2024 Cottage Garden Recap

Traditionally, I have summarized my blogging journal each year with collage style in a year-end post. It was a tidy way to button up each year, and I would send the year's posts off to be printed in a yearbook fashion. In 2024, Blog2Print ceased operation, and so, too, have the annual yearbooks. It's just as well, I suppose, as my bookshelves were getting a bit crowded for this cottage home. I guess I'll need to backup my blog on a more regular basis.

New year, new tradition. I'm looking back on my Zone 7a garden efforts of 2024, recapping weather and planting notes. My landscape garden is important to me, nurturing my mind, body and spirit.

January

We had a mix of average winter weather and a couple of unseasonably warm days (mid 60s F) by month's end. With just two snow events of 3" and 4" mid-month, these were our most significant accumulations for the entire winter! 

By the end of January, I was outside weeding, pruning, and dreaming of plants to come. I placed my first ever mail order with Proven Winners in December 2023, and shared my ideas for spring planting.

February

With just one day of just under 2" of snow, we saw a little more than average rainfall in February. The average high temperature in February was 55°, the low just 32°, both about 4-5 degrees above normal. This prompted daffodils to push through the ground. I was happy to see a grouping which I had transplanted spring up. Simple pleasures.

By February's month end, winter pansies had perked up, and several daffodils in other areas of the landscape had begun blooming! March was looking promising as our meteorological beginning of spring!

March

No snow fell in March, in fact, we had less than average rainfall of just under  3.5". Average high temp warmed to 62°, with a low average of 39°. I was getting excited seeing my peonies starting to emerge and grow. I had transplanted one of them the previous September. With a few freezing nights predicted throughout the month, I took care to cover the tender, new foliage and buds.

Our 2024 grass was cut for the first time on March 11. I was satisfied with the newly planted areas having filled in, and I was able to stay on top of the wild cress greens which had snuck in with the compost amendment of November 2023. One year of weeds, seven years of seeds, as it's said.

The transplanted daffodils bloomed by month end, and the violas made for a happy complement.

April

April is a very active month for gardening in my Zone 7a. Knowing my Proven Winners order was to ship mid-month, I was busy taking care of maintenance in the garden prior to their arrival. Our average high/low temps were 71°/48°, with greater than average rainfall of just over 5" - perfect planting and growing weather! However, we started off April with an F-1 tornado, a most unusual weather event in our Appalachian river valley! 

April blooms included (top, l to r): PJM rhododendron, woodland hyacinth, Star of Bethlehem, skip laurel; (middle, l to r): weigela, peach and grape iris, clematis, poppies; (bottom, l to r): peonies - Coral Sunset, Bartzella, Cora Louise, Karl Rosenfield, Chestine Gowdy.

In addition to all the above blooms bursting from prior plantings, new annual containers for 2024 were created from some of the plants ordered from Proven Winners in April.

More plantings in the form of perennials took place in April. Two more PJM rhododendrons replaced two boxwoods damaged in winter 2022. A new peach drift rose replaced one tired one, a new fothergilla replaced another. New perennials planted included an added Bobo hydrangea, two hellebore, a soft touch Japanese holly, two sedum, and two cardinal flowers. My fingers were crossed (after a pruning accident when trimming all the boxwoods) for a continued good growing season to get all these plants established!🤞

May

May's high/low average temperatures of 79°/48° along with near average rainfall held the promise of a beautiful spring. Peonies and iris continued to bloom, although my lilac bush did not push much of a show. This was due to my late winter pruning (it blooms on old wood).

Other blooming perennials in the May garden included false indigo (baptisia), Jack Manii clematis, buttercups, peach drift roses, spirea, St. John's wort and salvia.

Additionally, my front hydrangeas (Everlasting Garnet) were in full bloom in May, while my front annuals were set on May 18th.

June

By June, I was patiently tending all new plantings, hoping for the best. Average temperatures heated up quickly to average high/low of 86°/63°, and rainfall fell an inch short of our average 4.7". As the rainfall decreased, the water bill increased. 

June blooms included Pugster Blue butterfly bushes, daylilies, pentas (annuals), and my cardinal flowers planted in April even bloomed! Daisies, bee balm, crocosmia, coneflower, and more daylilies also bloomed.

I remained enthusiastic about adding a few more plants to the landscape once my newest perennials showed blooms. The newest Bobo hydrangea in bloom (top L of collage below) encouraged me to look for another dwarf variety I might add to a blank space in my front bed. A Tiny Quick Fire hydrangea filled that void.

Additionally, my girlfriend was planning a move and bequeathed a Brilliant Sedum transplant to me. I also ordered three penstemon (Midnight Masquerade) and another sedum (Pride and Joy) from Proven Winners and planted them.

Little did I know we were about to enter into our region's worst drought since the 1930s. My front hydrangeas were telling. By the end of June (top, photo below), compare how they looked as compared to the beginning of June (bottom, photo below).

July

July's average high/low temps were 90°/66°, but with less than 2" of rain compared to our average of nearly 6", the toll that combination was taking was affecting much of the garden, but mostly the grass, 

which started going dormant in mid-July.

I continued watering annuals daily. Containers and front annuals thrived with weekly fertilizing. I had put out some heat-loving zinnia seeds in June, and they starting blooming. Volunteer vinca and celosia sprang up in July's heat.

All new perennials would get watered as needed, often daily. Hydrangeas in sunny spots would get watered sometimes twice. July's heat proved to be good for the butterfly bushes, crepe myrtle, and lavender in particular. My penstemon surprised me with some dainty pink blooms. I transplanted a shade-loving plumeria (lungwort) cutting from my girlfriend in July which I had given to her in 2023. Not the ideal time for transplanting, but she was moving and I wanted the cutting, as mine all died in 2023! 

All established plantings (more than one year old) would get a good drenching once a week.

August

One word: drought. Average high/low temps of 90°/63° and just under average rainfall of 3.5" during August perpetuated the drought situation and manual watering needs. 

In spite of it, many blooms continued with just minimal care. Thank goodness for those drought-tolerant Pugster Blue butterfly bushes, the crepe myrtle, the Brilliant sedum, and the zinnia and vinca annuals! Also, those volunteer celosia plants just kept growing!

In mid-August, I worked the property line between the back of our house fence and the neighbor's. Tired of pulling the weeds in such a tight space, this time after pulling them, I dropped several bags of top soil and mulch to suppress future growth. It's working so far.

September

The drought continued. Average high/low temps were 84°/57° and rainfall of  1.85" only half of the average for the month. Early in the month that didn't stop me from anticipating better conditions, and I 

ordered another shrub for the landscape. It is a dwarf forsythia variety called Sugar Baby (see arrow bottom left of photo below). And the celosia (behind the concrete bench) began setting its feathery plumes late in the month. The gravel paths were refreshed in September also.

The cooler nights were beginning to help the grass recover in the landscape by late September. However, since we originally removed the large pin oak at the corner in 2021, the ground has settled and there are many divots. At this point, I began thinking in spring 2025 I would tear out the entire corner of grass, level it all over again and restart the grass.

October

Average high /low temps fell to a more tolerable 74°/44° in October. The drought, however, persisted, with only 0.2" of rainfall versus our average of nearly 3". It was time to ditch the summer annual container plantings and front bed annuals for fall/winter pansies, and cleanup a few tired perennials. I slung over 70 bags of mulch throughout the landscape (leaving the beds at the back of the house for spring). An auger I received from Proven Winners as a gift with purchase for my order back in April made digging holes for my pansy quart pots a cinch!

The sheet I used to cover my peonies in March became my ghost costume for my concrete reader statue in October. 👻😊

November

Average high/low temps cooled to 61°/41° in November, and total rainfall was an inch above the average at 4.25". Although we had a dusting of snow on the 21st and 30°, we didn't receive our first hard frost until the 30th, when the celosia finally gave up the ghost.

December

By the end of December, with high/low average temps of 49°/30° and 4" of rain (3.5" being the average), meteorologists declared we were finally out of the state of drought conditions. I actually still had some coneflowers blooming, a few blooms on my skip laurel, a random clematis bloom, and buds of my sedum emerging from the ground level. 

The front hydrangeas, which were drained of color back in June, perked back up to an autumn red by December. The hellebores began growing fresh leaves with the much cooler temperatures.The grass was even cut on December 23rd, looking much recovered from the drought damage.

For the most part, the garden in December fell into its long winter slumber, giving this gardener a chance to review and recharge for 2025. I've already placed my spring order with Proven Winners. 😉

If you've stuck with me throughout this 2024 cottage garden recap, I kindly thank you for indulging my urge to journal the importance of the growing year. I hope next year I can share the fruits of many of the plantings made in 2024. Year by year, I hope to whip this garden into the true cottage appeal I envision.

As of this writing, though, we are in the midst of winter storm Blair's wrath of three phases: snow, freezing rain/ice, and then more snow. Currently, we've passed phases 1 and 2 and still have power, but my shrubs are a mess.😭

The photos below show how so many of the boxwoods split apart from the snow and ice. I tried gently shaking off what I could, not wanting to break the ice covered branches. I didn't even try to shake the skip laurel branches. Ugh, only time will tell the extent of damage. We're forecast for more snow, and frigid temps and wind through the rest of this week, and more snow by the weekend.

I'm praying our power stays, and that pipes (first and foremost) don't freeze, and plants aren't permanently damaged. Not a great start to 2025.

If you want to see more garden posts in this home's overhaul, you can start at this link, here. The garden is mentioned in each of these posts to one degree or another, and they're in date order, from the most recent.

Thank you for your visit!

Rita C. at Panoply

Parties I Share With: Pieced Pastimes, Love Your Creativity, BNOTP, My Wee Abode, French Ethereal SYS,  Eclectic Red Barn TFT, My Thrift Store Addiction, Our Hopeful Home, Karins Kottage, County Road 407 Farmhouse Friday