Summertime!

Sooo....lots to discuss in the garden, mainly. Yesterday, I took the afternoon to work on the raised bed I built last year next to the pool. Turned all the dirt, added some rotted manure Betsy brought from the ranch and some grass clippings and even things out. Six hours later, voila!After getting things in order, I planted some dwarf dahlias (below, LOVE the pink-orange bloom)
and some white petunias. I still need to put the drip lines back in place.

The other bed, which is in the background of the picture, is filled with hateful bermudagrass, and I am in the process of poisoning it. Once it's all good and dead, I'm hoping to transplant some of my black-eyed susan seedlings, so I can see them from my office window all summer.

I moved some of the sunflower seedlings yesterday, too. The "tiny" ones, expected to come in at 4.5 feet, are planted along the pool fences. It's a bit touch and go at the moment: two got decimated by earwigs overnight, and several others are looking pretty wilty, despite my heavy watering. It may have been too early to move them.

Also along the pool fence (above) are balloon flower seeds. Nothing's sprouted yet. I planted them a little late in the season. The purple and yellow should be a fun combo, though.

Speaking of a fun combo, how about some pool and sunshine? Thanks to the wind the past few days, there's leaves at the bottom of the pool, but it was looking pretty darn good on Sunday when I floated around for the afternoon. Come a long way since last year. Mom and Dad: please note use of hooks in the background!
Pool shack, also looking super cute with hanging baskets of red petunias (that hopefully won't get eaten by budworms this year).
The baskets hung on the fence (toward the street) are bigger, so there's petunias and blue salvia in those. I'm curious to see how the combination turns out.
I was running back across the street from the neighbors' a few days ago, and I thought to myself for the first time since I've lived here, "Hey, this place doesn't look so bad."

Perhaps you agree? In any case, it doesn't look NEAR as bad as it did a year and a half ago.
I've mastered the Photomerge Panorama option of Photoshop elements to bring you this gem. A nice picture of the back yard, which, again, doesn't look that bad. At this point, I'll take it.