Catherine Love~ Ramblings from my Heart and Home

My All-Time Favorite Garden Tool

is the Stirrup Hoe!  I just love mine . 

Weeding  is by no means my favorite gardening activity .....that would be planting, which leads inevitably to more of my less favorite....weeding! 

When I picked up my trusty stirrup hoe at a garage sale for less than $1.00 , I had no idea what a bargain I was getting!  New ones cost somewhere around $30.00, I think.   But, if I couldn't find a great deal on a used stirrup hoe, I would gladly pay for a new one!  

It is simply amazing how this tool allows me  to zip through weeding the garden in a snap.  No bending, squatting, back-breaking pulling necessary.  Just pull the hoe lighly through the soil and it cultivates up all those freshly germinated weeds and they are gone gone .  Our garden is small this year, just about 15' X 30' .  I weeded the entire garden (except for the spot where I seeded some greens) in less than half an hour! 

If you love gardening, but not the weeding ; try a stirrup hoe, you'll be glad you did!

A Bit of Gardening...

Though Fall is right around the corner- Sunday is the "official" first day of Autumn, I believe; our warm temperatures are hanging on. 

I did get 6 collard green plants and 1 Early Girl tomato planted in the raised beds earlier this week.   I wanted to get the broccoli planted, but the transplants at the local nurseries were tall and leggy- not what I want.  Hopefully I'll be able to find some healthier specimens soon, as I didn't get seeds started in time to grow my own.  I also planted seed for lettuce and spinach, though with the new wave of heat it probably won't germinate for a while.  

It will be time to divide the perennials and herbs, and plant a few flowers for Fall color soon.  I'm ready for some cool weather, that's for sure!

Garden Girls

Here are a few photos of my Garden Girls... 

Is that a face or what? 

She's having some trouble with that clingy Cypress Vine!

She took a break from her watering to pose for the camera!

Giving the last of the Basil a much needed drink.  Fall garden is coming soon!

Searching for hidden treasure.....

Success, a zucchini!

That's all that's left in our little garden...Basil and Zucchini...time to replant for Fall, I do believe.

More from the Garden

Here are a few photos of my herb and flower beds:

This one is Thyme, Sage, Marigold, and just a bit of Rosemary.

More Sage with Dianthus and Zinnias.

Marjoram, Lemon Thyme, Marigolds, Zinnias and Dianthus.

This one is a container grown Nearly Wild Rose, with a pretty little plant called Starry Eyes growing along side it.

This is the flower bed outside our dining room window. The Sunflower came up as a volunteer, and the Larkspur and Poppies are from seeds from a fellow blogger. I can hardly wait until those Poppies bloom!

Garden Photos

I had some trouble getting these to post properly in my Front Porch post.  I'm going to see if I can get them to work here...

This is one of my tomatoes before adding Lady Bug Brand Garden PEP

> 

This is an after photo of a different plant.  The Garden PEP really made a big difference in the health of my garden. 

p.s.  The photo posting trouble was my own lack of knowledge of course!  After reading a tech support post, I discovered that my photos would have posted anyway !  Now that I "sorta" know what I'm doing, I'll be back to post more photos later!