garden stuff

Time to catch up, I haven't posted about the garden for a while.

Most of my herbs are doing great, I need to find more uses for them! I only have one sweet basil plant that made it from seed, but it's plenty enough for us. The leaves are as big as my hand.

The coleus are all looking nicer now that they've grown in size. Purple 'kiwi' one is becoming a striking plant. It's still hard to get a decent picture of it because the fine foliage gets lost against any background. Here's a closeup.

I potted down my last mock strawberry plant that was on the front porch. Down, because to have them in the house on the mantlepiece I want them in shorter containers. Already lots of long runners trailing over the brickwork. Pleased with how that is turning out (will try to get a decent picture of it soon).

I don't know why, but my newer pepper in a pot has much larger leaves than the four-year-old one. The established plant has small foliage and is giving us lots of peppers -they don't get big because I inevitably put them into beans or lentils or slice them onto pizza first. Newer one has great big foliage but no sign of fruit yet. I wonder if it's the growing conditions? Soil type? Or is my older plant stunted from the winters indoors...

About two weeks ago I put some cuttings of sweet potato vine in a jar, because I wanted more of it. It grew a lot of nice white roots and I tucked them back into the planters. Something is eating holes- either whitefly or japanese beetles. I am regularly squishing japanese bettles to death now, when I find them.

Last picture here, is, I think, the most interesting one. Now that I've looked at hosta flowers, I find them curiously attractive. They don't get admired out in the yard, because the huge leaves are so impressive you just fail to notice the flower spikes. I cut a bunch off the biggest hostas and brought them inside. I like how the fleshy green colors fade into violet.

And how the tips of the leaves and petals each have an edge of white, as if they've all been highlighted with a brush. I'm enjoying looking at this odd bouquet more than the common white daisies (which we have loads of, that plant is really thriving despite the heat out there).