Summer is Over

How was your summer?

Mine felt really short. It got off to a late start, with lots of rain.  Then the bugs came and after that it got too hot to do what we like to do most....Geocache. 

You know fall is upon us when people start to clean up their gardens. I've only recently started on mine.  It's way overgrown from the past few years of ..... laziness, I guess. 

Actually, I suffer from something they call Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I used to be very active, and my garden was beautiful. Every year it got a little bigger. I would divide some perennials and always have some left over after finding homes for as many as possible.  I'd dig up another piece of land and plant them there. Then my life changed, and after no more than 30 minutes just deadheading the plants, it's like someone pulls the plug on my energy supply.  The garden has now gotten way ahead of me and I don't like how it's been looking the past couple of years. 

My energy levels have not been bad lately (knock on wood) and the weather has been nice, without being overly hot, so I decided to just go dig and see if I can improve at least some corner of this tangle of plants.

I started at the far end of the strip out back. There is a peony there, and I won't touch that, but almost everything else is being uprooted.  Some of it I don't even remember what was growing there.  I saved wee bits of that, and discarded the rest. I moved  one patch of columbine over to be with the rest, and moved one small bunch of iris over next to the peonies, as I know they bloom about the same time.  The bigger patch of iris got dug out yesterday.  I just put them in a bag, and can plant them anywhere, any time or give them away. I do have lots more of that particular colour.  Right now, I suddenly have a bare spot large enough to transplant part of the old fashioned rose that's living at the corner of my vegetable garden.  I'll let the man handle the digging and moving of that.  It's prickly and he's tough.

Did I say vegetable garden?  Ha. It hasn't been that for several years now.  The deer always got more of whatever I planted than I did, so I gave up.  The birds kindly planted some blackberries, and I've let those grow. I usually get enough berries to make a few nice desserts and still put some in the freezer for winter months.  That's a much better harvest than anything I ever tried to grow in the way of actual vegetables. 

I do put a net over the blackberries,  to protect them from the birds.  Mind you, the birds still sit on the upper vines and push the net down so they get a good share.  All the berries I get, I notice, come from underneath, where I have to carefully reach my hands through the thorns to get them.  The easy ones on top are all gone. The robins this year didn't even seem to mind sharing with me while they were there.  They just stayed there, looking at me while I picked my share a few times.  I wish I'd had the camera with me for that.

While I usually really enjoy the fall colours, this year I find I'm sad to see the leaves changing. I guess I just don't feel like I've had enough summer yet.  The weatherman did promise us an unusually long and warm autumn.  One can only hope.....

I'm ready for Indian Summer. Bring it on!