So yesterday when we were on our way to the grocery store, Corey gallantly pointed out some hand-lettered signs indicating a plant sale off in a nearby suburb. It turned out to be a fundraising event for an African women's charity. I snapped up an impressively large red-flowering peony for $10 (sahWEET), some phlox, and some brown-eyed susans, as well as a substantial pile of ten-year-old gardening magazines.

Inspired by a couple of said magazines I have added the following to my shopping list:

* Seafoam rose. Apparently a super-floriferous "ground cover" rose that gets to be a couple feet high and sprawls several feet wide; canes will actually root where they touch the ground. How cool! I'm thinking this might be nice in the wall bed, which is sadly empty at the moment and I'm at a loss as to what to fill it with, although in the pie-in-the-sky department I'd still like to put one of those fountains there. The ever-helpful Galetta Nurseries apparently has these in stock, so maybe I'll make a road trip during my week off.
* Oooh, looking at the Galetta website, "The Fairy" is actually pretty gorgeous too. This would have the advantage of adding some colour to that bed, which is set against the white-flowering spirea and hydrangeas. Hmmmm! Although I already have a pink rose in the sun bed...
* Zephirine Drouhin rose. I've heard this name a few times and it sounds pretty spectacular - climbing, fragrant, shade-tolerant. But Galetta doesn't have them, nor does Vesey's. Hmmm. Some phone calls are in order, I guess.

So in my puttering around over the course of the weekend, I managed to fix the irrigation system in the back, install an irrigation system out front, do a bit of weeding, and plant 3/4 of my recent purchases. Now that the irrigation system is back in business I am optimistic that I may actually get blooms out of at least one of the rhododendrons. I was baffled as to its failure to open any of its promising-looking buds, but apparently this April was the second driest on record or something, and the intarwebs tell me that drought can delay flowering or abort it entirely, but watering can help if you catch it in time. And now that I've given everything back there a thorough soaking, there is a bit of pink starting to show on the buds. FTW!

Also the "shade" bed is rather sunnier than I thought, except at the very back. It's at least as sunny as the other side of the yard. So that gives me a few more options as to what I do with it, at least!