Happy 4th of July!

   We had a hot, dry and windy holiday - so windy that the city had to postpone their fireworks display. That's okay - better to be safe!

   With this heat, and with having treated my lawn to deter crabgrass, I have been spending quite a bit of time trying to save my lawn, since the beginning of summer. We finally had a nice gentle rain last night, and my lawn and plants seem visibly relieved. I still need to dig up quite a bit of dead crabgrass, but I just keep after it.  I'm not going to try to over-seed until fall, anyway, because of the heat.  Also, I need to wait because I just applied some leftover fertilizer to the bluegrass, since it seemed so dry and stressed.  Just in time for that rain, too. Believe it or not, it seems to have already "greened up."

   My zucchini plants have so many blossoms, but I had to move the planter over by the flowers, in order to access the bees for pollination.  . 

   

Zucchini Blossom with Bee

   I'm still waiting for some zucchinis, though, and fear that I should have thinned them out to begin with.  I added some fertilizer yesterday, though, so let's wait and see.

Trumpet Lilies

  Here's an older bed of trumpet lily bulbs.  I'll be thinning these out this year.

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More pruning and some mulch . . .

   

Front Shrub Needs a Haircut

   This is a deciduous evergreen shrub.  It stayed green all winter (although we had a mild winter, for Colorado). It seems to have grown about 15 inches this year.  I almost didn't want to trim it, but it was over-lapping the edges and corners of the sidewalk, and I couldn't see over it, which was a security issue.  Also, I had to really trim the corner branches, because I kept scratching my arms against the protruding branches. and I didn't want anyone else to hurt themselves.  I also needed to freshen up the mulch, because it has been so hot (110 -112 degrees) here, and the mulch helps keep the ground from drying out.

   Again, I kept my spritzer bottle full of water nearby to spray myself with, and this time I hydrated with a can of Orange Crush. Both were very refreshing!

This did say "112," but it changed 

before I could capture it on-camera.

(The time is incorrect.)

This got me through!

Trimmed and mulched with red mulch.

Brown mulch protects and "dresses up" this area.

   The deciduous evergreen is on the right, in the corner.  Those black panels are trombe wall enclosures.  They worked well last winter, but in the summer, I depend on the sun to migrate so far north in the sky that the house soffits shade them from direct sunlight. 

   I found the two bags (one red and one brown) of Scotts Hyponex mulch at Walmart's garden center for only $2.97 per bag. 

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