2026 CW27 - Midsummer [Powerless] Night’s Dream
Gooooooooooood evening (or morning?) garden blog enthusiasts! The cover story of this week’s blog is a Power Outage which took place in the midst of writing last week’s blog, we cover some capital expenditures around the property, check in on some staple ornamentals around the garden, and have a variety of animal friends visit! I also cannot promise (as you may have surmised from the title) that there will be an absence of Shakespeare quotes this week. Read on to find out!
Big Picture
As always, we like to take a step back and appreciate the garden in its full form before diving into the blooms, foliage and details.
This week we take a look at the Front Porch. Here we can see the overflowing Hanging Baskets with their Coleus and Potato Vine. As you may recall, we removed some Dwarf Dahlias from these earlier in the season due to overcrowding, and now we are concerned that the potato vine may be the next victim of the ambitious coleus. These 16 inches hanging baskets have proved quite overwhelmed by the irrigated coleus, and we may have to make some mid-season adjustments if these plants keep putting up some absolutely wild gains.
You can also see the remnants of the Gladiolus from this year. Though the blooms are gone, we leave the green stalks standing all season long to harvest energy and nutrients to feed back into the bulbs for next year. In addition, you may notice the void behind the gladiolus since the relocation of the Frost Proof Gardenias, but fear not! We have big plans for the background and foreground plantings in this bed, and I hope to share updates on this in the coming weeks.
Around back we have the staple Live Oak which plays host to hanging baskets of Dragon Wing Begonias and Silver Falls, a luscious collar of Cast Irons, and a potted Geranium. This is by far our favorite part of the yard. In fact, this very tree was the deciding factor in our original decision to purchase this property.
Closer up to the house, we have a view of the Raised Beds and Princess Flower planters. This area has recently undergone some renovations (including a redneck approved temporary Garden Pool to be featured later) and will hopefully be overflowing with new garden additions in the coming months.
[NO] MO POWA BABEH!!
You didn’t expect both a Shakespeare AND Donut Media reference in the same cover story, did you?
As alluded to in last week’s blog post, blogging day faced a SIGNIFICANT disruption in the form of a long-term power outage last Tuesday. This resulted in Blogging by candlelight and frantically running extension cords from the outdoor generator to power the Refrigerators and Freezers that preserve our precious harvest.
While I had kicked into high gear making sure the blog audience was served and our produce was saved, Sara made sure not to lose sight of preparing dinner! Here you can see her prepping some freshly picked Zucchini Squash and Eggplant by the light of a magnetic flashlight hanging from the pendants over the kitchen Island. Thanks to our Gas Stove, we still had a delicious homegrown homecooked meal amongst the chaos of the evening!
The Tortuga Takeover!
As a refreshing, delightful treat to compensate us for our power outage woes, we received an unusual visit (at least for our yard) from a neighborhood Box Turtle.
Scout (and Yoda) wasted no time getting to know our new friend as he traversed the thick grass between the house and the in-ground vegetable garden. It’s amazing that after 14 straight weeks of sharing these updates with you all, I still manage to find some new wildlife to share with you!
Capital Expenditures, Oh My!
Moving back to the productive happenings in the garden, we check in on all of the capital improvements going on around the property right now.
The single biggest line item right now is the replacement of the South Side Fence. As you may remember, this fence was taken out by a very unhealthy water oak (which also clipped our garage and carport on the way down) several weeks back. I am making good progress with the fence line cleared of brush, post holes drilled, and posts set in place. Next up is leveling of the posts and concrete pouring.
As a [fun] side effect of the tree disaster, we have ended up with dozens of cubic yards of free Wood Chips to be used around the property! We have already deployed these throughout the in-ground vegetable beds, and plan to refresh some beds in the front yard soon! In slightly sillier but way more fun news, we broke down and added a $48 redneck Swimming Pool to our garden space! It may be a bit of an eye sore, but it sure is nice to take a break from fence building to soak amongst our Zinnias and vegetables.
TREEmendous Update!
We don’t often step back to appreciate our taller garden members, but I wanted to take a second this week to step back and admire the grand impressions offered by the towering trunks throughout the yard.
First of all, let’s check in on a fan favorite, the Crape Myrtle trees. Several of these flourishing trees have begun blooming with many more to go! My personal favorite in the yard is this single stem example which originates from Sara’s grandmother’s home in Pascagoula.
In other news, we also have the twin Maple Trees continuing to fill out in front of the house. These were the first trees I planted when we purchased this property, and they are both now towering 20 feet over the front lawn. Around the side yard, a recently transplanted Lime Tree seems to have taken well to its new home, putting on a record amount of fruit this year!
Extravagant Edibles
Around the garden, we continue to see fruits and vegetable coming to maturity and sustaining our family through the summer. Here, Blueberries continue to ripen and Pole Beans continue to bush out.
In terms of harvests for the week, we primarily focused on cleaning up the peppers (primarily the Poblano Peppers) and doing our best to keep up with VERY productive Eggplant producers.
Cut Flower Collection
We have absolutely NO shortage of cut flowers to be harvested around the yard. Here you can see a variety of vase-ready Zinnias along the northern fence line.
We don’t just admire these gorgeous blooms in the outdoors. Instead, we flood the house with beautiful arrangements (created by Sara of course) primarily starring Zinnias but with the occasional guest appearance from something more unusual like the picture-perfect Echinaceas in a blue and white vase.
Front Yard Favorites
Around the front yard we have a number of updates. The combo Salvia and Coleus planter is blowing our minds, as neither Sara nor I can comprehend how such a small planter can sustain such an astonishing arrangement. Alongside this, we have the clearance section Mandeville continuing to flourish and finally reach out to its trellis.
A little further along the house, we have some purple hue blooms from both the Society Garlic and Happy Plant. I also wanted to give an update on a garden staple, the Elephant Ears which I believe were last seen on the blog in their teenage stage. These plants have since quadrupled in size, and tower over the retaining wall surrounding the house.
Backyard Bonanza!
The backyard is flush with even MORE updates than the front yard. Near the house, we have a Peggy Martin Rose continuing to scale the white fence, recently trimmed Plumbago plants (with fresh blooms!), and Black Fountain Grass reaching its full potential looming 5 feet into the air.
In close proximity to the back porch, we also have the ever-healthy looking Ivy, a seemingly artificial Crown of Throns, and one last Hydrangea bloom sneaking into the corner of hydrangea plant.
In other areas, the Dragon Wing Begonias are still as happy as ever in their hanging baskets from the back yard live oak, the Princess Flowers are ALMOST blooming, and the Grass is really thickening up to combat that Gulf Coast summer heat.
Pests and Pets
As always, we close with the juxtaposition of garden pests and garden pets (also known as The Supervisors).
Dancing among the Zinnias this week, I noticed both this dark colored Moth and a pollen covered Bee smaller than any I have ever seen before! I particularly love seeing these little guys with pollen coating their hind legs like a ferrous dust attracted to a magnet.
Though she be but little, she is fierce! (You knew I’d sneak in a Shakespear quote before the end of the blog!). Here we see Scout lounging amongst the grow baogs scattered across the back patio.
