Elise Schlaijker’s extensive gardens will be a part of the Greenfield Garden Club’s annual garden tour which will be held on Saturday, June 25 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Schlaijker is one of those gardeners who loves food gardens and flower gardens equally, although she admits that the big 30 x 30 foot vegetable and fruit garden was her first priority when she moved to Greenfield eight years ago. I wrote about Schlaijker when her gardens…

Thirty-five years have passed since I planted my first rose bush in Heath. In the months before our move from New York City I read and re-read Onward and Upward in the Garden by Katharine White. It was her experience and thoughts about roses that particularly touched my dreams of a romantic garden in the country. I had never grown roses, and never even really paid much attention to roses. My dreams and limited experiences had been with…

With my first Peach Drift roses I am celebrating my first real Garden Blogger's Bloom Day in the Greenfield, Massachusetts garden. Peach Drift is a fairly low growing, long blooming, disease resistant rose. Oso Easy  Paprika shares a small bed with Peach Drift. Paprika is a little outside my usual color palette, but when I saw it blooming at the nursery I could not resist. I am so excited to be able to add Kordes roses like Zaide…

The South Border did not exist on the day we closed on the house. But we had ideas. On June 3 we planted three hydrangeas, Limelight, Angel's Blush and Firelight, as well as two lilacs, deep purple Yankee Doodle and double white Beauty of Moscow. Shrubs were planted in the ground with the the addition of Martin's compost. Once shrubs were in the ground we built the lasagna beds around them with cardboard and compost so  that we…

  The Forbes Library Garden Tour is this Saturday, an opportunity to see unique private gardens. If you are lucky retirement from the everyday world of work is an opportunity to make happy changes, and possibly even make a dream come true. This opportunity has been beautifully and artfully used by Paul Redstone, and Jesse and Jack Martin. They both gave up country homes and properties and moved to ‘the city,’ Northampton, where they now live next to…

The Greenfield Garden Club brought Tovah Martin, author of The New Terrarium, and many other books, to town to not only talk about terrariums, but to hold a workshop. The site was the elegant Brandt House B&B, the weather was rainy, but the spirit was one of excitement and creativity. Many members of the Greenfield Garden Club, and other gardeners in the community filled all the Brandt House space to get  some preliminary instruction  about terrariums, and jolts…

It is tree peony season on the Bridge of Flowers in Shelburne Falls. There are a number of tree peonies, but not all of them have retained their names. No matter. They are all still stunning. We have been promised a few days of hot weather. I hope the tree peonies don't mind too much. This tree peony took a beating in the rain - and now here we are fearing the hot sun.   Of course other…

Yesterday the Bridge of Flowers held its annual Plant Sale and it was a great success! The sale included perennials from the Bridge itself as well as from area gardeners. Shrubs and trees as well: pussy willows, thornless raspberries, Japanese maples. Lots of special peonies! Japanese jack in the pulpits. Amazing. Hillside Nursery sent a few of its rare wildflowers down. In addition the master Gardeners were there to do soil tests, there were garden books from the…

These newly planted Japanese primroses are one of the reasons I am so excited this spring. A friend invited me to dig the primroses where they were invading her lawn. We did not make much of a dent in the patch that is thriving in front of her house and I am imagining that it will not be very long before they cover the ground in  this bed where it is very wet. Although you can barely tell…