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Sunday, June 28, 2026

Moon Garden Beginnings


It stayed clouded over quite a bit of the day which allowed me to spend more time outside than I had anticipated. That meant I finished getting at least the first space in the Moon Garden dug up and planted, which includes the "entrance."
walkway to a garden being built


And look at this nifty stepping stone I got from a local artist, Matt Borema, to be at the very beginning of the walkways! It has the "tree of life" motif on it.
tree of life stepping stone


These are most of the plants I have so far. I suspect a lot of them will get moved eventually, but it will be easier to water if most of them are near each other for now.

This group has a variegated Miscanthus (the grass). It will get huge and can not stay here more than this year, but I have to decide just where it should go because I suspect I'll have one chance to move it somewhere. I could have ordered the Hakone grass I wanted. But it was very expensive, and not all the variegated ones are so white. Many are quite golden, and when you order, you can't actually see the plant. This wasn't very expensive and I picked the whitest one to bring home.

I got two things that are annuals because most of those are marked way down by this time of the summer. There is a Dusty Miller, and a 'Frosty Kiss' Gazania. I'm going to try propogating some of these over the winter. At the worst, I won't succeed, and at best, I'll have more plants for next year.

The little one on the left is Greek Mountain Tea. Betsy brought me this one. The leaves will get whiter and fuzzier. I was not familiar with it at all, so this will be fun to watch.
plants with white leaves


On the other side of the walkway are things I have lots of. The four plants you can actually see are Lamb's Ear. I have a ton, ton, ton of that- all spread from one sad end-of-season plant a few years ago. But it's perfect for many filler spots in a moon garden.

Behind that maybe you can see some tiny stalks. Those are common yarrow I dug up out of the yard. These are the wild ones with white flowers and the usual feathery foliage. But the flowers last a long time, so I think it will work well, and it spreads easily. They will get almost 2 feet tall.
young plants in a new garden


Despite how much Lamb's Ear I now have, this is the first time one has bloomed for me. I'm much more interested in the foliage, but a flower is always fun too. (This is by the driveway.)
lamb's ear flower


Now for a focus on another of the plants I bought that you can see in the first grouping. This is a Veronica (Speedwell) called 'Snow Candles.' I cut off quite a few of the flowers that are fading and it's getting some new ones. I'll probably trim it some more in a couple of days.

Basically, when I was cruising the greenhouses the other day, if I saw something on sale that was on my moon garden list, I bought it. I was surprised to find some things I thought I would have to order. Finding them locally saved me, on average, about 50% (factoring in shipping).
Veronica snow candles


This was a surprise find- again 50% off for end of season annual. I'd never seen 'Frosty Kiss' before with the white foliage. One of the flowers opened today.
frosty kiss gazania


There's also a White Sage from Betsy, but it's small yet. I'll show you another day. She says it's annual here.

I have three other plants I've purchased, but they need to go in specific places. Whatever time I get to play outside this week, I'll need to work on getting them placed, hopefully in their long-term locations.

And, um... I may be guilty of ordering a specialty Hosta. I saved so much money on most of the ones I just bought that I splurged a bit.

And I have, for sure, two other plants I already own that can be split and some put here. But there's no rush on those.

I went to the annual patriotic concert this afternoon. It's always good, but this one was great! Lots of younger people involved which is sure important to the future of things like it. The instrumental music was live with local musicians, a full choir, and a children's choir.

And now they are saying rain tomorrow on top of the heat. But that's ok. I was thinking a whole week of heat without rain was going to be tough on the plants, and I'd probably have to water quite a bit. Now, maybe not.

Betsy has brought me so many plants I'm struggling to decide where they should go and get them in the ground!

See Bonsai Apple Tree Is Getting Friends

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