First what is this? I had one show up a few years ago, and now I have a nice clump, and it has seeded in another part of the garden. Then today I noticed a white one in the clump. I am thinking some type of verbascum?

Here are a few of my favorite combo's

This combo was an accident, the campanula seeded itself from another part of the garden, but I like it!

There are some more images in my flicker album linked below. The newest ones are at the end.

Enjoy!

Do you know the name of the steel blue allium that's growing up through the budding hydrangea?

As are all your photos and your garden! And I haven't even looked at the link yet!

Thank you for sharing! My garden is such a neglected mess this year its nice to see one that is so beautiful.

Dee

Diggerdee, The window has a funny story behind it. We live in the country, with a gravel road along one edge of our yard. A short way down the road is a cemetery that gets a lot of summer visitors. Between the yard and the road was a row of shrubs. There was a gap in the shrubs, and often while working in the yard cars driving by would go past very slowly, and the people in the car would be peeking through the gap at my yard.
So I decided it needed a window! I was at a junk shop and found this old metal frame that I believe used to have a mirror in it. I bought it for $5 sprayed it with copper paint, and mounted it on 2 4x4's. I put some fencing on the 4x4's and planted some clematis I found on clearance there.

It is just at the right level for people to look through while sitting in a car. The road is raised above the height of my yard, to form the 4th side of a levee, to keep flood waters out.

Since then most of the shrubs have been pulled out, they died, which was fine with me as most of them were the invasive buckthorn anyway. I am slowly replacing them with shrubs I like, while I don't miss the buckthorn, I do miss the privacy. This is how the elderberry ended up in front of the window.

Jenny P
PS if you like this story, remind me to tell you about the penguin in my pond someday! LOL!

My fav is the window frame with the clematis though! I've seen that technique used before, but yours is by far the best. The other one was wooden (which I liked, just doesn't last as long as metal!) and framing a stand of fennel. The other still had a mirror in it. My first thought was "OMG, no! I would hate to have to look at myself when I am in the sweaty midst of weeding!!" Lol.

I am totally in love with your style sense. Beautiful. Thanks for sharing!
CMK

Now, penguin in the pool?

I never used to do arrangements, they intimidated me. Which is funny as I worked for a while in a flower shop, I worked in the gift shop and never did anything with the flowers.

But a few years ago I read a book about Tasha Tudor, and decided I have the flowers, I have the pots, what the heck am I saving them for?? Now I have vases of flowers on a regular basis.

Here are the arrangements

I think you are right about the book, it's not by Tasha Tudor, but by Tovah Martin who wrote books with Tasha Tudor. Sorry about that. Nice book though.