The Gardens of Camp MP Bid Summer 2009 Adieu

Yes, fall is coming and the frostbite pansies and kale are settling in but some folks in the Gardens of Camp MP are not quite ready to give way to the falling leaves and frosty days--one last splash before bedtime!

Happy Happy Hydrangeas! The Gift the Rains Left

If I could only plant one thing in my gardens it would be hydrangeas, hydrangeas, hydrangeas, and more hydrangeas!

When I first started to plan the gardens at Camp Moneypit I knew for sure that every bed and spot would have hydrangeas at the center. I planted countless plants in all varieties, I even rescued some from the trash bin and popped them into the ground. There are hydrangeas that started life as houseplants, centerpieces, baby roots and even hydrangeas that were bought as sources of comfort after losses in my life. Almost all have made it through New England winters and gone on to thrive...but in my wildest imagination I could never envision a season like this...hydrangeas everywhere! HUGE mounds and mounds of color.

If you are starting your gardens or just want to add on play with hydrangeas. I love all kinds-lacecap to Pee Gee Trees but I would suggest starting with Endless Summer This is a relatively new variety that will in fact bloom from spring to frost-I have had hydrangeas as late as Thanksgiving from my Endless Summer. There is no real trick to growing any variety. Hydrangeas love moist cool spots but they will tolerate direct sun---just be sure to give the lots to drink in their first year, once established they do just fine in the sun. Color is determined by acidity in the soil but they always surprise me with the shades they form. Even the plants that were once white can change their tune the next season. Whatever their mood hydrangeas will improve yours---

Quite simply hydrangeas are Happy!

A Baby in Bloom-Spring Awakens at Camp MP

While sitting at my favorite salon having my haircut this week I thought to myself that I am not the only one due for pampering and a fresh snip.

Just as my hair has been stuffed beneath hats and scarves for the past 4 months, the Gardens of Camp Money Pit have been buried beneath piles of snow and ice and sand--it's time for a new season.

Under a milk sky the temperature today reached close to 90 degrees! A welcome piece of joy. It is still April after all, but with a winter of ice and snow and shovels and sand and boots finally gone, I threw open the doors and windows, flicked on the ceiling fans and listened to the birds chirp through the skylights...time to wake up the garden!

This was the first opportunity to do a real assessment of Winter 2009's treatment of the gardens. I walked, clippers in hand, through each bed and patch and was amazed as I always am in April how resilient and magical a garden can be. True there is plenty of winter burn, and I am afraid the mountain laurels and boxwood topiary may not kick back in, but everyone else-AOK!

First up the Hydrangeas...I have too many to count,but that won't stop me for planting more this year. Each has sprung to life and is ready to strut their stuff. I am especially proud of my climbing hydrangeas. There is an adage that the is so true when planting climbing hydrangea--The first year they sleep, next year they creep, the third year they leap!

I leave my hydrangeas more or less as is in the fall- I love the dried blooms against the snow. Come spring I cut back to the new growth. On the Endless Summer hydrangeas, which grow repeatedly on old wood, I still cut away to shape and give strength. My hydrangeas are the anchor to my gardens and my summer.

Next the Lavender patches. How is it possible that after months and months of being "buried alive" that lavender can still have a fragrance? I gave each patch a good haircut to allow the new growth to thrive but I found so much had started without me. Many spots are well on their way-no waiting for me to get around to tend them. I cannot wait to plant more! I just learned of a new variety called White Ice that I will start in containers from seeds from Renee's Gardens.

If you are visiting Cape Cod this year be sure to stop at Cape Cod Lavender Farm for a bit of Provence New England style.

Another treat is the discovery that the roses that line the driveway and the back courtyards made it through their first New England winter and are growing strong.

The great joy of the gardens of Camp MP this spring though is a real surprise. Last year I discovered that next to an old and graceful cherry tree there was a "sprout".

A "baby" tree that had rooted off of its Mom but clearly was struggling. Carefully it was dug free and planted out by the garage at the end of the drive. lots of TLC but not many high hopes for it. Well look at her now! I never expected to find her alive let alone in bloom-

made my week and my spring! and look at her proud Mum who clearly has gained strength and stands as a tribute all good Moms who send their sprouts off to thrive in the cold world.

Mrs. Obama's Garden

And he gave it for his opinion, that whoever could make two ears of corn, or
two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew
before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service
to his country, than the whole race of politicians put together.
- Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels


When you see images of the White House Lawns they are always perfectly manicured, graceful and stately. Jacqueline Kennedy and Lady Bird Johnson created gardens that lend a backdrop of peace and beauty to a residence that has the weight of the planet on its doorstep each day...but peas and beets, carrots,spinach and tomatoes??-Change has come to the White House gardens!

A kitchen garden in the backyard-the South Lawn to be exact- of the White House is now settling in and soon will be sprouting providing veggies that the White House chefs will pick and prepare for the First Family and their guests. The first veggie garden at the White House since Eleanor Roosevelt planted one during WWII, Mrs. Obama's garden is also a teaching garden, is there a better classroom than a garden?

Thirty Fifth graders from Bancroft Elementary in DC helped Michelle Obama dig and hoe and prep and plant. These kids were pros as they have a victory garden at their school. Michelle could have taken a lesson on what to wear when planting from them, but these kids also helped show the lessons that this garden will provide to not only school children but every supermarket shopper. Healthy eating, cooperation,local safe food and environmental sustainability as well as a bailout for the food budget. For pennies you can reap what you sow, instead of $3.00 a cucumber a cucumber from your own garden costs just pennies. Green saves green and everyone eats better-worth the digging?-absolutely.

I used to visit and revisit it a dozen times a day, and stand in deep contemplation over my vegetable progeny with a love that nobody could share or conceive of who had never taken part in the process of creation. It was one of the most bewitching sights in the world to observe a hill of beans thrusting aside the soil, or a rose of early peas just peeping forth sufficiently to trace a line of delicate green. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mosses from and Old Manse


Nothing tastes better than homegrown and it really does not take any great gardening skills...roll up your sleeves and turn on your laptop for starters. Do your homework, learn about your zone and what will work best in your backyard,choose veggies you like and learn how they grow-zucchini for example could take over your world-in fact, many veggies will yield more than you can eat-so be sure to donate and share! Start slowly-don't plant the whole back forty and plant what you like. Seeds are fun project to do with kids and very inexpensive. be sure to buy a bag of seeds starter. You can plant in a shallow plastic tub or even an egg carton. Once you have a sprout then transplant to a peat pot with a good soil mix. These pots can be planted right into the ground. Some sun, good moisture and you are on your way. If you are an ornamental gardener like me plant strawberries, patio tomatoes mint, herbs as accents in your containers or scatter a cutting garden amongst your carrots and peas.

Here are some good places to get started:

Burpee -The Burpee Seed catalogue has been a welcome addition to the winter mailbox since 1876-guess they know what they are doing and their sales have soared in recent months as Americans decide to cut their food budgets and eat healthier.

Seeds of Change-provides certified organic seeds and has a great website that includes a collection called Seed the Change Collection that includes many of the easy organic varieties Mrs. Obama and the kids planted at the White House.

Gardener's Supply is really one stop shopping for everything you need to get started from seeds to soil to pots and tools-great customer service too!


A vegetable garden in the beginning looks so promising and then after all little by little it grows nothing but vegetables, nothing, nothing but vegetables.
Gertrude Stein

For ideas to get kids involved and what to do with all those veggies...check these out

Blooming Perfect Presents!-A Few of My Favorite Things

Kinsman

They play in dirt throughout the year to make the world more beautiful, give them something special!...and Do not forget the Birds in the gardens!

If you play in the mud..do it with color. Hunter Wellies from Smith and Hawken

These are a big smile...animal watering cans from Smith and Hawken...I would plant mine!

Forcing Bulbs is THE cure for Winter! Smith and Hawken has great bulb gifts,bulbs and kits.

I love these...gorgeous gifts come in a variety of "garden" options-Butterfly, Wildflower, cutting, hummingbird... and include 5' of seed tape-"Happiness held is the seed, Happiness shared is the Flowers" from Charleston Gardens

Watch the rain rise, it helps to know how much water fell and I love it as an ornament in the garden. This one from Charleston Gardens

For the Birds...and their Watchers. You don't have to be watching for spots and tails and chirps to wear this out and about from Charleston Gardens

Feed those Birds! These Yummy ideas from Duncraft

Also, from Duncraft the ultimate bird bath-it's heated so Open the Spa!

Tossing Pumpkins-The Winter Garden

How do the weather gods know the second the Thanksgiving leftovers are in the fridge? It seems as if the moment the last balloon floats past Macy's someone flips the switch and says OK-WINTER!. You can get serious whiplash in the transition from Thanksgiving to Holiday...Bam! Goodbye pumpkins and cornucopia..hello snowflakes and silver bells..forget that that every retailer has been playing White Christmas since Labor Day!

So in an effort to get with the program, and to come to grips with December, I have been playing tag with the thermometer and weather forecasters. Dropping temps, freezing rain, wind...all kept me from playing outside. Finally!! last week I had a window to clear away the autumn setting, toss the white pumpkins and gourds and clean out the frost bite pansies.

The Kale were still blooming in glorious color so I left them in place.

It became a race against the clock to wave a magic wand and snuggle greens and nestle heather into their containers before everything freezes solid til March.

The goal for me is always keeping as much green and color through the snow and cold that I can.

Boxwood and juniper boughs galore tumbled out of the trunk of the car as I circled the planet searching for pink heather which will freeze and should keep its happy color into February.

My Winter Gardens are less about the holiday season and more about Post-Holiday. My need to peer out the windows on a desolate January morning and see green and color becomes something that I start to think about the moment the last rose drops its petals. Of course the moment I popped in the last branch...a Nor'easter!

Time to Go Bare-The Promise of Peonies

I know I should be thinking pumpkin pie, squash and cranberries but I look out the greenhouse window and I see my poor hydrangeas who have finally given in to November. I will go clip them back, leave some dried on the stems for the winter garden, and tuck them in for the winter, but I am delaying saying "so long". The white roses of Camp Moneypit have not given in just yet but their time is near as well, they know it and, sigh, so do I.

Knowing I was going through my annual "I miss my garden" mood, a good friend sent me a "cheer up" email. She knows me well and this email had two of the best mood changers-Peonies! and a Sale!

Now through December 10 Peony's Envy is having a Buy Two get One sale on their Bare Root Tree Peonies-just in time to get them settled in...

I have grown herbacious peonies for years, even in containers on a roof deck but this year-Tree peonies!!

There is something simply magical about peonies, they truly take my breath away and hold my heart. I plant hydrangeas and roses and lavender and...but peonies are the blooms that I cherish most. If you look at my roses and even my tulips, I always choose the variety that mimic...peonies!

Growing peonies requires patience because they are slow to get comfy but once they do...Oh My! Also, a funny hint that I learned the hard way, if you see ants loving your peonies..let them..they actually help! The sad part..they are sooo short lived...soon after Father's Day, bye bye...the good news, with proper care you will have more each season.


Peony's Envy located in Bernardsville New Jersey is a Nursery and Display garden specializing in the perennial that brings me joy and breaks my heart...the perfect peony.

Their gardens show off over 30,000 peonies and 250 different varieties
This is the time to think Peonies as bare root tree peonies are available now-but hurry before the snow kisses them goodnight. Tree peonies bloom in May and thrive in partial shade. They offer huge dinner plate blooms and foliage that turns bronze and purpley come fall.They are deer resistant and provide perfect structure to a partial shade garden...They don't like their feet too wet so be sure to plant in well drained soil. According to Peony's Envy, Tree Peonies will live for centuries-I like that thought!

I instantly fell in love with this site-Peony's Envy- and cannot wait to go visit their gardens..I learned so much and cannot wait to fill the gardens of Camp MP with all the colors and varieties they offer...In the meantime, I will go knit something in Peony Pink as I wait for Peony season.

Moonlight in the Garden of Camp MP

It has been difficult to find time to tend to the gardens at Camp MP of late. Today's weather was more late November than October, making me long for just last week when we had perfect days that just couldn't be missed. On one of those perfect October afternoons I decided that the everyday stuff could be tossed aside to make room for Fall in the gardens.

I planted and clipped and dug all day...in fact I lost track of time and found myself still digging as the sun went down. I felt just like Morticia gardening by moonlight which crept up and lit the garden perfectly to place the last of the bulbs.

Morticia of course had a garden filled with poisonous weeds and beheaded roses...I am pleased to say my weeds are finally asleep and my roses are in their glory this fall...I think Fall is their favorite season!

In June I planted scads of white hedge roses that I thought would drown in all the rains of August. How thrilled I was to walk out along the back path and see them tall strong and bursting with white blooms...this one is kissing the snow crab filled with fall berries.

Clear October skies made the perfect canvas for the oranges and golds and reds of the turning leaves and with warm temps it was hard to come inside...my favorite season, though the saddest one. One way to avoid the sadness of fading hydrangeas and drooping clematis is to get ready for spring now!

I know what is coming with cold and ice and snow but this is really my favorite time to plant. Take advantage of great sales at local nurseries, they want to get rid of their stock and you won't see those prices next Spring. Visit garden websites such as Jackson Perkins and Wayside Gardens.

This is such a great time to plan for Spring. I moved some hydrangeas that were crowding each other and found some great deals on Crab trees and Dogwoods. There is still time to get shrubs and trees and perennials(don't forget the bulbs) into the ground. They still have a chance to settle in, be sure to give them a good drink, a toss of a good feeding mix and clip off any fading blooms or leaves. When the temps turn chilly tuck them in for a good winter's rest with hay or leaves to protect them. You can also cover new shrubs with burlap to protect from snow and ice.

...one of the new kids

Then kiss them all goodnight and snuggle in...a long Winter to plan for spring planting!! Hydrangeas, climbing roses, a boxwood hedge, cone flower , catmint......

Let's Make a Deal-The Annual Leap of Faith

Each Columbus Day I enter serious negotiations...not for a new business deal but with the winter residents of my gardens. The gardens at Camp MP have admirers but they are not the type who ooh and aaah and walk on..no these have fuzzy tails and think my gardens are a country club, dinner included! Each year I make a deal with the Nutkin Family. The Nutkins are an ever populating bunch and they have taught one another all the best places to shop, my gardens being the Bergdorf's of bulbs. The squirrels and I have long discussions and I make every effort to hold up my end of the bargain..they,however.... So here's the deal, if they leave my newly planted bulbs alone they can feast on whatever they can shake out of the bird feeders all winter...Squirrels are not to be trusted!

Consequently I was not going to plant this year...but I couldn't resist! Bulb planting is the special spot of a gardener's soul. They represent the hope and optimism that every gardener holds. While the leaves are still turning and the sky is a glorious blue I dig and place and tuck my bulbs in with a kiss for a long goodnight. I admit I often forget where I placed them, which is actually part of the joy...to walk by a section of the garden and see a group poking their heads up is the reason I plant. Winters in New England can be long and cruel so the first sprout of a leaf tip through the cold and icy ground is a gift that I would not trade for anything.

This year I am continuing my blue and white theme..parrot tulips, peony tulips, grape hyacinth, narcissus, muscari, scilla...I love them in patches and not neat rows. Check out Van Engelen and John Scheepers Old House Gardens for glorious collections. Just a hint..bulbs can be addicting! Pick a corner that is visible come spring and plan around color...what do you want to see first/ Group them in clusters of color...don't plant one tulip here and one there...show them off together. Dig an appropriate sized trench and place them. You can add bone meal or bulb booster but be warned...The Nutkins love that, like whipped cream for them! Go dig a hole!

Iron Clad Garden

Mrs. Powers Garden Gate-Mackenzie-Childs

Popping up among among the hydrangeas and roses this year are fabulous garden elements that fall into the "everything old is new again" category. We are seeing perfect solutions to seating, planting and design made of durable iron. Many have an antique feel and I have spotted great original vintage pieces at antique marts made of iron go for huge dollars so these new pieces that are reminiscent with great style caught my eye...

Plant Strong!

Singing Frog Planter -Horchow


First, Have a Seat...

Chinese Chippendale Chair-99 Market



Curled Iron Garden Set-WisteriaBean Chair 99 Market

Faux Bois Bench-Wisteria
Red Mandarin Bench-Horchow

Now, Let's Plant...

Curled Iron Planter-Horchow
Urn Planters-99 Market

Vine Pedestal Planter-Wisteria

Pagoda Wall Planter-Horchow

Tuck in Some Accents...

Birdie Bath-Wisteria

Butterfly Wall Art-HorchowBirdsong Garden Spigot-Mackenzie-Childs

Obelisk Hurricanes-Horchow

...and Welcome Them into The Garden-

Emily Garden Gate-Amazing Gates





Monogrammed Door Knocker-Horchow
Personalized Door Mat-Horchow


Mrs. Powers Dinnerbell-Mackenzie-Childs

Weeding Life

Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them- A. A. Milne, Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh

But make no mistake: the weeds will win: nature bats last.- Robert M. Pyle

The Gardens at Camp MoneyPit did not exist 2 years ago. There was literally nothing to salvage, nothing to "grow" from or keep. For a small cottage that took 18 months to breath life into you cannot imagine the panick that set in every time I started contemplating the landscape. Camp MP has no less than 7 different areas surrounding it , each with its own challenges...I of course chose to take them on all at once! My flaw as a gardener, as in my life, is that I want to make everything right, make it better, make it beautiful and make it into what it can and should be...I do that with people too-they don't always respond as well as the hydrangeas!

So it should be no surprise that my need to control and keep everything blooming beautifully does not really leave a lot of tolerance for weeds! Gardening for me has become the corner of my life that insists on teaching me...my gardens have a stubborn student! The gardens are determined to show me that I may hold the trowel, I may dig and amend, and plant and water, and nurture and hover, and.. but I am not in charge, nor do I determine the success. I am just a "player" in this ever changing "landscape".

Every gardener will tell you that patience is perhaps the gardener's best tool. I am not the most patient...I want the "result", I want my vision realized-NOW, please! Taking on the gardens of CMP has shown me that there are small yet great victories if you wait and watch and let it happen-a Clematis, given up for lost, coming into spring with strength and showers of blooms is one reward for a lesson learned, as is a climbing hydrangea that slept then crept and now has leapt to grace the stone of the house.

It was a surprise to discover that the soil at Camp MP is good in most spots, unless you hit one of the old stone walls buried beneath. Most of the "new" residents seem happy to be here, but so do the weeds...the weeds absolutley adore it here, and they are determined to take up permanent residence-I should have them chip in for the mortgage payments!

Most days I actually do not mind weeding. True, one of life's most thankless tasks..or is it? Yanking, tugging, pulling unwelcome intruders out of the ground can actually work wonders after a long week. The weeds at Camp MP,however, are on a mission. They are determined to win, to take over, to pop up at will from the weed cloth and mulch. They arrive and start crawling about as if they were in charge...not so fast fellas, remember I am the Controlling Gardener!

Yesterday I spent about 4 hours weeding, filling three trash bins and ruining a pair of gloves. I woke up this morning, slipped on my garden sneaks, picked up the hose to water the new roses and Hello!- WEEDS!!! You know what, tomorrow there will be weeds, and the next day and certainly all summer til the frost of October I will have weeds. I will pick and pluck and pull every Saturday morning-maintenance yanking-but they will come back more determined each time to "show me". Just like in life, things grow and pop up where you don't want them...they certainly do in my world.

I have made my peace with some weeds. If you look like a pretty groundcover, if you have a delicate white flower, you might be able to hang around til you become unruly. If you are a dandelion, or your first name is "Crab" you are out of here-NOW!

The weeds at camp MP have taught me that I cannot control what grows overnight. I cannot totally stop "ugly" from happening anymore than I can stop unwelcome or sad for that matter. Yup, weeds happen! The gardens are lecturing ..."Accept that, adapt and work with what you can...make the best out of it, even learn to live with some of it."

So sure, I will continue to pull and yank the ones I can grasp, but for those that I simply cannot get to budge I will have to accept them, welcome them and make them a part of the garden til I can take a shovel and give one big tug...then I will plant hydrangeas and roses in their place to show them how Life s really done. The weeds of my garden, and my life, may crop up another day in another spot but I'll have a peony ready to put them in their place!

Waking Up the Garden

All through the long winter, I dream of my garden. On the first day of spring, I dig my fingers deep into the soft earth. I can feel its energy, and my spirits soar. Helen Hayes

It has been a topsy turvy spring in the gardens of Camp Moneypit. New England in April is usually grey and wet and cool while May is when you blink and there are blossoms, buds and blooms.

This year April vacation was like a week in June and now this weekend before Memorial Day is cool and damp. It is no wonder then that the trees that burst out of their winter sleep to turn their faces to the warm sun now look a bit like they want to roll over and go back to sleep.

For the gardens of Camp Moneypit this is a BIG spring. I spent the better part of last May and June making daily trips to the nursery fillling every inch of Silver Girl the miata with pots and pots to transform the endless empty grounds. After a spring of digging, planting and planting, digging some more, planting some more and summer days watering watering watering watering, I watched out the window as all my new "kids" got battered by snow and ice and wind and cold all through the winter. Believe me if I could have pulled them inside with me and fed them chicken soup I would have. For weeks this March and April I didn't dare look at the baby flowering pears, cherries, dogwoods and crabtrees. How could they make it through, they are so young and the winter was mean ?? I could see that the rhodies and azaleas and mountain laurels did not look too pleased, and the boxwoods that were green all winter suddenly were turning jaundice...so of course I began to worry about the "big guys". My hopes were set on my hydrangeas that rarely let me down. Their teeny buds started to sprout out so I knew they just needed some clipping and a kiss and off they'll bloom. It was the paths of dried lavender showing green and the french tulips and hyacinth popping up proudly that gave me the courage to go up close and personal with the taller residents on the block.

A sight I dreamed of seeing all those early August mornings with the hose came true. Sweet blush and rosy pink buds and blossoms were welcoming me and smiling a big Thanks for taking care of us. They made it!!!!!!

Welcome to the Gardens guys...you did good! Move over cause it's time to head to the nursery!