In the Garden: June & July

“Home is where I want to be.”

— Talking Heads, "This Must Be the Place"

June 2023 arrived with us out of town. Upon returning home, I always like to check on the garden, to see what has changed. Looking back on these photos, so many months later, I feel like I took what flowers we did have blooming for granted.

The truth is, summer flowers are hard for me! I love the ease of spring bulbs. But summer and fall are filled with all the seeds you sow in the cool months and plant out painstakingly after the final frost date.

For me, my gardening journey is one that takes place in pockets of borrowed time. Spare moments that we can get outside without tears and stay out until the inevitable sliver, scrape or bruise. Waking up before baby does, getting outside to put seedlings into the ground—I normally do not afford myself the grace I should and take a more critical approach on how productive my harvests are. We didn’t really garden before starting a family, so this is the only way I know. And waking up after so many years of feel sleep deprived, well. That’s an accomplishment in and of itself.

Borage, common milkweed and bachelor’s buttons on June 5, 2023

Lavender blooming on June 12, 2023

First blooms of new ‘Wildeve’ roses on June 12, 2023

Like every good story, this is just a chapter. With the flip of a page, we are already starting anew with another year behind us. And I know I’ll miss this time of little hands yanking on flowers. So I’m going to try to let my girl pick the flowers she wants, without tears, without desperation to save the one orlaya that did in fact grow, despite the other seeds washing away.

This is as much her garden as it is mine.