Just pretty... and playing

I dug up my wildflower bed in the spring and scattered some new seeds out there, but I didn't have much luck with anything growing, probably because my seeds were old and the timing of the rain wasn't the best. My old bachelor buttons and plains coreopsis grew here and there (and the weeds did VERY well, but I've finally managed to finish cleaning them out), and recently I noticed something that looked a bit different. It's now beginning to bloom, and I believe it's a cosmos.

There are only two flowers so far, but lots of potential for more.

I haven't had cosmos this color before. They're so bright and cheery! But have you noticed that yellow flowers seem to be the hardiest? It seems to me that there are always yellow flowers around. Okay, this is yellow-orangish, but still.....

My many-years-old black-eyed susans are blooming, too.

I did a bit of photo playing, cropping for different effects.

Close-ups are always fun.

Which of the three shots did you like the best?

There's another plant growing out there that I haven't identified. It doesn't have any buds on it yet, so I'll save that for another day, if indeed it blooms at all.

Now I'm going to jolt your eyeballs with a different color! My mini rose is blooming again, and this time it was not damaged by kittens (or whatever). A bit of misty rain makes it extra pretty.

That pink flower is an impatiens. It gives you an idea of how tiny the rose bush is!

More pretties

As long as I had the camera out taking pics of the weeds, dirt, etc., for my last post, I thought I'd snap some pretty ones while I was at it. I always love the moss roses in their many colors. Here are a few of them. This first pic sorta got photo-bombed. Those white streaks you can see are whiskers. I had so much "help". :)

My sedum plant bush in the wildflower bed is becoming so pretty now:

Behind the sedum are a few black-eyed susans still blooming.

I've pulled out pretty much everything else, as it was done blooming and going to seed. I'd like to dig up the whole bed except for the perennial sedum and BES's and plant new seeds next year... or even yet this fall. We'll see if I get that done. Then I could have some new kinds of flowers to show you instead of just the same ol' same ol'.

After the rain

Yesterday morning I noticed how pretty my mini rosebush looked with raindrops still on it. I couldn't resist snapping a few pics. I was very pleased with how this turned out (click it to enlarge)!

I kept that little rosebush in the house over the winter. It did okay while it was getting the south sunshine, but once the sun got higher in the sky and no longer hit the rosebush, it got very straggly looking. It would also lose a lot of leaves every time it got too dry because I forgot to water it, since it was in the bedroom Courtney uses... and out-of-sight-out-of-mind. I cut it back a LOT before I set it outside this spring. It's now catching up and blooming quite nicely. I won't be bringing it back into the house this fall, though. If I didn't have cats, I could put it in the living room where it'd get better attention and sunshine longer. But I'll give up the flowers before I'll give up my cats. ;)

Here's what's blooming in the wildflower bed now. These black-eyed susans are beginning to take it over. That's okay... they're easy.

From one tiny plant

Quite a few years ago I ordered a special 'deal' pack of several little plants... from somewhere. I don't remember what the other plants were, or where I planted them, or what happened to them... but one scraggly little plant was a black-eyed susan. It took off and over the years has spread. This year they're taking up a good portion of my wildflower bed, and they're looking gorgeous... the best they ever have!

(Cindy... the setting is 'Auto', zoomed from about 5 feet. Just thought you'd want to know that.) ;-)

On second thought, I believe my sedum was also in that little pack of plants. It's done very well, too. It's not blooming yet this year. Later.