My New Garden: Surprises, Delights

Y'all! My landscape garden has been surprising and delighting me at our new home each week since the start of Spring. I want to show you some of the highlights and successes, and even the fails (luckily, not many). I haven't posted a garden update since last fall, so this is a photo heavy post. Grab a drink!

For a look at where we started with this little borderline Zone 6b - Zone 7a landscape*, you can click on this post from November 2021. Things were so overgrown when we moved here that I literally walked through with both the tree and landscape contractors I hired and said, "take it out", or "cut it to the ground and we'll see if it survives. It was a mess. (*Note: our Zone is borderline 6b - 7a, as we are situated in a river valley area more temperate than higher elevations which surround us). 

After random daffodils sprung up in places that appeared to have been covered up by the shrubs previously smothering them, other unrecognizable plants started popping up. Google Lens became my friend over photos I'd snap as the slightest emergence of growth came through the mulch.

Pulmonaria - or Lungwort - in what was considered the "shade" garden (where the pin oak was) came in early March.

Spanish bluebells started showing up in totally random places in early April. I started digging these and another plant which did not bloom at all (I believe were snowdrops). I tossed most of the snowdrops, and relocated some of the bluebells, in hopes that next year the randomness will be a little more tame.

By the first of May, Lily of the Valley and a woodland fern (Sensitive Fern) started popping up in the shade garden. These were all surprise inheritances in my landscape garden on the "shade" side.

At the entry of what is labeled as the "sun" garden (see photo below), three coral drift roses, with [spent] bluebells in front of them, and  a "Heavenly Bamboo" nandina shrub is partially visible at the top right of the photo below. Juniper plants bookend the drift roses (partially visible). All of these were existing plants. I transplanted iris behind them last fall, which were passalongs from our former home by way of my daughter's flower bed when we downsized.

I was pleasantly surprised at the blooms from the iris transplanted just last fall.

The coral drift roses are gorgeous, and fragrant! I have five in total at the front of our property, the other two you'll see in another photo to come.

The photo below is looking into the gate of  the "sun" side and garden (taken early evening). You can see peonies in bloom inside the gate. Let's take a look at those beauties. 

I have four different peony varieties that were already established in this garden. The first to bloom was Coral Sunset. Its blooms start as a deep coral, and as the bloom opens, it gradually fades to peach and, ultimately, cream. These are my favorite! They have sturdy stems and do not require staking, and have only a slight fragrance.

Next to bloom was Bartzella, a sunny yellow Itoh (tree) peony with a slightly red center stain. It also has a sturdy stem like Coral Sunset, but with a delicate fragrance.

My third peony variety to bloom was a bit of a surprise. It is Cora Louise, another Itoh peony, also with a delicate fragrance. Its bloom is white with dark lavender center, and also has a sturdy stem.

I thought originally the Cora Louise plant was part of the Bartzella, as it was crowded in the landscape bed as I watched the plants grow day-to-day (like a hawk, I might add).

Looking at the circles and arrow in the photo above, the Cora Louise was so close to the Bartzella in the foreground, I thought they were the same variety. I plan to transplant it in fall in the space where the cherub statue is situated. 

The fourth (and last) peony variety to bloom is a Karl Rosenfield. This one fell over after the first set of blooms and the rain that came after. I'm not thrilled about having to stake this one, but will  - next year.

If you notice in the two photos preceding, there is also a lilac bush. This was also part of the original landscape, and I kept its large structure through winter because everything else in that bed was either cut down (the peonies) or removed (a barberry bush). 

After the lilac bloomed (it's a rebloomer), I cut it to the ground to start over. All the growth was on the exterior, and it was quite leggy on the interior. Lo and behold, there was a Rose of Sharon growing in the middle of it! Needless to say, out it went. I am not a fan of those ROS plants, and I had two removed last fall (one was a double bloom - pretty - but this plant is invasive in my opinion).

So here is how that bed looks now, with the lilac hard pruned (and ROS gone).

Opposite this bed, I had nearly a blank space to work with after removing most of the existing plants, other than three small upright boxwoods in the far back corner. They are situated opposite the Karl Rosenfield peony that you see in the background of the photo above. One of the upright boxwoods can be seen in the photo below.For this bed, I bought and planted three new dwarf butterfly (Pugster Blue) and four lavender (Grosso) plants. I transplanted some of the Spanish bluebells among the butterfly bushes, and also transplanted what appears to be a small hydrangea on the left side (above). It was one of the plants I said "cut it to the ground and we'll see if it survives" that I found growing randomly.  It seems to be surviving in this bed too.Another view (above), showing both sides of the sun garden, and the refreshed gravel path.

Speaking of Rose of Sharon, my neighbor, whose yard adjoins at the fence on the sun garden, had a Rose of Sharon tree which she let me trim last fall. That was great, until I started weeding in my landscape bed next to it this spring and saw her ROS was covered in poison ivy. I asked permission to have it removed, and hired it taken out by the root. I am highly allergic to poison ivy, and no love was lost on the ROS.Along with refreshing the gravel paths on three sides of our property, I also had a stone path (Pennsylvania bluestone) installed from the front door, extending to the small patio in the front of the house.

I planted pansies last fall and they are considered bi-annuals in my area. They do well throughout winter, bouncing back in early spring, and last until consistently hotter, daily temperatures. I just switched out my annuals the second week of May to coral geraniums, white angelonia and vinca. In the lower portion of the collage below, you can the new stone path and also see where we are extending the grass line. One of the coral roses was transplanted a little further up  (see in bottom half of collage below), in front of the cherub statue to extend the grass and lessen the mulch bed. While all the existing grass was sod, all the new grass is by seed. It will take a while to get them to both look good together.

In the photo below you can see the coral drift rose in bloom, and the one which was transplanted (directly in front of the cherub statue below) suffered shock, so I cut it back to the ground.

Containers flanking the garage door were also switched out from pansies to a geranium mix.

On the side (north) landscape bed, I also added a couple of perennials  to flank the annuals - Magnus coneflowers. Existing daylilies were transplanted to flank the statue. The latter blooms will be a surprise.

A delight in the garden included seeing three Baptisia (False Indigo Blue) emerge and show their beauty in spring. They look like asparagus as the stalks grow and develop their flower pods. The blossoms form pea-like clusters, which is not by coincidence, as they are part of the pea family.

One fail to note: last fall we pulled boxwoods that were smothering the entry, and used them as a natural barrier fence on the corner of our property where the large pin oak tree was removed.

I said I didn't care if the boxwoods lived or died, they were a temporary solution. I lied. Each time it snowed, I was outside, brushing heavy snow and ice off the boxwoods. We had a late snow with bitterly temps and wind in mid-March, and I did not remove the snow/ice. One boxwood suffered winter burn as a result, so it was pulled.

So, the bad news is there's a break in the corner barrier fence of boxwoods on the property. The good news is the grass within is growing where the tree was taken out! There's a lot of boxwood on this small landscape, so I'm still considering these transplants as temporary. However, given the price of mature plants, I'm rather getting attached to them.

Another delight is a patch of Spiderwort that came up behind the house and camouflaged various system vent pipes out of the basement.

Various surprises came up in the "shade" garden. At least two hydrangeas, a spirea, and a couple weigela are coming back after being cut to the ground. There's also a fothergilla (bottlebrush plant ), and more. I don't know how this side of the landscape will fare, given the absence of the pin oak. There's a Hinoki cypress in the middle of this side of my landscape, plus there are trees in neighbors' yards which cast some shade at various times, so perhaps some of these will last.  I do know it's all a bit messy right now, so I'll be working in this area in the near future. Lily of the valley can be (and has become) quite invasive (and poisonous, I've learned). 

Oh, one last photo. There's a bed of gladioli behind the garage that I'll be surprised by if and when they bloom. I'll keep you posted. 😊

If you've stuck with me this long, I appreciate it. This post was long overdue (and long!) as a means of journaling my new garden. Until we've been here a full year, I'll still be making lots of notes with how the light and elements affect the existing plants (and the few new ones). 

Thanks for your visit. Leave me a comment with any reaction(s) you may have. A lot of these plants are new to me, so I welcome you sharing the dirt!

Also, I'll be hosting a summer tablescape blog hop on June 7. Stop back then and see how the garden has influenced my summer table design. 

Rita C. at Panoply

A special thank you to Julie from My Wee Abode's Tuesday Turn About #153 More Summer Fun , Cecilia from My Thrift Store Addiction's Vintage Charm Party #139, Bev from Eclectic Red Barn's Thursday Favorite Things, and Suzanne from Pieced Pastimes: Saturday Sparks Link Party #517 for featuring this post!

Parties I Share With: Pieced Pastimes, Love Your Creativity, BNOTP, All About Home Common Ground, All About Home Follow the Yellow Brick Home, A Stroll Thru Life, My Wee Abode, Zucchini Sisters, French Ethereal SYS, Happiness is Homemade, Traffic Jam Weekend, Follow the Yellow Brick Home TFT, Eclectic Red Barn TFT, Grace at Home, My Thrift Store Addiction, Our Hopeful Home, Karin's Kottage, My Hubbard Home FWF, County Road 407 Farmhouse Friday