Catching Up: End of Summer

Since we're squarely in Winter's grasp now, it seems a great time to look back four to six weeks to appreciate the end of summer 2019.

Ah, those were lovely days, warm and sunny and dry. The perfect time to...

***

...hang out on the deck and soak up the last of the summer sun.

Beautiful greenery behind, dark purple castor beans reaching above the deck railing as usual (what an amazing annual!) to add more color to the scene. Plenty to look at too (a helicopter flew over as I took this!)

The tropicals area was particularly nice this year...

...possibly because of the removal of that tree...

...but also because so many potted plants did not make it further into the garden:

I don't typically put that many pots over here, but I think I will from now on.

That was all in late October.

Less than two weeks later...

...a cold front moved in.  Not just any cold front either, this one was mean.

Temperatures dropped substantially, and I scrambled to get all of the tender plants either dug up or moved into the garage. It stayed around for five days I think, with temperatures below freezing that whole time. So strange for mid-November!

(Things were not as nice out on the deck as they were two weeks earlier.)

The leaves hadn't even finished falling when the hard freeze hit (it got down to 12ºF/-11ºC one night)...

...so things looked strange for a few days.

That's a nice mix of colors though. Thanks bamboo!


Back to what I said about digging and moving plants inside. It's a big task, especially when it's crammed into one or two days.

I'm quite pleased with how well organized I was at it this year, tagging everything that needed it, and remembering every single pot. I didn't lose anything that I didn't want to.

Not a thing forgotten!

Well, one thing forgotten.

I haven't shown you the stream after its rebuilding yet, mainly because it wasn't quite finished -- there are still rocks to place, and I'm still not sure if I like the new design yet.

I certainly don't like it when it looks like this!  (The pump was still running even after all of the water had frozen. Drat.)

So winter is definitely here now.

(The pump was fine, amazingly)

.