Six on Saturday: Spring Exits and Summer Begins

Hello to my Six on Saturday friends and all of those who follow my Barefoot Lily Lady blog. I’ve been busy dealing with the details related to my sweet mom’s departure for heaven on May 24th, so haven’t kept up with my blog as much. Life is finding a comforting rhythm once again as I adjust time formerly spent with my mom to time spent creating a new routine – including more time in the garden.

With our warmer weather, I find myself barefoot gardening more often. My feet are once again irretrievably dirty as my somewhat neglected flowerbeds are slowly weeded and tended.

As my dear mom went through her final weeks of her battle with Alzheimer’s my garden went through its lovely iris and peony stage. I didn’t take time to show you those photos, so created this little collage photo (cheating, perhaps?) to give you a taste while keeping my photo max within my six.

Now, for this week’s Six…

1. When I sold my mom’s home several years ago, I took divisions of a few of her pretty perennials and transplanted them in my garden. This iris is from her garden and this is the first year it bloomed. Serendipity? Or a blessing to remember her by? (And it’s in her favorite color…purple)

2) The lovely Clematis ‘Princess Diana’ is scrambling up my arbor entrance to the backyard gardens. Its tulip-shaped bells are a lovely fuchsia pink (one of my favorite garden colors).

3. During this time of COVID-19 “Safer at Home” reclusiveness, I have made it a goal to actually try my hand at making some of my crafty Pinterest pins. My husband Wayne helped me earlier this month by building a birdhouse for me to paint, adding an “as seen on Pinterest” roof made with one of our old license plates. While our son Matt was here for a visit, he helped by cutting down a volunteer cottonwood tree (without anyone getting hurt) and leaving a stump tall enough to serve as a post for this new birdhouse. I’m pretty sure that there are new residents, but haven’t caught them coming or going yet.

4. I kinda love it when I plant something and forget what color it will be. It’s like watching a surprise gift slowly open before your eyes. I sort of remember planting an Asiatic lily in one of my daylily beds last fall. Anyone want to venture a guess as to what color it will be?

5. I’m a big fan of cranesbill. It grows in soft little mounds, but I love how it gently winds its way in and around the shade provided by other flowers in the garden, adding darling blue, purple, or pink five-petaled flowers here and there all summer long.

6. This is another clematis (cultivar unknown) which I dug up from my mom’s garden before putting her house up for sale. It is inching its way up the other side of the garden entry and will hopefully meet up with ‘Princess Diana’ this summer for a sweet pink and purple combination.

Oops! I guess that’s 7!

Are you wondering what this “Six on Saturday” thing is all about? Simple. Gardeners all around the world post photos (words optional) of six things in the garden on a Saturday. Let me tip my hat to The Propagator, the creator of Six on Saturday, who provides the forum for gardeners to virtually traipse through one another’s gardens every week. It’s a lovely way to show off our gardens (both the pretty and the yummy), share knowledge, and even glean some advice for how to deal with our garden failures. I hope you’ll join us next Saturday.