Garden flower zen. A stroll through the garden provides bright colors and fragrant discoveries painted by blooming flowers planted throughout. I may be weeding but my ears are soothed to hear the song of many birds and bees buzzing by. The time spent is full of surprises like an occasional ladybug, butterfly, or dragonfly! Flowers are an essential part of an artist’s garden. I cut flowers almost every day to make our house feel alive in summer.
The work seems easier…
…as my eyes feast on the beauty surrounding me in the garden.
It is amazing what you discover when writing a blog. Looking through the photography of the garden, I see that we plant 20+ types of flowers in the garden on a regular basis. No wonder, the bees like our garden so much. I could probably write a post about each variety from the various pictures shot over the years that show the growth progress, colors, and best angles. But don’t worry, that is not the intention of this post. The goal of this post is to show you what flowers we grow in the garden as an introduction to further articles that show more intense information about each variety.
- Alyssum, a ground cover that I like to plant around other bigger guys.
- Bachelor Button, a frequent bloomer gives a touch of color wherever they are.
- Baby’s Breath, a small white flower used in bouquets.
- Bleeding Heart, the bush springs up just as the snow melts with heart-shaped blossoms appearing as we are ready for planting. Notice Mr. Butterfly on the top right.
- Carnation, the cinnamon scent of these blossoms make it a pleasure to snuggle them with your face every time you pass by.
- Coneflower, a hardy bush that grows up tall and spreads arms wide showering the garden with yellow blossoms all summer long.
- Cosmos, a favorite wildflower blooming throughout summer.
- Crocus & Daffodil, 2 short-time early spring guys who pop their heads out of the snow, with heads that turn to follow the sun.
- Dahlia, comes in a multitude of bright colors, shapes, and sizes.
- Daisy. We had daisies and red roses at our wedding.
- Geranium, I have to take into the house over winter.
- Gladiola, a flower that I love but so do all the gophers, an ongoing war.
- Iris, is planted all around in and out of the garden. The deer seem to leave it alone, most of the time.
- Lilac, lavender spring bush blossoms with a heavenly fragrance.
- Marigold, 2 years ago I scattered a coffee can of dried flower seeds. Wrongfully, thinking were no good. But, they were just fine, notice the height of those marigolds.
- Poppy, a wildflower self-seeder.
- Roses, one of my favorite flowers.
- Snapdragons are very fragrant and colorful blossoms.
- Sunflower, pale yellow, orange, to brown. Check out the bee zooming in for a landing here.
- Zinnia, splashes of color all summer long.
I get out one of many handy books by 
I made up this recipe in less than half an hour, and after putting three drops in each ear, got immediate relief.
BTW, did you know that the pioneers used to call the mullein blossom the torch flower? Well, they did. Why? Because they’d dry the blossom stems and later fasten them to sticks and soak them in oil and use them as torches to light their way at night. Wow. Did you think of that while you gazed at the yellow blossoms on a stick?
Canning Berries. Ever wondered how you go about it? After a strawberry picking morning in the garden, comes a lot of prep work. Cleaning, sorting, coring the harvest. I am lucky to have a sweet husband who stands at the kitchen counter coring and sorting with me. This batch, after prep work, measured 36 cups ready to be processed.
24 cups are split into 2 pans on the stove. Pete’s Mom gave me the recipe and I remember Dorothy every time I make it. 12 cups fruit to 8 cups sugar, brought to a boil then immediately add 1 tsp of butter & turn down to simmer for 10 minutes. Turn the heat off, add 3 Tbls lemon juice. This image shows it ready to foam over the top on the stove.
Cooking Berries
I place a colander cone in the sink with a bowl below it. The sink is lower and easier to reach, and spills are no problem. Pour through the colander to strain the fruit pulp out and put aside to make fruit roll-ups later. Then, pour the syrup into the jars and proceed with seal steps.
Making fruit roll-ups with the already sweetened pulp is easy cause you have already done all the work. I line a cookie sheet with plastic wrap that can be microwaved. Then, spread the pulp 1/8″ – 1/4″ thick on the sheets.
Place them in a 150ยบ oven overnight to dehydrate. In the morning, it is done if it is not sticky to touch. If it is still sticky, put it back in and let it go longer.
There is a history to this berry patch. Growing strawberries for the family took us a little while to get right. Pete and I started seriously growing them in 2015 at our place in Elk, WA. Beginning with seed, because of budget restrictions gave me very little success, but I didn’t give up and kept planting for 3 years. Looking at this picture they look pretty scraggly. Finally, we determined that the location they were put in the garden was not good for them.
When we expanded our garden in 2018, I decided to move the strawberry patch to the other side. First, building an 8″ raised bed approx 16 ft long x 2.5 ft wide using old concrete blocks and then transplanting the plants. We were blessed with a gift of more starts from my friend’s beautiful patch, and she also showed me how to pull the runners as I picked. Even though this was a new patch, because of the move, these 2 suggestions really made a noticeable improvement to the strawberry harvest and fruit size.
In the spring of 2019, my strawberries were overcrowded and desperately needing thinning. I removed the concrete blocks (CMU) surrounding the raised bed. Then we tilled the area around the original raised patch and lowered the soil level to be equal with the surrounding garden. We could disc the soil with our tractor then.
Thinning the overgrown area, I transplanted them to the newly tilled area in rows about 4-6 inches apart. The strawberry area became a 20 ft x 8 ft patch.
This is what it looks like this year and now this old gardening-girl is beginning to wonder, “What was I thinking?” We are already harvesting a lot of berries this summer. Sometimes my body talks to me about it and I am making friends with Tylenol and Aspirin in the evenings.
Strawberry heaven is anytime you are able to pick fresh strawberries and pop them into your mouth. Heaven for sure. A couple of days ago was my first time picking this year. It amounted to 1-1/2 gallons, which isn’t all that impressive, but it is still strawberry heaven in my book.
I picked 5 gallons of fresh strawberries in the garden this morning. So, it looks like I am going to be really busy with these berries this year, picking, eating, processing and canning.
If you are in need, call us and we will share. Or, you can get permission to come to pick yourself. We are considering selling at a minimal price at a farmer’s market if the COVID 19 insanity ever ends. We will probably have quite a nice harvest this year nonetheless.
We do love these beautiful red berries. Today, I plan on making syrup, juice, and fruit roll-ups after it cools a little more this evening. There is no need to fire up the stove during the hottest part of the day right?