Monday, June 27, 2011

How many times can I possibly write about the same topic?

Every May I look with envy at my neighbor's yard.  It spends every May through September in glorious color and bloom.  Okay. I'll admit that I get a little jealous when I look at my own barren and dead yard.  So every June I buy a few flowers and look smugly at my two pots and think how jealous my neighbor probably is of how beautiful my flowers look with so much less work than she has to invest.

Then in July, I ask the nursery employee why my flowers are dead and the neighbor's are thriving.  The employee will warn me about over watering and needed nutrients and about measuring sunlight.  I always have a witty retort that sounds suspiciously like,  "Um.  
What was that you said about 'watering' ?" And then the employee will guffaw about having never heard of anyone killing flowers by NOT watering.  Ha! Ha! Ha!  "Do you feed your children?"  Ha! Ha! Ha!  "Don't YOU eat?"  HAHAHA!!!!  

It's at that point I leave the nursery because I cannot be bothered with feeble-minded idiots.

Last fall, I outsmarted myself.  I picked up a catalog and pointed to a few bulbs and ordered them.  A few weeks later those little, oniony-looking bulbs went into a couple of potting tub-thingies, and I covered them with newspaper and put them under my despised camper to rot.

Of course, I didn't mean rot because I knew exactly what I was doing.

This spring my husband needed to pull the camper out of the garage, and look at that!  There were those pots that I had forgotten clearly remembered.

I proudly put them in front of my house.  Take that, green-thumb neighbor!!!  And then, while flowers came and went all around her house, my family and I enjoyed lots of spindly green something or others in our potting tub-thingies.  Occasionally, my children would inquire about what they were, and I would smirk.  "Silly, dear children!  They're our flowers!"  My precious children would begin to question me again, and I would quickly silence them by going for ice cream.

But look what happened this week!!!  We have flowers.  Nine things I don't know the name of colorful, graceful, elegant examples of my horticultural talent.  Take that, condescending nursery employee!  Be jealous now, talented gardener neighbor!  Enjoy, oh ye children of little faith.

Checkered tells me that we might even have rain for the next few days, and we all know what that means:  these nine flowers have a chance to live until next week!!!!!

Sometimes, I absolutely amaze myself.

12 comments:

Cranberry Morning said...

I have to tell you, I was feeling kinda cranky when I sat down at the computer (loooong story, irritating 20-something child!)until I read your post. That just cracked me up. So go enjoy your lilies' short life. They are beautiful, if only momentarily. :-)

Mental P Mama said...

Enjoy those lilies! It'll be time for mums before we know it;)

claudia said...

I think you and I are from the same planet when it comes to gardening. This year I took plants from our nursery at work that were dying and couldn't be sold. I figured that they could finish their death in my yard as well as anywhere else. But, lo and behold, they are thriving! Of course, my girls took the time and back pain to plant them for me and then threatened me to within an inch of my life if I let them die!

joanne said...

you done good! And you've got some beauties to prove it...lillies dear, and they will be back next year!

Kristin - The Goat said...

My flowers, when I had a house and a yard, always looked really good until about August. I was so tired of them by that point that I stopped watering them. When we moved to Florida and watering the pots of flowers was nearly a year round activity I had pretty flowers for a month on and a month off for the most part LOL

Congrats on the lilies! They look fabulous!! and they don't last too long, so you won't have to worry about the watering thing for too many days.

Laura~peach~ said...

beautiful lilies... and they will come back year after year... provided you give them water and maybe a miracle grow food stick or two ... you go girl!

Ma What's 4 dinner said...

That was hysterical. I feel ya though. Your flowers look great. Mine always look dead so I finally just took pity on the poor flowers and left them at the store so they could have a much better life than if they came home with me!

Lots of yummy love,
Alex aka Ma What's For Dinner
www.mawhats4dinner.com

The Silver Age Sara said...

:-) I know just what you mean cause every time I even glanced at a plant it withered and died. If anything survived, it was in spite of my care. Your flowers are so beautiful and I hope you keep on going with your adventures and I bet your neighbor is sure jealous!

I Am Woody said...

That's why I'm all about things that self-seed or are perennial. If it ain't easy, it ain't getting planted!

I Am Woody said...

And sorry to say ain't to a teacher but sometimes you really just need a good ain't!!

Busy Bee Suz said...

I just wish I could read your neighbors blog.
Great job!!!

Sketches by Mary said...

You know the old saying; the grass is always greener over the septic tank. LOL

From Erma Bombeck

Yes, I must admit I get a bit crazy over beautiful flowers too.... especially when its the neighbors!!

C'mon over to my blog... http://sketchesbymary.blogspot.com