What's growing in the garden

As I've said before, one of the fun things with moving up here is seeing what will erupt out of my ground as the weather gets warmer. I missed photos of the grape hyacinths, the lily-of-the-valleys and most of the azaleas. But coming back from Field Day across the street (have I mentioned lately how much I love living next to the school???) with camera in hand gave me a chance to show off a little of what is out there now.

And I'm still trying to figure some plants out, so if you notice I have the type of plant wrong please correct me!


I have one bleeding heart in front of the house (and these are some of the final blooms on it). I think I want to plant more of these because the flowers are so cool, even though they only bloom in the spring.

I'm not exactly sure what this is, also almost totally bloomed out as you can see. Before turning brown the entire section of blooms were light purple. I first thought it was butterfly bush, but after a little research I actually think it might be lilac. I have about three of these in various spots around the house, but I think at least one is not getting as much sun as it would like, making it a little leggy.


I finally have azalea bushes! I have one that is still covered with flowers. The other 3 or 4 are pretty much done. None are huge - most are about a foot or two in diameter. But one lavender one is about 3 feet across and is right next to where we park the car so we can see it all the time.


A little patch of dianthus is growing in front of the house. I may plant some more of these because I like their spiky gray-green leaves.


My FAVORITE currently blooming. I've always wanted poppies, but never had the sun in Dallas for them. These are at the end of the driveway, actually on the side facing the neighbor. But they are impressive (you can't tell by this picture, but the flowers are about 4" in diameter.


I don't know what these little guys are, but they are popping up all over the place. Only about 4 or 5 inches high. I should know what they are, but got tired of looking in the books.


The hostas are coming up all around the house. Also something I never had much luck with in Dallas - snails, slugs and roly polys seemed to eat mine up.


I did a double-take when I noticed the size of these leaves. But I don't think it is an elephant ear - I think it is just a giant-sized hosta. I'll be interested to see if they grow bigger.


Alex holding one of the flower pods I've been finding all over the ground. I couldn't tell where they were coming from, but I think it might be from the sweetgum trees (however I haven't noticed them in the back yard, where we end up with a lot of "pokeyballs" from the trees).


Alex's favorite thing to find in the yard right now are these big thorns that have dropped off the same trees as the blooms. He likes to think of them as tiny swords. That's what he is holding up in front of him in the hosta picture above.


And I don't want to forget my viburnum. There are two of these blooming on the opposite side of the house from the driveway, so didn't realize they were there until I looked up from the table and saw these big snowball-looking blooms right outside the window next to the fireplace.

The yard guys are here today to treat the weeds. There are so many in the back yard that we have to just get rid of everything and reseed the entire yard. But hopefully soon it will end up looking as nice as the rest of the areas around the house.