phlox Archives | Diana's Designs Austin

Dazzling color in the spring garden…

We all love the spring garden — the awakening of plants that herald the arrival of spring and provide a foreshadowing of more to come.

As the sun shifts in the sky and the breezes begin to warm up, I’m enjoying some rejuvenating time in the garden.

I bought these sweet glass daffodils to bring a pop of color into the garden before the daffodils were ready to open up.

The ‘Kate Izzard’ irises are loaded up and several of them are opening every day. You can tell that I should have divided them last fall, which I fully intended to do, but I seriously need to do that this fall.

Just gorgeous.

Even though traditional tulips aren’t in our Central Texas plant palette, these species tulips, cluisana ‘Lady Jane’ are sweet substitutes in my garden.

This little patch of phlox disappears entirely in the head of summer, but I can count on it to emerge in spring with loads of little blooms.

My cemetery irises are also popping open all over the garden. Our winter clearly made the irises happy.

Bluebonnets are covering my decomposed granite path, and even Kallie’s playground filled with pea gravel. Fletcher enjoys a peaceful moment with them here.

While most of the buds on my monster wisteria were frozen in our last freeze, there are still some opening up and draping delicately from the fence.

And then there is the homestead verbena. What a powerhouse. In the cooler spring and fall, they thrive and liven up any spot in the garden. They will shrivel and look poor in the heat of summer, but just shade your eyes and pretend not to see them until they return again in the fall. Even though many of our bloomers start now and run through the fall, homestead verbena is well worth it’s little summer break.

Now that the threat of freezing is past (I have my fingers crossed as I type this), it’s time to fill in the rest of the garden with new and exciting plants that will herald the summer.

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-04-14T02:38:53-05:00March 29th, 2015|Blog, bluebonnet, daffodils, Fletcher, garden art, hideous bed, homestead verbena, iris, iris 'Kate Izzard', phlox, Sharing Nature's Garden, spring, spring bloomers, tulipa clusiana, verbena, wisteria|0 Comments

Pretty purples are my passion…

My garden is awakening.

Warm days have coaxed many plants into beautiful blooms.

Among the best performers in the garden right now are the purple plants.

Can you tell I have a passion for purple?

Many of my favorites are salvias.

Did you know that there are more than 900 species of salvias in the world? How amazing.

I’m lucky to have a nice collection of them in my garden. Indigo spires, Mystic Spires, Mesa, May Night and several more, but I’d have to go digging through previous posts because they are unusual and I don’t have them committed to memory

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-04-14T02:40:08-05:00April 10th, 2011|Blog, iris, larkspur, Mexican Oregano, phlox, Prairie Verbena, purples. salvia, Sharing Nature's Garden, skullcap, society garlic, spidewort, winecup|0 Comments

Finally a few blooms for their day…

We’re breathing a sigh of relief here in Central Texas as we celebrate Garden Bloggers Bloom Day with our friend Carol of May Dreams Gardens.

Blooms are slowly coming back to our gardens. We’ve had a taste of true winter here this year, and like most of our neighbors to the north, have had to wait a long time for spring to show her face.

We are about a month behind in growth for most plants in our gardens. And while the official chance of frost has not yet passed (the range takes us to the end of March), we think we are probably safe. (How’s that for scientific guesstimating?) Isn’t that what we gardeners do though?

So here are my blooms for this very slow March. Above is a new Phlox that I added to a front bed this week.

My favorite time of year for the little peach tree – in its full glory. Since it never produces peaches, this is it – enjoy it!
After trying hard to kill all my Amaryllis this fall and winter, once they went into the greenhouse and got farther away from me, they were all happy and growing. This is the first one to bloom – it opened this week.
Okay – don’t put me in time out. I know these aren’t in the ground yet, but they will be this week and they’re just so pretty I wanted to photograph these Diamond Frost Euphorbia that will join the shade bed soon.
My Sierra Memorial Impatien is still blooming – bloomed all winter long. I hope it’s equally happy when it moves outside next week, because it’s getting a little too hot in the greenhouse when it’s 80F outside.
I have lots of strawberry blooms and even have little green strawberries growing already. I think these kinds of blooms are my favorite because I know they will yield sweet, juicy fruit that I can eat standing in my garden.
A few white and fucsia colored Alyssum plants went into vacant spots in the rock garden path yesterday. They love living in the crushed granite.
As does the Ice plant and the Homestead Verbena.

I hear my paperwhites are short because I planted them late, but they are really cute and they don’t flop over as easily either. Maybe I’m onto something!
Not a great shot, but you know the Hellebores are shy and hang their little heads so you can’t get a good photo of them. She’s pretty in spite of my lack of photo skills.
Even though the vines are pretty skanky-looking after our hard winter, I do have a few blooms on the Primrose Jasmine.
And much to my surprise, the mystery Viburnum left by the previous owners even has a little bloom on her.
The first Hymenoxis opened today and there will several following on her heels. They are growing where no one else will grown, and they like it there just fine.
Daffodils of all types are still blooming all over the beds. Sadly, I fear that those not close to blooming may not make it because it’s already too hot for them. It’s been 80F for several days and I see some leaves on daffodils without buds are already turning yellow.
Don’t ban me from GBBD for this one, but I just had to show you how close the Texas Mountain Laurel is to actually blooming. And yes, it is a full month behind. I was showing off beautiful Mt. Laurel blooms on Feb 18 last year: http://bit.ly/9BpqxP
A little Dianthus returning after the blooms all went away for the bitter cold of winter.
Loropetalum showing off her hot pink fringe flowers.
Mexican Plum tree in full bloom.
Yellow Grape Muscari “Golden Fragrance” that packs a punch of scent. It’s so sweet and yummy smelling, you almost want to take a bite out of it. (Sure hope no one does!)