SMOKE GETS IN OUR EYES...

I guess we were getting antsy or something, being stuck indoors during the outdoor season. We've had wall to wall smoke for several weeks now (no surprise with 150,000 plus acres burning up around us), with only an occasional few hours when we could actually see the sky. Sometimes there were even clouds and stars...who knew?
So this morning when we could actually open the windows and enjoy a bit of fresh air, we opted for the lumber yard and a mini project.

 With $90 worth of 2"x 12" cedar planks and some treated 2x4's we designed and built a small platform to hold the birdbath and assorted pots. Here I'm "head down, butt up" (thankfully photographed by the under gardener from the kind position) painting the cedar with Miller Storm in "boxwood" which is really a sage green. 

Here you see the alternating pots of daylilies and dwarf boxwood NOT sinking into the gravel and clay soil beneath! Quite an improvement. And now with the help of additional gravel under the platform we may be able to level the birdbath! 
We got it done just in time as the smoke is drifting back into the hills here. 

IN HOCK...

 My volunteer hollyhock is loving its location in the garden. I figure it free seeded from my neighbor's yard. It is over 8' tall and growing in the gravel and un-amended clay soil next to the raised beds but not in one!  
I've never had any luck growing hollyhocks "on purpose." They always die on me. Obviously they thrive in heavy clay soil with little water! 

ROGUE VALLEY CLIMATE CHANGE?

 When I first moved to the Rogue Valley in 1971, I couldn't buy agapanthas (Lily of the Nile) anywhere. I had to "import" them from California where they enjoyed popularity, even on freeway medians. Here the standard answer to my query about them was, "Oh no, they aren't possible in our zone!" (Sunset zone 7). And they didn't survive the cold winters so I stopped planting them back then.  
HOW TIMES HAVE CHANGED!

Today they are widely available at all nurseries and garden centers in the valley. For the past several years we haven't had the extreme low temps that would kill them! Other formerly tender plants have also become available at local nurseries suggesting that our climate has indeed changed! 

IT'S GRAND!

Yes, just looking at my little grand niece Tessa makes my milk drop! Isn't she a sweetie. And my sister-in-law is reveling in being a grandma for the first time and getting to spend lots of time with her in Texas.   

BIG BOX ARRIVES AS PROMISED!

 My sonny Chris and my delightful daughter-in-law Susan warned during their birthday call to me that a "big box" would show up on our doorstep sometime in late June...IT DID!

 It is a huge resin planter, self watering with a BASKET WEAVE look, on legs. 

My under-gardener wants to put in a special word of "thanks," as he got the job of moving it around in the yard several times before I settled on the right spot. 
"OH COME ON, IT'S NOT THAT HEAVY!" I said. 
I picked a spot where I've struggled to make anything look good... the slope to the southwest, almost to the very end of my garden. Nothing seemed to work there. It's under the shade of the big silver maple tree so I had a few pots of ferns propped up on rocks. 
Now the legs of the planter elevate the foliage so the eye looks up, not down at the slope. In other words, it disguises the slope nicely! 
"PERFECT!" I said. Don't you just love instant gratification!
We did have to use a board at the back to shore it up so the legs wouldn't sink into the gravel.
So here it is kitted out with ferns in my own special "fern grotto." For now I'm using pots but I'll probably plant the ferns in it this fall. 
A GREAT BIRTHDAY GIFT!

OLD CROW FACELIFT

No folks, not me! Too bad it it isn't as easy as this! 
My under-gardener and head sign painter took pity on the old crow in the garden (again, not me) and repainted it with One Shot sign painter's paint. Yes, that's the paint that still has lead in it, so he needs lots of ventilation! I usually place this sign between the tomato plants but they are already growing past their cages and filling the entire bed so we put it at the end where it can be seen...for now!   
   

BIRTHDAY SURPRISE!

 My Honey and resident sign painter said that I just needed this sign. I've been so upset since this BS immigration policy business that I've become depressed. Not a good thing! So he cheered me up by creating this sign. It reminds me that I can't let the current horseshit get me down. Soon we'll be rid of the ASSHOLE government in DC...one way or another!