When ‘Great Expectations’ Happen

If my great expectations of gardening goals were met at all this week, it was through no effort of my own, but by the loving efforts of my dear husband. I had two projects in mind and he took care of one of them for me. It had been my desire to rake the flowerbed on the east side of our home and clean up a winter’s worth of birdseed hulls from underneath my bird-feeding station. The later was quite handily accomplished by my husband, who also took the time to relocate that feeding station to a spot a little further away from the fountain.

I had also expressed a desire to repaint a garden arbor which has been in need of TLC for a few seasons. On our way home from church on Sunday he asked me what color I wanted to paint it (he knows I’ve been painting this and that’s in the garden purple for the past few years). I told him that I was thinking of painting it a basic black, so the arbor would frame the beauty of the flowers which will (hopefully) scramble upon it, rather than distract the eye with audaciousness.

While I was at work one day this week, THIS happened.

Several decades ago my parents gifted us with a really cool birdbath. I just love all of the little details on the base. The birdbath is made of concrete and is a heavy bugger; even so, it made the move with us when we moved from Milwaukee to our current Fitchburg home twenty-one summers ago. For several years the ornate birdbath graced our secret garden (a little garden outside of our front door that is difficult to see from the street). Sadly, the “bath” part of of it cracked and sprung some leaks a few years ago. Much to our favorite robin’s dismay, I turned the leaky bowl into a succulent garden. [Note: we purchased a new birdbath to replace it, but said robin kept visiting the old one and fussing about the lack of water. He eventually settled in and began enjoying the replacement bath.] Well, the concrete bowl eventually succumbed to the elements, unceremoniously dumping the succulent contents on the ground, and we were left with the ornate concrete base. We tried to put a new bowl on top, but it never fit right. A good, stiff wind would blow it off the base, water and all.

The base was too pretty to get rid of (and held special memories of my parents), so I told my hubby that someday I’d like to create another succulent garden, but was worried that the top would fall off in the wind. He offered to figure out a way to make it work.

Fast forward to yesterday when my clever husband permanently affixed the bowl to the base. I’m looking forward to planting it up real pretty for the summer months. My resident bird community need not worry–we have two more bird baths and a fountain for them to play in.

I’ve had a yearning to plant ‘Peacock Orchids’ (Acidanthera), a sweet little flower I had in my very first garden 40 years ago. I found the bulbs on sale on a site I occasionally order from, so placed them in my virtual shopping cart. Even on sale, 10 bulbs for $10.99 (plus about $10 for shipping) seemed a bit steep. But, I also had a credit of $7 to spend, which would bring the cost down a bit more. However, in order to use the credit, I would have to call them to place my order…so they sat in my “cart” over the weekend. Imagine my delight when I walked into my local Aldi grocery store and saw the same bulbs for sale…30 bulbs for $2.29!

I bought TWO bags…and another clematis ($4.99) because, what gardener doesn’t have room in their garden for another clematis?

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Meanwhile, I’m still working on finishing reading Dickens’ Great Expectations and writing out another list of gardening great expectations for the week. And I’m still waiting for those slow-poke daffodils to open up! Thanks for joining me (and a host of other blog-happy gardeners) as we join our host and fellow gardener The Propagator for another Six on Saturday. Our goals: Six photos (writing optional) about six things in your garden on a Saturday. Please join us! Click on the link to get started.