Gardens Gone Wild!

OK, so I'm impatient. You may or may not recall my ranting last year about my garden, or lack thereof as I had planted several fine specimens and was disgusted at the slow pace in which they were (not) filling in. Before:

And now fast forward nearly one year later:

Much improved over last year, with the addition of the new rock wall around the tree, and oh yeah, the PLANTS! The above pic was taken two weeks ago, and now after the scorching heat and torrential rains, all is lush and dense-like (including the MANY weeds):

I made a truce with the walnut tree, it will continue to poison the ground with its juglone and I will only plant juglone-tolerant plants. And for some reason, the squirrels and bunnies aren't much problem anymore either, I won't question why, don't want to jinx that...

So now that it's all coming together nicely you'd think I'd be content with just relaxing and enjoying the wonder that is nature...but no. See, I still have a jones to buy more plants. And while this was justified last year, kind of seems redundant this year. But I keep doing it anyway, because that's just how I roll. What am I going to do with this plants, you ask? Got me. Oh wait, I know! I'll dig up established plants and replace them with new ones!!! Behold my lunacy:

In all fairness, the plant, a sedum, that I had there originally was WAY too prolific, tried to take over my beloved Scotch moss (which is now dying due to the heat last week BTW). My Mom-in-law gave me a few clumps last year and it went bat-assed crazy this year! It is now happily ensconced around the walnut tree, cascading over the rock wall like a good trailer should:

And speaking of sedum, let's take a tour, shall we? As of last year, I'm a big fan of sedum (this is my very first official garden being a first-time home owner and such) so how about some glamour shots.

This one is gorgeous, a light chartreuse color. It's called Japanese Odon Sedum. The photo doesn't do it justice:

This one is Sea Urchin, note the moss growing in the lower left corner. I found out last year that you really can't plant moss, more like just give it a general suggestion. It takes up residence where it wants.

These are Blue Spruce and Angelique:

I think this one is Autumn Joy, or Showy, either way, it gets about 15 to 18 inches tall!

This one is stonecrop, it's blooming now...really pretty purple flowers!

Showing the other plants some lovin... These bad boys popped up briefly after the rain, so cute!

I thought this fern died last year, but it surprised me. Love the perennials!

Two of the groundcovers I went with are moneywort (creeping jenny) and mazus. They have filled in nicely, but are a little aggressive this year! Witness the Clash of the Groundcover:

The bigger leaves are moneywort and the smaller ones are mazus. They both flower in the spring, it was so pretty. They spread a little too eagerly, as witnessed by my Irish moss:

While last year I coveted every inch of plant in my meager garden, this year I have to rip the groundcover from the other plants to keep them from, well, covering them. The plan is to take them all the way to the road, and that should be no problem this year, given how much they've grown already since May. For a little color, we've also added bugleweed:

Love the contrast of the red-violet leaves and the blue-violet flowers...and isn't that a nice name? Bugleweed. Also called ajuga. And yes, it's also an aggressive spreader....Sweet! Hence the "weed" in it's name...

So that's what I've been up to, that and pulling weeds, which I pretty much have to do on daily basis. Good times. But in the end, it's worth it! Now I just have to find another place to put a new garden.....

Yea more plants!!!

All for now,

Nugget