The day after:

Congratulations, Senator Obama.

So! I got the tomato cages. I had considered buying the more expensive ones that are coated with some kind of fancy schmantzy stuff that keeps them from rusting, but... meh. They cost too much, and the plain galvanized ones only cost about 2.50 each. So I got 2 of them. And a bag of "Citrus" potting soil, which should work for the baby lime trees, and tomato sticks to push into the soil to fertilize over time. (They worked rather nicely last year)

The front garden splotch looks pretty good - even without the geraniums in it yet, the NINE buds on the peony are opening up slooowwwly, and the coreopsis is all budded out and looking like it might decide to bloom in the next few days. The big wind/rain storm the other night knocked all the iris over into the grass, unfortunately. The coreopsis is kind of unevenly spread around, however. But considering that I only bought a small 4" pot of it several years ago, and now it has almost filled-in around 2/3 of the splotch, I figure a few more years will even everything out nicely. The daylillies survived as well, as did the Chrysanthemum (to which I am allergic.. achoo!!)

I am not sure what to do about my garden gnome. He's about 8 inches tall, and made from unpainted terra cotta. His name is Herbie. He is hollow, with a hole in the bottom of his feets, and he keeps falling over face-first into the mud. Drunken lil' gnome, no doubt. More importantly, he is now covered with some kind of green slime - mold or something, I suppose. I would hate to bleach him and have him lose his pretty brownish color - but while he is cute, I had really wanted a painted one anyhow...

229 days