Hello friends!
In the last post I gave you guys a house tour, so I thought I’d follow it up with a little walk around my yard and garden. I live in a neighborhood right outside of town, so my yard isn’t large. And due to outrageously brazen groundhogs and a sad lack of weeding, my garden is struggling a bit.
However! You know me – I love looking for bits of beauty and nature everywhere, even in a regular suburban yard. So enjoy the result of my searches. 🙂
We’ll start with my front yard, which faces the road. I’ve decorated our porch with pretty hanging flowers, string lights, and pots of herbs.
On the deck side of the porch are two helpful trellises. One is covered in cherry tomatoes right now which makes me inordinately happy.
Picking the ripe, vibrant fruit is one of my favorite daily tasks. These cherry tomatoes are so sweet they taste almost like berries. One of the best garden foods. ❤
The second trellis supports my “mystery tomatoes.” Lawn service accidentally mowed off my tomato starts this spring and then a couple weeks later, a flat of new tomato seedlings appeared on my deck. I never found out where they came from. The plants produce large, mild tomatoes in a salmon-pink color. Sadly I’ve only eaten one because every time they’re juuust about ripe, they get chomped off. Like I said, we have groundhog problems. -_-
I bought this lovely pot of Impatiens back in May and the green vines have gotten so long since then!
Even one hanging pot really livens up a porch.
I love growing herbs on the porch. Whenever I need them for cooking, all I have to do is walk out the door and pick some! I have basil, chives, parsley, and mint right now.
Everything’s rather going to seed at this point in the year. I don’t usually think of herbs as flowering plants, but they mostly are, to some extent or another. This is parsley’s “flower.”
We don’t really have flowerbeds, but this butterfly bush in the front yard adds a pretty floral touch. It definitely attracts butterflies as well as hummingbirds, providing a relaxing view from the porch chairs.
One thing I love about our yard is how much moss it contains. I use some for terrariums and centerpieces inside, and enjoy it outside whenever I come to fill up my watering can.
Another favorite part of our yard is the maple tree in front. It drops rather a lot of small branches in storms, but having at least one tree around is basically a necessity in my opinion, hehe.
Glowing green in the September sun. ❤ I’ll have to update you when the leaves start to turn soon!
Lastly we’ll take a peek at the back yard, which is mostly a strip of grass behind where we park. It contains a nice little garden plot which I’ve let grow up in weeds, oh dear.
Yet another trellis for tomatoes! I think cherry tomatoes are just so aesthetic, hehe.
Okra has such pretty, creamy flowers!
The okra has been probably my most successful crop this year, despite severe groundhog damage to it and everything else in this garden. I literally watched from my window as a groundhog CLIMBED A STALK, pulled a leaf and stem off, and consumed them placidly from a sitting position. *exasperated sigh* They even bent one plant almost in half, but it’s still growing. Okra will survive despite all odds!
And that’s it for this very modest garden tour! I am grateful to even a garden at all – last year the deer demolished it, but Milorganite seems to be keeping them away splendidly this season. Funny how I have more trouble with garden pests here than we ever did on my family’s farm. Anyway, plants make me happy so I hope these pictures brightened your day too!
What are you growing in your yard or garden this year?
Thanks so much for reading, my friends, and have a lovely day!
***Allison***
P. S. Photos taken with my Nikon D7200 and 35mm lens. Edited with Lightroom.
Allison Marie 
Your gardens are beautiful! I particularly love tomatoes and okra. I’ve grown in my tiny hydroponics ~all my herbs in winter, and strangely, tiny Tim tomatoes are bursting from the small unit. I transferred cucumber and mainly flowers in a small garden bed. My strawflowers and marigolds were the “testers”. Next year I’ll try more. Thank you for sharing your beauty!
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Thank you! Yesss those are two of my favorites as well. Hydroponic tomatoes? That’s so cool! I loved hearing what you’re growing. Sounds beautiful and tasty. 🙂 Thanks for reading!
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It’s my pleasure! Thank you, too! ☺️
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Love these pictures! My sister’s garden is not doing great, but we did have an abundant amount of tomatoes and green beans!
Also, I’ve been wanting to ask you… I have a Nikon D3400 and I’m looking into getting some lenses (I have the basic 18-55mm one rn), you seem to use a 35mm for most of your photography. Do you know which one? There are two different kinds I’ve found, I just call them the expensive one and the affordable one. 😂 I would also love any lens recommendations you might have!
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Thank you! Yeah I feel you. I guess that’s how gardens go sometimes – some things flourish and others… don’t. XD
Ooh, exciting! I highly recommend the 35mm as yes, I use it at least 90% of the time. I looked it up on Amazon and from what I can tell (I’m not an expert though), the more expensive one is for a full-frame camera which the D3400 is not. I think they’re somewhat interchangeable, but if you have a fancier camera the wrong lens will crop your pictures a bit. So yes, from my limited knowledge and memory of buying my own lens, I’m fairly certain the affordable one is the way to go. How handy! 😀
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Ooh, good to know!Thank you so much, I shall be purchasing the 35mm! I’m going on a trip to NYC so I wanted to get one or two new lenses for it. 😉
(ooh, oops, my first comment went through as anonymous)
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That’s a fabulous idea! I hope you have so much fun with it. Prime lenses are astonishingly much better than kit lenses so I’m excited for you to try it out. 🙂
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Thank youuu!
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I love your garden and the herbs and hanging flower pots! Wow, I had no idea okra even had flowers- and beautiful ones at that! I can almost taste those cherry tomatoes in a salad…
So sorry about the groundhog issue. We don’t have them where I live in North Central Texas. But we do have a Lot of grasshoppers of a decent size.
Thanks for showing the photos, Allison! God bless,
Valentine
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Thank you Valentine! I know, you wouldn’t expect okra to have such showy flowers but I find them beautiful. Yesss they’re so good in salads.
Haha thanks. It’s a pain but I’m really glad we still get some vegetables! Oh interesting! We definitely don’t have many grasshoppers here. Do they do a lot of damage?
Thanks for reading Valentine! Blessings to you too. ❤️
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Yes, grasshoppers (especially if there are many) can cause damage. I’ve seen a lot of them on our rose bushes. There have been more than usual; that might be due to the extreme hot temperatures we had this year.
But, praise God, we finally got rain!!!!
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Oh dear! That’s terrible.
YAYYYY how wonderful that God sent the rain though! I’m glad.
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Thank You Allison for sharing your pretty yard. The tomatoes look very good. Love those flowers.
We have Marigolds blooming. The rest of the flowers except for the Rose Of Sharon trees did not fare well thus summer.
Marilyn,Joan and Marion
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Thank you for reading! Marigolds are such cheerful flowers, and Rose of Sharon blooms are unusual and beautiful. Too bad about the other flowers though.
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