Determined plants

All of you who garden, please forgive this post.

I am not a gardener. Oh, I like pretty flowers and all, but I neither enjoy the homework (what grows in this soil, lighting and how far apart) nor the physical labor (weeding? digging up bulbs? dividing root systems?). Over the years I have had some successes but never achieved what Ihad envisioned in my mind's eye.

Bill has not always cared for my choices but given his work schedule, he usually didn't say much. Last year his schedule changed and we agreed that he could (should) take over planting.

Whew!

He has a greener thumb than I do. Often green with black dirt smeared in too.

Last fall he asked me if I wanted to salvage the creeping Phlox that he didn't really care for. I fought against saying yes and told him it was up to him. For a variety of reasons, the Phlox wasn't dug up last fall although he thought he may had killed it.

Ha!

The Phlox rose to the challenge of not being admired and doubled, if not tripled in blooms this spring!

Look at their happy little faces saying "You can't ditch us! Look at how pretty we are!"

Their cousins at the other end of the flower bed aren't quite as full and lush, but where they lack in amount, they make up the difference in their own striped beauty. This variety is called Candy Tuft if I recall correctly.

In the front of our house we had two Bleeding Hearts that were trying to take over the world. An admirable goal, and lovely in the spring when they were in bloom, but not so lovely when summer sun and heat made them pale and scraggly. Bill dug them up and wasn't sure if he wanted to save them or not. He threw, literally threw, the plants into two questionable pots near some stacked wood, never expecting them to survive the winter. Not only did they survive, they thrived! You can't help but love a Bleeding Heart, can you?

One Bleeding Heart is larger than the other. Bill must have spoken more harshly to it, issuing a growth challenge. The white pots in these pictures have old, and I mean OLD wild flower seeds planted in them.
They will never grow said I.
No big deal said Bill.
Hello said the seedlings.

In my next life, I am going to like gardening and will be good at. I hope. If not, I hope I meet up with Bill again. Heck, I hope I meet up with Bill again regardless of whether we garden or not.