Friday, June 17, 2011

Joy In All Things

It's a beautiful, sunny Spring morning in Oregon!

 Are you ready to greet the day?

This time of year the days fly by in a mix of gardening, genealogy research, chores, and life!  I often do not manage to have the time to stitch that I'd originally planned.  I did find time to work just a bit on "Bluebird Alphabet" last night...a couple of more letters completed.  I'm trying to take joy in the thing that I do, and let go of worrying about the things I did not accomplish or finish.  Tomorrow is after all, another New Day and New Start.

I did find joy in my Sunday Garden Day!
The Avid Gardener's Sunday outing ended with a stop at Joy Creek Nursery in Scappoose, OR.

Joy Creek has lots of Clematis and Hydrangeas...

As well as Hostas and Fuchsias...

But perhaps the best thing Joy Creek offers is its wonderful display garden.   

You can walk around the property and view many of carefully labelled plants "in-situ".

And that's great, because Joy Creek is on an exposed bluff above the Columbia River...and it gets weather!

So if something, like this Gunnera, is hardy there, it will most probably be fine in my southern Willamette Valley garden too.

I always think it's nice to have an example of mature plantings - it helps put the purchase of a one gallon / five gallon plant in perspective. 

And a healthy garden always has happy pollinators!

I thought this black Columbine was striking!

And this large fern a delight!

But nothing can beat a mature stand of regal Delphinium!

8 comments:

robindefender said...

I LOVE that first photo of the cat! He looks like he's laughing to himself about something.

Teresa said...

Your flowers i Oregon are so pretty. You cat looks just like my Annabelle. She gets that look also sometimes.
Teresa's Heartfelt Stitches

Ann at Beadlework. said...

I love the expression on photo number one - very intelligent. Those black/purplish flowers are amazing - not what you would call pretty but very dramatic and as you say striking.

Sarah Beth said...

I look forward to your pictures of flowers and descriptions. I have a flower on my blog a bit back maybe a week or so ago and I would like to know what it is. would you mind taking a look and telling me what it is?

Mouse said...

love the cat pose heheh ... at least you are making progress girl :) one stitch at a time ... an love the plant photos too :0 love mouse xxxx

Rowyn said...

It's a rainy, cold winters morning here in New Zealand. Today will be a good day for me to sit and stitch.

Love the photo of your very happy looking kitty, and the delphiniums and irises are gorgeous too!

Siobhán said...

That must be so neat, to see the flowers and plants already in the ground. DH & I struggle with how things will actually work where we are, situated in a spot that gets a LOT of wind. The flowers are so pretty--I just love that delphinium!

Nice progress on your stitching!

Nancy said...

What a great garden! It is so nice to be able to see plants and how they really look when planted! My favorite is the Delphiniums! They are such a beautiful flower!