From 2011 to 2014, I frequently posted pictures here on the blog from our garden – various flowers and plants that were in bloom, images of ripe tomatoes or other vegetables we harvested, or new plants we just bought. But not this year.

Other than the vegetable garden, some annual herbs, the usual water plants for the pond, and two butterfly bushes, we have not added anything else to the yard this year. We made an early decision to really cut back this year and to just enjoy and maintain what we have. The yard is already full of plants and flowers from years past!

Back in April, I did go to the nursery for some herbs. I planted our favs…Rosemary, Basil, Sage, and Oregano. We later went back for some other varieties of Rosemary and Sage which we like to plant in pots each year so the dogs don’t trample or pee on them. I also put some zinnias in a pot, and some cilantro which has already been used up.

We even cut back on the vegetables this year despite extending the size of the garden last year. We have three tomato plants, two pepper plants, and two cucumber plants. That’s it! About half of what we normally plant. And peppers are the only thing we’ve harvested so far. Everything else seems to be late, but we did plant in late May this year as opposed to usually planting right before Mother’s Day. Thanks to the hot weather we’ll probably still be picking in September.

The picture above is of some surprise lilies that really were a surprise last year. I took the picture last August. I planted the lilies four years ago when we moved my dad into the nursing home. I dug up about 60 lily bulbs from his yard and transplanted them in mine. None of them came up for two years. And then last year, suddenly two appeared out of no where. I’m looking forward to hopefully seeing them again in a few weeks.