Cozy Little Gardens

The gardens I had in Tyler, Texas were beautiful. It took me six years to get them there. But after a divorce in October 2011, I am now relocated to Tulsa Oklahoma.

And once again creating new gardens. From scratch. In a little blue house.

Many bloggers have been generous enough to help me get started. The photo of the butterfly bush, above, is one of four that were sent to me by one reader.

It will attract lots of butterflies and hummingbirds. It is in a pot. As it gets a little bigger, I shall create a garden space for it.

Every year I choose various colors of annual petunias to grace my gardens. As long as you're diligent about dead-heading (snipping off the spent blooms), you will be rewarded with fresh new blooms.

This year I am enjoying bright pink and this yellow and white you see above. A great combination.

I have planted this broom plant with yellow blooms. It is tiny now, but is suppose to grow to six feet high by six feet wide.

As I'm trying to bar the ugly, trash-ridden yard of my neighbor, I think I shall have to build some sort of fence to get me through till this little bush does its thing.

I must have daisies. Back in Texas, I had big mounds of white Shasta daisies I shared with my neighbor, Walli. I didn't bring any plants with me.

But I'm liking these small yellow daisies, which are really attracting the butterflies.

In the past year or so, I've developed a fierce love of ornament grasses. They look so natural in a landscape.

This is the same old galvanized bucket you saw in Texas with a fairy garden in it. I shall start planting fairy gardens soon. And will put them into various containers. This bucket is already filled with verbena and sedum and daisies, among other plants.

Gardening is a big part of my life here in East Texas. We have very moderate winters here. And it is quite humid. All of these things plants love!

This past year I've tried my hand at fairy gardening. And I'm hooked! I love the miniature subjects and finding plants that are suitable. I find that herbs work quite well in fairy gardens.

This is the first one I created. It is still going strong over a year later.

It is right outside my French doors on my deck.

This is what I refer to as my stone garden. Once the two brick walls of the dining room was knocked out for the French doors. Then the deck and pavilion built. Then I wanted some flower beds.

This is in the far northwest side of my garden room-sized yard.

This is what I call "the pavilion" for lack of a better word.

Structure-wise, it is about 16 feet by 18 feet. It is simply an extension of my deck with a roof.

These are my two most comfortable chairs. I bought Pottery Barn pillows for them.

As you can see, I've hung blinds on the east and west sides to keep the sun glare down.

A deeper look to the stone garden...

We have lots of little lizards in our neck of the piney woods.

An assortment of plants the with same needs in a container garden, below. Most happen to be herbs.

Below is the pond waterfall a carpenter built for us last spring, 2010. But it's changed now. I was not pleased with the overall scale. And so I decided, fall 2010, to have a garden pond expert come in and built a "pondless waterfall." Which is far less maintenance.

I sat under the pavilion and watched and took photos as they changed it from a pond to a pondless waterfall.

So this is what it looks like now...

Above is what it looked like right after the crew left. But then of course I had to landscape it.

I am very pleased with the pond now. Though it put me back about $3500. I got a 32 inch waterfall instead of the 16 inch I originally ordered. But it makes for a much louder waterfall. Which means you must get a bigger pump to push the water.

There's Clyde, king of the rocks. The driftwood he's perched on is his favorite place to sharpen his mighty claws.

I planted herbs and various perennials and grasses around the pond to make it look more natural.

We didn't need to have any more rock brought in when they changed it in October, 2010, as we'd hauled in so much for the original waterfall. In fact I knocked much of the cemented rock down myself.

With what I had leftover, there is now a fully covered flagstone path around the pond and my stone garden. About a month after I had the waterfall changed, I had landscapers come in and put decomposed granite in between the flagstone to make a more permanent surface. I like it much better now, as the flagstones no longer slip underneath your feet and shift. Good decision!

This pink hazy-type plant is called Muhly grass.

Below is how I landscaped the very back of the pond.

This is the other side of the pond. I took bricks and made a little garden up beside the stones.

Variegated ginger plant on the other side of the pond...

Just to the south of the pavilion (other side of the pond) is the deck that wraps around the north and east sides of my house. I have container plants here, that I switch out according to the season. Right now they have fall plantings in them.

I like to put stick solar lights in my bigger pots. It helps me see after dark, and doesn't need electricity.

I have five seating areas around my yard. Here is Abi in one just outside the east-facing French doors.

She loves to have her photo taken, in case you can't tell!

Charlie inspecting the landscaping. Probably searching for lizards.

Right after the pondless waterfall feature was added, I had electricians come in and put in the proper electrical outlets for it. Prior to this, whomever built the pond before I moved here had a long cord going under the garage door on the other side of the fence and into the garage to an outlet. I wanted something safer and more permanent.

We also have a ceiling fan under the roof of the pavilion. So it served to take care of that electrical need also.

Ornamental kale is one of my favorite plants for the fall season.

Also daisies, and after that, Mexican petunias.

Fall mums in containers by the pavilion.

The stone garden as seen from the pavilion. I had an eight foot fence built. The boards overlap one another for the most privacy.

I buy most of my outdoor rugs from Ballard Designs. They have good prices and they rugs are very durable. In fact, they are what I use in my house as well.

The below photo is the west side of my house. We live on a corner of this little cul-de-sac of garden homes.

There is now (as of a year ago) a two-story bank that was built just across the street you see. We actually live one block from the busiest street (six lanes) in town.

The view from the pavilion to my back French doors.

The view from the back of my yard toward the house.

I found this old rusty wagon at a garage sale last summer for $5. It serves to hold my gazing balls. Behind that are a row of pink azalea bushes. Living in Tyler, we are in prime azalea country.

A small cobalt blue birdbath in the pocket garden beside the stone garden.

A small lizard on a Lambs Ear leaf...

Below are the purple beans that form on Hyacinth bean vines. I bought ordered one packet online at Rene's Heirloom seeds years ago. And every fall I gather the dried beans and save for the next year. I've sent them to bloggers all over the United States for their gardens.

Here they are in bloom. I just love the pretty blooms they make. Obviously the butterflies do too!

Me and best friend Nola meeting up at Blue Moon Nursery for her birthday in September. We meet their for our birthdays every year. She lives in Ennis.