To add to the shopping list:

Threadleaf bluestar (amsonia hubrichtii). Cloud of feathery foliage, little blue flowers, and turns a lovely bright yellow in fall. And they like dry soil, for a bonus.




Miscanthus 'Kleine Fontaine', because I saw a stunning picture of it growing in someone's Montreal garden. Fancy feathery maiden grass, which I already love and have resolved to acquire, only even better because it blooms RED.




I don't think I got around to mentioning, either, that I've managed to identify the prickly thing invading from the neighbour's yard. The neighbour didn't know what it was called, just that it produced bright orange berries if you had both a male and a female plant - and one of my garden magazines had a feature on such a thing. It's a bittersweet vine.

Yep, that looks pretty familiar.

I think it must also be the semi-civilized kind, since it hasn't suckered too egregiously. Helpfully a google image search also turns up a bunch of interesting crafty uses for cut branches of the stuff. Hmmm!

Catalogs ahoy!! I am valiantly attempting to restrain my wishlist to those items I have not seen in garden centres or that are good enough deals I'll give it a shot anyway.

Vesey's
Mix of giant hardy phlox - 6 for $25
Asclepias - 3 for $14
Bicolour butterfly bush - $15 (although I'm skeptical that I will have much success with a 3" plug)
------
$54

Breck's
Purple astrantia (Venice) - $15
Mix of astrantias - 3 for $20
Mix of mulleins - 3 for $26
Hardy cyclamen - 5 for $28
Kirengeshoma palmata - $13
-------
$102 - $35 discount = $67

Gardenimport
Totally Tangerine geum - $18
First Blush euphorbia - $18
Stinking hellebore (gotta love a name like that!) - $32
-------
$68

The awesomeness of davesgarden.com - already pretty high in my books thanks to their endlessly informative PlantFiles, which allow site users to post reviews and experiences with various plants - is made all the more impressive by their Garden Watchdog, which has users rate mail-order companies. People left rave reviews for Lindenberg Seeds, for instance, whose somewhat discombobulated website and black-and-white print catalogue I would have completely overlooked. Apparently, however, they have kick-ass plants for rock-bottom prices - three cannas for $4??? Sign me up!

Two months till spring, provided spring is as freakishly early as it was last year.

Siiiiiiigh. C'mon plant catalogues, where are you when I need you??

Well, the Experimental Farm's plant sale is on May 8 this year, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., in the parking lot of the Tropical Greenhouses on Maple Dr. In addition to the wagon, this year I must bring a screwdriver and/or a wrench to secure the loose bolts on the wagon, and also an actual shopping list, although I would never dream of restricting myself to such a thing.

I should sign up for some of the tours of the Experimental Farm too, come to think of it. They have a guided historical tour and also tours of the rose and peony beds. Bet I could drag my mom with me on those.

I also want to check out the Fletcher Wildlife Garden's native plant sale on June 4, since I missed it last year.

Toying with the idea of putting my planned John Davis rose climbing up something like this, but not sure whether I really have a spot for something like that. Could put it over the start of the path next to the driveway, but then it would block the view of what's behind it from the road, which at the moment I kind of like. Could use it as a focal point in the upper part of the yard, but don't know if that would work and/or if I'm design-savvy enough to coordinate things around it. Time to break out the mad paint skillz!



That's...not half bad, actually. And I'd forgotten about the metal railing around the stairs, which isn't exactly conspicuous but would still provide some sort of repeated element/context for the thing. Let's see if I can fill in some of my plant schemes for the spring and see how it jives. Something liiiiiike...



Well, it will be a hodge-podge, but we knew that already. Hmmm.

Option #2:



Huh. That doesn't actually work at all. As a focal point it would be fighting with the magnolia, and it looks weird with the window anyway. Good to know.

Ooooo. Pretty dwarf conifer that does well in shade: tsuga canadensis "Gentsch White".





4' x 4' and a slow grower. Must keep an eye out for a spot for such a thing. In the shadier part of the front yard, maybe? Depends what else I'm going to plant around it, since it would look best with some dark colours around it to contrast.

Living willow fence

How cool is this??



Maybe this is what I will do with the cuttings I plan to prune off the dappled willow. Apparently if you put willow whips straight up and down in the ground, they will grow at the top, but if you put them in diagonally, they will grow lots of bushy little side-shoots.

Sweet merciful crap. After a week of hard frosts and even a couple centimeters of snow, this is what the Fairy rose looks like: