a july jar and a plan to better one's garden

Picured here is a small arrangement of Stokes' aster, a dahlia bloom I didn't feel like staking, one-of-a million black eyed susans in my border, and a few snips from  Spireae thunbergii 'Ogon'. I didn't realize it echoed the colorful illustration on the dish above my sink until I placed them next to each other. 

I spent a long weekend looking at my garden but not doing much of anything productive. We had plans to entertain,  so to get ready (and to get out of the house) I stepped out into the sweaty Saturday morning to cut flowers. I cut tons of stuff. I got lazy and hacked up bushels of black eyed susans that were falling over.  Careless me stripped small coneflowers from stalks that would have looked nice in a pairing with white Blazing Star....but I had to skip the Blazing Star which was growing at the base of a switchgrass clump. Did I say "growing?" I meant contorting.  You see, the switchgrass flops over like fistful of wet spaghetti if the soil is too rich. And that smothering effect is not such a great thing for the sun-loving Blazing Star who was pitifully displaying way too much phototropism and way too  little flower plumage. So much for trying to make everyone happy with good soil.

There is a pretty tight crowd in some spots: hop vines clamber all over a barberry which is hidden by this summer's Queen Anne's Lace. Forty feet down the row, a snowbell styrax may become a myth if I do not prune Mt. Wax Myrtle behind and around her.....I need to find some time to look through my notes and my old plant tags and reinventory my yard and garden in a serious way. If lolling about and daydreaming about my garden were a job, I'd be a Master at it.  Maybe I'll start a Master Lolling program for us gardeners who aren't retired yet and can't take off work to finish a Master Gardener Program. We'll all get together for drinks at each others houses on the weekend and mispronounce scientific names with great abandon. It'll be fun.