Garden Tour #3

I finally want to share with you the last of the gardens Worker Bee and I visited for our anniversary date day.

Garden #4

Who Needs Water?

Is xeriscaping popular in your part of the country?  

Love those pillows!

We live in the Central Valley of California.  The gorgeous Pacific Coast is a couple of hours away to the west, but it is very HOT in our valley in the summer.  We get very little (or really no) rain during the summer.  We aren't quite a desert, but we're pretty close to it.  Xeriscaping is a way to garden and use as little water as possible.

She's growing artichokes!  I LOVE artichokes!  They are my very favorite vegetable.

 This gardener had a very water wise yard.  Lots of cactus and succulents.

This bricked in circular area is where her swimming pool used to be.  She filled it in and planted a garden.

 I have to confess, I'm not that big a fan of cacti.  I think I might have the opposite of a xeriscape garden at Sweet Bee Cottage. 

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the chairs, table, and footstools from an old tree.  

 Now I mentioned I'm not a fan of cactus, but I do have a thing for succulents.

This hanging was made in felt pockets.  And do you see the cute little birds on the ends?  The gardener took a very plain boring wall and made it cute!

The side yard was very welcoming as we walked out of the garden.

Can you tell the lattice is inserted in the fence and is like a window into the neighbor's yard?  Love those suns too! 

The front yard didn't really give away much of what the backyard was like except for these rusted flowers.  Definite xeriscaping there!

And one last shot of the mailbox and the Mexican primrose surrounding it.  Aren't they pretty?  These will just spread and spread and spread.  

Well, things are still pretty busy here.  We just finished state testing and Open House is next week!  Can I just say, "YIKES!!!"  But it will all get done and it's all down hill from there.  Only four more weeks of school. YAHOO!

Thanks so much for buzzing in!  

I've got so many projects I'm buzzing about and I can't wait for the summer to come so I can tackle them with you.  

(You are going to help, aren't you?) 

P.S.  I still have one more garden to share with you so I hope you come back to see my very favorite one we visited.

P.P.S.  I always loved when a letter I got in the mail had a P.P.S.  My cousins and I used to write back and forth over the summer and we always had plenty of P.S.es (how would you pluralize that - I'm not sure).

P.P.S.  This garden tour is my cup of tea so I'm linking up with
Have a Daily Cup with Mrs. Olson!

Quick Blog Break

Too many irons in the fire - very typical of me I'm afraid.

Must get Progress Reports done for my third graders (only 6 more weeks of school - YEAH)

AND

must work in the Kitchen Garden, Picket Fence Garden, and the whole stinkin' yard while the weather is still cool enough.

Bee back soon!

Thank you Karen from the Graphics Fairy for these great illustrations!

A Garden Tour Part 2

Now for the continuing saga of a Sweet Bee and her Worker Bee as they tour gardens around the county....

Today's episode:

Where Two Gardens Digress Dramatically!

Garden #2

 This garden is on what once a peach orchard.   The Victorian style home and gardens were started in 1980.

It's on 6 acres and HUGE!  I'm pretty sure they have some help, don't you?

Can you see the cute little teapot? 

I thought the little note was so charming.  Click on it to read about their beloved willow tree.

Now can't you just see Baby Bee delivering a sparkling lemonade out to me on that porch?

And foxgloves!

And foxglove overload!

And delphinium overload too!

 What is it about tall gangly flowers that appeal so much to me?  Delphiniums, foxgloves, hollyhocks.....maybe because they remind me of that tall gangly fellow I married 22 years ago.....(yeah, I'm stretching it a bit, but just go with it people, okay?)

Each of the stops on the garden tour had a water jug cozy!  Isn't that a cute idea?  They seemed to match the decor and style of each home and garden.

And this is their kitchen/herb garden.  One of the sons owns the most charming tea shop in Old Town Clovis and this is where he grows much of his herbs and veggies.

Garden #3

And now for something completely different!

 This garden is a huge deep pit!  Can you believe it?

The homeowners wanted to create a noise barrier for the traffic sounds

and apparently the guy working the excavator didn't get the memo that he was supposed to build rolling hills and instead just kept digging down and down and down........

This picture gives you a better idea of how steep the drop is. 

And looking back, it really has the look of our local mountains.

All this in the middle of the city!!! (a city of 500,000 mind you) 

I just couldn't resist a picture of these great chairs. (No, I didn't sit on them, but I was tempted!)  They were painted to match the deck that overlooks the pit.  

If you want to see Part 1 of our garden tour, please click here.

Come back soon if you want to see more of our tour (and I'll share my favorite garden then - I know, I know - I'm SUCH a tease)!

Thanks for buzzing by!

A Garden Tour Part 1

Worker Bee and I recently celebrated our 22nd anniversary and we decided to go on a garden tour for our "date!"

What a wonderful day we had.  The weather was wonderful - warm, with a cooling breeze.  Our lunch out was a wonderful treat - yummy food in a casual comfortable restaurant.  But I know why you're here - you want to see the gardens!

Stop #1

The Garden of the Sun

This garden is a demonstration garden.  There are orchards of fruit trees and vines, beds of vegetables, herbs, perennials, and small-space gardening demo beds.

 This is a gardener's dream!  

 Look at those foxgloves!  Those are one of my favorite flowers!  

(But wait until you see the next garden - it's foxglove overload!)

  I kept telling Worker Bee what a wonderful location it would be for a wedding reception. (Good thing we have a few years before Baby Bee is ready to tie the knot!)

 I just love herbs.  I've always had them and I just love stepping outside to get fresh herbs for something I'm cooking.  They always smell heavenly!  They had a plant sale at this garden and I was hoping I'd be able to find a bay cutting and I did!  We used to have a nice little bay tree but Worker Bee says he killed it.  (I think we both did by moving it, but if he'll take the blame, I can live with that.)

 One of my favorite gardens was the Children's Garden.

 Why look!  It's Hairy Potter!

 Cute little crayons all over this garden as garden accents.

 Right behind this fence is a parking lot for a KFC and a Carl's Jr. (Hardee's in other parts of the country) and you would never know it - so peaceful and pleasant.

 This was a tangram garden.

 This is a living sundial.  You stand on the month, put your hands directly over your head and it points to the time.  It pointed to 11 when I did it and it was exactly 10:59.  Pretty cool, hunh?

Thanks for coming with me on part 1 of the tour!  Much more to come!

Hope you can buzz back by like all those ginormous black bumble bees we saw!