Although I still have several more gardens to share with you from my recent visit to Southern California on the Theodore Payne Foundation Native Plant Garden Tour and given that I have two more big garden tours coming up in the next two or three weeks, I thought I hit pause on other folks’ gardens and let you see that I DO actually garden.

We have had an abnormally wet spring and everything in the front garden has benefited from the extra water. At mid-April, to not have turned on the irrigation systems by now is phenomenal. Last year I added pops of rosy red in the form of the Double Knock-Out  roses and a few of the perennial salvias–you can see the Salvia ‘Killer Cranberry’ in the mid righthand side of the photo. I think they really wake up the predominantly purple, lavender, pink scheme and will provide strength when the paler colors wash out in the heat of the summer. The earliest of the iris are blooming with others ready to come on. The perennial dianthus I have been adding over the last few years are nice big blue green clumps this year with the first few pink or white flowers open.

This foundation bed by one of the front sidewalks is looking especially good! The pair of tree roses (‘Renae’) has exploded into bloom. Geranium ‘Tiny Monster’ and Salvia fruticosa add a little violet and blue relief from all the pink. I featured this salvia in a post last spring when I added it to the bed. I love the blue gray foliage against all the other clearer greens. It has tripled in size from last year and is covered in blooms. The ‘Pink Dancer’ Indian hawthorn (lower left) has finally come into its own after several years of very few  flowers. I told you that 2017 was going to be the best garden year ever!