eimarra | Summer in the yard

It’s summer in Pennsylvania, which means it’s humid and hot — not as hot as in many parts of the country, but certainly hot enough that everything grows.

First up, we have the front bed, where the hostas are trying to take over the sidewalk. I think this fall, I’ll scrape out grass on the opposite side of the walk and split the plants.

In the corner bed, this isn’t a big bloom time like the spring is. There’s a burgundy clematis, but it only put out a couple of flowers, which are gone now. There is also an orange Asclepias tuberosa (butterfly weed) that just started blooming yesterday.

The purple clematis by the mailbox blooms all season long, although it usually only has one or two flowers at a time.

And in the back, we have Kniphofia, also known as torch lily or red hot pokers. They’re getting some odd twists to their stems this year (not shown in this picture; some of the blooms are coming out parallel to the ground, then growing upward), but they’re blooming nicely. My daughter and I planted sunflower seeds next to these — and something dug up the seeds and ate them. It’s a little disheartening to come out and see the shells on the ground. Yesterday, I sowed a lot more (took them out of the birdseed mix); we’ll see if they fare any better.

And in other news, I’ve gotten my newsletter set up. I’ll be sending it out the 2nd and 4th Monday of each month (I debated 1st and 3rd, but when the 1st of the month falls on a Monday, I would be surprised and panicking to get it out), with the first one coming out July 14. I will have sign-up notices at the end of my blog posts (see below!), and I’ll even get a separate page set up for those who want a bit more description before signing on.

Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.