the attempt to make sure you didn't see any of the weeds and winter debris still strewn about the garden that I haven't gotten around to cleaning up yet. I've been focused on redoing a couple of beds in the front garden at the expense of tidying.

'Princess Irene' Tulip with the early foliage of Gerald Darby Iris - a nice vignette when not overcome with weeds, dead leaves and stems and last year's old, dead iris foliage

Not 100% sure but I think this is Aubretia

Fritillaria meleagris

Primula 'Sunset Shades' has sown itself throughout one of my shade beds as well as into the gravel

It makes a nice companion for the orange Epimedium, which for the second year in a row I have neglected to cut back the old foliage

Perhaps not such a great companion to this Trillium, which I think is Trillium Kurabayashii

Another Trillium in the same bed, possibly Trillium luteum

Camellia 'April Kiss'

Dicentra 'Valentine'

Arctostaphylos, whose branches look a bit cockamamie because the entire shrub toppled over sideways in our February snow and I haven't gotten around to righting it yet

Grevillea 'Canberra Gem' flowering sparsely because it looks like many of its buds were damaged by our February snow

Ribes speciosum

Brunnera macrophylla

Yellow Epimedium whose name is lost

Another Primula (P. marginata, I think)

Honesty/Lunaria annua

Camellia 'Black Magic'

Camellia 'Black Magic'

Erysimum 'Blood Red' which has a sweet scent that's hard to describe, sort of like fruity candy

Pieris japonica

Ribes sanguineum

Pulsatilla vulgaris

Pulsatilla vulgaris

Erythronium

Erythronium 'Pagoda'

Dodecatheon and Anemones

Yellow Corydalis

Arisaema sikokianum starting to unfold

Only a few days ago it looked very much like a scary, clawed hand pushing up out of the soil

Trillium whose name I've lost

In the greenhouse are a couple of plants with buds that are close to opening. It's not Garden Bloggers Bud Almost Open Day, but I'm showing them anyway.

Golden rat-tail cactus

Adenium obesum

That's about it for my garden! I hope you have something blooming in April to show for GBBD. I know some parts of the country are suffering from bad weather and have even been hit by mid-April snow.

Carol at May Dreams Gardens hosts Garden Bloggers Bloom Day, check out her post here.

Is There a Doctor in the House (and Garden)?

Are you ready for another trip back in time to last summer's opulence? We're going back to a garden that was open to NPA members in mid-June of last year, so given that it's now already early April, that's nearly an entire year ago.

Who should we take with us on our trip? Who better than Doctor Who? He/she has more experience with time travel than anyone. But which incarnation?

The Many Faces of Doctor Who

Doctor Who Title Sequences

I've always been rather partial to Christopher Eccleston's version of the Doctor, even though he only spent one season playing him.

I'm The Doctor, By The Way

I liked David Tennant's stint as the Time Lord too, but I'm rather proud right now of the current female version, played by Jodie Whitaker. Can they all come with us? They'll have a grand time romping through Laurel Harrington's West Seattle garden.

The Garden of Laurel Harrington

Here's the description from the NPA booklet.

Laurel Harrington's very large, tumultuous garden covered a series of vacant lots set on a hillside. You entered it from the lot above the house, rather than from the street address, and slowly made your way down the hill through a series of terraces.

This path was the garden entrance, past raised beds filled with flowers and underneath a large dead, dinosaur-like snag.

I might have been tempted to plant something in that maw-like hole

This rose appeared to glow from within

Do you see the hummingbird in the upper left quadrant of the photo? I stood for quite a long time taking photo after photo while he sipped from this large swath of Salvia 'Hot Lips'

Another opulent yellow rose against a clear blue sky

Just beyond that area you enter a rectangular meadow of grass ringed by rich but chaotic flower borders.

The way down to the next level is between those two red barberries on the right, but it's not time to go quite yet, there's too much to see!

The view, with just a glimpse of the house on the right

Looking back toward the snag

On each side are narrow paths, but I was too awkward to dare trying to make my way along them, I just continued further down

A classic combo

Another rose, a single flower rather than a double like the others

Another path with a see holly self sown into the gravel

A rose campion with a double flower

Nearly down to the street now, we're beside the house, in the oldest part of the garden

Looking toward the side of the house

At the back of the house was a much shadier and more contemplative area, with this quiet water feature bubbling away.

All that remained now was to climb back up the hill to the car.

In 2016 when this garden was open for the NPA, my blogging friend Linda Reeder visited and blogged about the garden here.