July Gardening

 

I've got the itchies all over! I just finished trimming the hedge in our backyard with the help of our Little Man. Hopefully my hair isn't full of lice, but I did pick a spider off my shirt.

Every year Big Man and I get a little better at gardening. Each year we work more and more in the garden, and we learned a lot during the last three years since we really started taking care of the garden.  It takes a lot of time, a garden, but I am very pleased with it. It has lots of green and so it attracts a lot of animals for the kids to look at. I try to cheer it up a bit by buying/or sowing seeds with flowers every year. We live in this house for over four years now, and the back yard is almost finished to our liking. Only a low fence at the end of the garden would be nice. I will not discuss our front yard...... that is another story!


A few pictures of today's garden work out:

African Flowers! I love them, and they are so strong during summer heat.

Our apple tree is doing great again this year. I am looking forward to picking apples in September.
 

A  month ago I put our lavender in the garden. The last two years it was in a pot, but I wanted it to grow bigger and attract more bees and bumblebees. Bees are struggling to get food and a certain parasite is infecting them so lots of bees are dying the last few years. 2012 is the year of the bee and if you care for these little insects, please put in a lavender plant or another bee-attracting plant in your garden!

The plant I got from my parents last year is blooming lots this year! I love the flowers it is producing.

Alongside the African flowers I also put these flowers in pots and they are standing on the terrass.

I also put in Ranunculus bulbs in the garden this spring.

The first strawberries are appearing! I really need to buy straw to put underneath the, It keeps them "clean" but it also hinders snails who think they are delicious and munch on them during the night.

Tomorrow morning I will concentrate on the weeds growing between the tiles... I really dislike this part, but it has to happen!