Thoughtful musings on various topics by interesting people at Blithewold

Back to school

The schoolbus yellow rudbeckias foretold the inevitable starting weeks ago. School has started in Rhode Island, it’s about to start in Mass., and suddenly the property has gone quiet. No more laughing camp kids in … Read more.

The awesomeness of agastache

I am as fickle as any gardener. I’ll pick a new favorite color, fragrance, leaf, flower, and plant habit every other week (or day) and reserve the right to change my mind over the slightest … Read more.

Big changes

Do you remember the scene in Grosse Pointe Blank where Joan Cusack’s character describes going to her 10 year high school reunion? She said, “It was just as if everyone had swelled.” I couldn’t help … Read more.

Hold that thought

I’m off. Way off, as my mom would say. For the next two weeks I’ll be a million miles away (figuratively speaking) staring at the ocean for one week and pulling enormous crabgrass and pokeweed … Read more.

AUGUST 1903 – NORWAY, SWEDEN, AND DENMARK

At the end of July Marjorie left England by boat from Newcastle, sailing overnight to Bergen in Norway.  The party of four – Marjorie, her cousin Dorothy, her friend Gertrude, and their chaperone/guide Helen Macartnay … Read more.

To be adventurous

Yesterday, Gail and I had the pleasure of a road trip to a garden in the wilds of southwestern Rhode Island that would have felt as far away as Borneo or any other exotic tropical … Read more.

What’s at stake

I used to really enjoy the challenge of staking top-heavy plants in such a way that their crutches were as invisible as possible but this year, maybe because the ground is dry enough to make … Read more.

Live and let live

I’ve gotten a couple of questions in the last week or two about what we do in the gardens to manage pests and diseases. Although a lot of you already know the answer, I don’t … Read more.

The bare minimum

When the cicadas start buzzing early in the morning we know we’re in for a scorcher. With temps in the 90’s, high humidity and ground level ozone levels that were predicted to “approach or exceed … Read more.

Gratuitous Friday photos

It’s been another hot, dry week but the gardens are as beautiful as ever. Proof is in the pictures and I just couldn’t resist doing a tiny Garden Bloggers Bloom Day preview since I always … Read more.