Fading Lights

Saw an indigo bunting for the first time ever! Planted the little blueberries, speedwell, and bunched leaf penstemon in the lower rock garden. (Everything is blue now.) I definitely don't need any more mini roses* but I found another packet of nasturtium seeds at the hardware store, and those won't come amiss. Completed week 1 of my "watch 2 hours of Chinese video a day" challenge.

*My next post will probably be, "So I got some more mini roses."

Called the vet about non-emergency dental work for Daphne; she will call back tomorrow. Is it even possible to safely sedate this dog enough that she can be anesthetized? Someone managed it, because she was spayed after being picked up by animal control. But I am not convinced and would like the professional opinion of someone who has seen how difficult she is to handle, preferably while looking at the medical records from her second shelter intake, which indicate she received four different sedatives and still had to be muzzled.

We had a frost warning the last two nights, but "frost free" or our last average frost date is coming up next week. Spring is here!

Since I have plenty of plants already, there is no need for me to acquire more. Fortunately my sister told me about the following tumblr meme: "Don't let anyone tell you not to spend $25 on plants. That $75 will be the best $300 you've ever spent."

Then she came with me to our first plant sale of the season, guarded plants while I paid and got the car, and carried not one but four bags of compost ♥

( bunch of flowers )

PS, This was my first time attending a fundraising plant sale sponsored by a nursery. Highly recommend.

PPS, Do you see the innocent looking green sprig behind the pink flowers on the left? That's a palm tree. Someday I will not have room to overwinter plants indoors because the entire lower level of our house will be filled with trees. "The forest floor," I'll call it.

Dahlia timeline, according to my journal which I guess would know~
March 5: potted tubers
March 13: first tuber sprouted
May 1: moved pots outside
May 7: FIRST FLOWER BUD

(Dahlias are supposed to take 3-4 months to flower. Allegedly some "special varieties" can flower in as little as 75 days. It has been 62 days since my tubers went into pots.)

Today I started transplanting the dahlias from patio pots to fence garden. Started, because somehow I thought this would only take a couple of hours?? There are SIXTEEN of them. (Which actually doesn't sound right, since I started with 22 and only 5 didn't sprout, so there should be 17? Did I miscount? Probably. Anyway, there's so many, is my point. I had to make two trips with the cart to transport them all.)

I got them all in the ground, but it was dark by the time I finished, so I watered them (8 gallons of water) and built cages around the four tallest. I will return to make cages for the rest tomorrow. And also take more pictures, probably.

( dahlias )

I once worked in a building with a wonderful person named Elaine. She had lots of frog figurines on her desk. I asked her if she liked frogs, and she said no. She explained that her daughter had given her a little frog figurine as a joke, so she took it to work and left it on her desk. Since then, enough people had both 1) assumed she liked frogs, and 2) wanted to give her a gift, that she had amassed a collection.

That's how it is with me and plants, except for the part where I actually like plants, and people aren't always trying to give me a gift. Sometimes they're just like: hey Star, I have this plant I don't want any more, do you want it or should I throw it in the trash? (In that same office building I literally lifted two plants out of the trash and kept them on my desk, so it's a totally fair question.)

( And then, a tree. )

( Tree-moving pictures. )

Daphne had a quiet day after her big adventure yesterday.

( picture )

I thought she might spend the whole day in her cat tree (or beanbag, but the cat tree has a better view), but she agreed to go outside once it stopped raining.

She was a big help spreading compost on the fence gardens out front.

( picture )

Yay beach! Happy May ♥

The dahlias are outside. I hope I don't regret that in the morning,* but they looked so happy and there are just so many of them. Originally I thought putting them on a tray near the back door meant we could carry them outside (on the tray) during the day and bring them back in the same way at night. Ha ha. They are much too big for that.

( picture )

*"Star, didn't you set up not one but two popup greenhouses outside the back door?" I did, yes, and one of them is full of unsprouted cannas and the other one is full of patio furniture and houseplants, so clearly the space is well-planned and efficiently utilized.

( picture )

I should clarify, all the dahlias are too big to easily move, but some are tall and spindly despite my efforts to feed them artificial sun. I see now that putting the smaller tubers in smaller pots disadvantaged them in the race for light: the smaller pots were shorter, and that inch or two made a difference. Anyway, I put the bushy ones outside and left the skinny ones inside under the plant lights for now.

( picture )

I moved the blueberry twigs out too and put the indoor cannas where the blueberries used to be. I set up a dedicated seedling light next to them for the nasturtiums (and Cheri's cosmos and Marci's sagelings). I hope the seedling light turned itself off. I just realized I didn't check, but hopefully I plugged it into the timer side of the outlet strip.

( picture )

I also have some montauk daisy cuttings inside: my neighbor told me to just put them in the ground, but it's been so dry, and they'd be great out by the street if I can get them growing, so I started them in water. They are not happy. But another neighbor dug up some geraniums for the shade garden, and they bounced back after just a day, so the spring plant migration has begun. (All that discarded pachysandra and vinca definitely didn't hurt.)

In conclusion, here is a relatable short video by jesuisbaggsy on youtube: The thing that threw me most about neurotypical living was their homes. (They have spare rooms! "that's different")

In further conclusion, here are some pretty pictures for reading all of that.

( bridge garden - with bridge! )

( unrelated vet notes )