Late Summer Garden Tour | Gardener in Love

Hello everyone. We are back from the beach. We got some much needed rest from doing the parterre all summer long and we are rested. We are ready to get back in the garden today. We're going to take you guys for a walk around the garden and we're going to see some of the beautiful things, some of the not so beautiful things, but the garden still looks really stunning here in late August in North Carolina. So let's take a walk. All right. So we're going to start here at the picket fence garden. And if you have been with us for a while, you might remember that this is a new garden from 2025. So last spring there was virtually nothing here. We had all of the old shrubs pulled out. We had the new picket fence installed and we planted everything and you can see how full it is this year. Now I know we say sometimes that gardens can take a while to fill up, but clearly this garden is very happy because it is quite full. So we've got some limetime coleus here for some annual filler, but it is just filled up with beautiful perennials and shrubs all the way down. We've got some roses. We've got this beautiful rose of Sharon right here that has been in bloom for probably over two months. I think this is called French Cabaret. This is from first editions and it's got this beautiful double bloom and it is just going for it here. I think this will get somewhere between eight to ten feet tall and we have no plans of trimming this back. We're just going to let it go. It's going to be some kind of additional barrier between us and our neighbors. Our neighbor is lovely and she let us kind of plant some things on this side to give her a little bit of a garden too, but then you still get this nice view through to our house and our garden on the other side. So when we first started planning this garden last spring, we thought we wanted it to be really kind of like wild perennials, but then as we started doing that, we realized, you know, this is the front of our house and we still want it to be a little bit more formal and as much as we would love the wildness, that's just not us. And so we came back in and changed some things and we just wanted it to feel really full and lush and clearly it is. The other thing that I wanted to point out is the Senorita Blanca Clayomi. So this is an annual from Proven Winners and there are three of them planted in this area and every year when we plant this, I think, geez, this is just like this little sprig. And then by the end of the season, it is just this big, beautiful mass. Now, did we really need to put three right here? Probably not. We probably could have gotten away with one or two, but adding the third one just kind of made for the fullness. There's one on the other side and two on this side and there is no deadheading required. They just kind of keep growing up and up and up there in bloom all season long. And they are really, really great annual for the South. They don't need a ton of fertilizer like petunias or some of the other flowering annuals. And they just they just do it for us. We love it. It gives us really that cottage feel that we love. The other thing that I want to point out from this side is our Tuomeles Red Sentinel Japanese Maple. We planted this this summer and it is clearly very happy because it is shooting off little sprigs all the way up into the sky and they are like bright, bright red. So I'm very excited to see this whole tree go red for the fall. And then again next spring, I think it's going to be a really nice pop of color here. And again, this is going to give us a little bit more privacy in between us and our neighbor. And it's also going to provide a little bit of beauty as well. You know, we've got some North Pole Arborvitaes back here, which are great for privacy, but they don't really give us a lot of interest. They're more like a background plant. But having things like the Japanese Maple and the Big Rose of Sharon kind of add to that privacy while giving us some beauty as well. So why don't we pop over to the other side of the fence and see what else is going on? So here on the other side of the picket fence garden, it is also very lush. So you might remember last year we planted this low glow Japanese Red Pine here and it is doing really, really well. Earlier this spring, there was a little bit of browning on the front and we thought, oh, this guy's not going to be happy here because this soil up here is really, really heavy clay. I mean, there were some old shrubs here before we planted all of this, but even still, the ground is just really compacted. And so, you know, we planted this like we should, planted it up, but you never know with conifers. But it is doing really, really well and it has pushed out a lot of new growth this season. And then, of course, we've got some geraniums here in the ground. Now, we grew a lot of stuff from seed this year and our goal was to sell most of it at the Charlotte Garden Tour. And I would say we sold probably almost all of it. And we did have some that was left over. We had some that we pulled for ourselves, but we got so distracted with the parterre that we kind of forgot about them. And so Brian popped some of the geraniums and some other things here along the edge, probably about a month ago. So they're not as big as they should have been, but it's still adding some really nice color. I mean, I love how neon this is. I think this is the Scarlet Pickety geranium from Swallowtail Seeds. And we've grown this one before and we've got it in the parterre as well. And I really like how bold it is out in the landscape. We've got this is the Treasure Trove Rubecchia from Walters Gardens. And this is one plant. It's about three and a half feet tall, I would say. And it is massive. I mean, it has been blooming all season long, which is great. There are a lot of little babies around the base and we've got some that have spread out here. But we love Rubecchia in this house. And so that's OK with us. We've also got the Salvia Argentia here, which Brian loves. We searched for this plant all season last year and couldn't find it. And so we decided to grow from some from seed for ourselves. And we sold these at the garden tour and these were left over. And so we popped them here. I think they will get a lot bigger next year once they have more time in the ground. I'm excited to see that. And then I got to talk about this potato vine here. So this is the Sweetheart Caroline Mahogany potato vine. And we also have this in our planter box out back, which you'll see. And this kind of sat here for a long time. We have put the Sweetheart Lime in the ground before and it just kind of toughs up and becomes this big, massive ball very quickly. And this one kind of sat for a while. And now it's kind of starting to trail out, which I really like. I kind of like how it's weaving through the other plants and adds a little bit of pop of red up here, which we were missing. And it pairs really nicely with our Monte Blue Spruce. Now, we planted this Monte last fall, I believe, and it is doing really great. You know, blue spruces always make me nervous because you never know how they're going to do with our soil, how they're going to do with our humidity. But this one is doing really, really well. And it has put on a lot of growth. So you can see this point here is the growth that we got this season and it's kept its leader. It looks like it's about to push another little flush. And I'm excited to see how this grows over the next couple of years. We've also got our castor beans here. Now, if you saw our garden tour last fall, end of summer, you might remember that we had some castor beans here and they were giant. Well, we did not plant these this year. These came from the seed of last year's crop. And if I'm being honest, they were all through this flower bed. And we had to just pick a bunch of them that were rogue. These we decided to leave. There's a little bit of a hole here while the blue spruce is growing. And I mean, I do love it. It's really fun. But I think we're going to be pulling these out of our garden for the rest of our time here. OK, so why don't we take a look at our window boxes, because they still look really great. All right. So earlier this year, we added some Nantucket window boxes from Maine planters on the front of our house. And there was one also on the window to my office. And these things have really done it for us this year. I mean, it's hard to imagine our home without these on the front now. They just add such whimsy and fullness. And honestly, as much as I love the summer planting that we have here, I'm super excited to swap them out for fall. We've got a chocolate drop coleus here in the front. We've got three caladiums here. And, you know, what I'm realizing is that the caladiums have really taken over the show here in late summer. You know, the petunias are still going for it. We did give them a trim halfway through the season. We've got our diamond frost euphorbia that has grown a lot. But if we didn't have these caladiums in here, I think this would feel kind of flat. And so if you're in the south like us and you want something that's going to carry you through those really hot months, I cannot recommend caladiums more. And, you know, if you're super ambitious, you can actually pull these out and bring them inside and winter them over as houseplants. And then once we get above about 55 degrees at night next spring, you can bring them back out and plant them in the ground and enjoy them for another season. So there you go. I don't know if we'll be doing that, but we will see. The supertunias we have in here are Supertunia Mini Vista White and Mini Vista Indigo. Classic pairing for us. We've paired this in many different ways throughout our garden. As you can see, we also have the Mini Vista Indigo along the front. And this is typically what they look like for us here in August in the south. You know, they are still hanging on. They still have a little bit of bloom, but they are starting to peter out. And that is A-OK because we have about 500 violas growing inside that we're going to be popping here in another month or so. So we've enjoyed the petunias. We lost one right here and one right here. But for the most part, they really took. We got these in the ground later than usual. We really like to do it like early April. I always think like right before Brian's birthday, April 25th, not too hot, not too cold. Right before Brian's birthday is the perfect time to plant petunias because they can take a little bit more cold than people typically think. But getting them in early allows the roots to establish before we really get into that brutal North Carolina summer. But they are still doing really, really well. We also have our in the summer hydrangeas back here that we planted like in the middle of the summer. And I was nervous. Now we're at the end of the day here. So some of them are a little wilted, but all of these have two emitters on them for our drip irrigation. So they're getting watered every single morning at this point. And they have also put on a lot of growth. So I'm excited to see the show that we have with them next year. Now, here at our front porch, we're getting tired. So we've got Mini Vista White here on either side of the box. And, you know, I will say that these didn't fill out as much as I was hoping. And I don't know if maybe we need to repot these boxwoods and get a little bit better soil in there. When we bought these boxwoods, they were already pretty big root balls. And so there's not a lot of extra space in here for the roots of these annuals to grow. So I don't know. To be determined there, we might pull these out and shake a little bit of soil off and try to regroup here so that we have a better chance next year. And then up here on the front porch, I mean, you can't even see the wicker pot anymore. This is so. Oh, my gosh. The Jenny has rooted into the doormat here. You can't even see the wicker pot under here because this is just so massive. But the petunias, again, they're on their way out. They have they have kind of stopped blooming as much as they were earlier earlier in the season. But these begonias, I mean, my gosh, I can't remember the name of these. Erin, the inpatient gardener, when she was at our house, she named them just like right off the top of her head. And I'm like, of course she knows the name of these. But this this is a hanging begonia that Brian got at a farmer's market here. And we popped them in a little hanging basket that we have. And these also are on drip irrigation. And they have just been in bloom all season long. I love it. And I love how simple it is up here because this planting mix down here was a lot. We've got the bright orange begonia, we've got the purple supertunia, and the white just kind of like settles everything. I love usually up here we do like a fern or something, but I love having the hanging be simple if this is going to be crazy or maybe next year we have the containers down here be simple and we go crazy in the hanging baskets. I don't know. But I think if you go a little wild in both of them, it might be too much. But that's just that's personal preference. So let's walk over here because I really want to show you the jasmine wall. So if you'll remember right before the garden tour, Brian put this beautiful diamond trellis on our fence and planted four Madison star jasmine at the bottom. And I mean, really, they only came to like right here. So in one season, we've almost covered the whole diamond, which is amazing. Now, I can't wait to see how this winter is over because I know jasmine is kind of on the cusp here in our growing zone. But Madison star is supposed to be hardy to our zone. It's also supposed to be hardier in shade, which is kind of what we have here. This is really in shade for most of the day. And this is going to be stunning in bloom next season. I mean, I cannot wait to see it here. We've got some more our other wicker basket containers. And, you know, they're getting a little tired, too. We still have a little bit of color. One thing I will note, this is the sparkling amethyst super bina. And usually this time of year, we get like spider mites and bugs really bad on them. And they just kind of stop blooming. And so typically what we like to do is treat with like neem oil or Captain Jack's, give them a good shear back and then they'll flush out. Obviously, we've been on vacation for a little bit. We've been distracted with the parterre. So we haven't been able to do that as much as we normally would. But we're still getting a little bit of color out of them. And of course, we have the beautiful boxwood topiaries here, which are providing some interest all year long. All right. So that is the front garden. Let's head through the gate and take a look at what's blooming back here. So as you enter the garden gate here, we've got this beautiful wisteria from Isley Nursery. And my gosh, I haven't really taken a look at this in a few weeks. And the growth on this is insane. If you remember, this was like here when we planted it. And I mean, we've gone all the way up the trellis. Now we're going off both sides. I think our goal here is to train this across the wall, go up and over the arch, and then kind of just let it take over. And we'll get those beautiful blooms in the spring. And I think it's going to be stunning. I mean, even next year, this is going to be an amazing show. The other thing that I love that Brian made an executive decision on here is adding this table here. We used to have our grill here. We pulled that out because, I mean, it's just an eyesore, right? Especially this is right where you come into our garden. So we added this table here and we've got a collection of geraniums here or pelargoniums, as Brian would say. We do have one casualty here that we lost while we were at the beach. But other than that, I mean, they're looking really, really nice. We've got this one that's still blooming here. We've got a mangava here. I think this one is praying hands. And we've got this in a small container now, but we'll just keep bumping it up as things go on. And the other thing that I wanted to point out is we have our devil's trumpet here, which we picked up at Clay 30A in Florida on our beach trip. And we've got to figure out where we're going to put this because it has a really, really cool bloom on it. Unfortunately, we have missed all the blooms for now, but it's almost kind of like a double purple bloom with like a long throat. It's really, really cool. So I want to make sure we put this somewhere special. Pro tip, if you're getting a devil's trumpet, it is highly poisonous. So if you've got pets or small children, you want to put it in an area where they're not going to get it because you might have a trip to the ER on your hands if that happens. So we're going to find a special spot for this. And the next year we'll get to enjoy the blooms all season long. OK, I'm going to step up onto the deck and I want to show you guys our little French cafe area. So I kept putting this off and putting this off. And finally, Brian just did it. So Brian set this up on our drip system. So now both of these containers are getting drip irrigation every time the irrigation system runs. And they have really pushed a lot of new growth. I mean, look at this Superbina. I love the I think this is Superbina Whiteout. I love how ball shaped this is. Some of the Superbinas are kind of flat, but this almost looks like a mini hydrangea from far away. We've got the Helichrysum Icicles. We've got Supertunia Deep Purple, I think is this one. And it just is like really full. And we really wanted this to be a spot where we could come out in the morning, drink our coffee and feel kind of like surrounded by nature and create our own little room right here, which I think we've done. And again, I'm very excited to change these out for fall. I love fall containers almost as much as I love summer containers. It feels like a rebirth and like a refreshing after the summer heat. Now, let's talk about this planter box. My gosh, I mean, this is probably the most lush I have ever seen this planter box. Last time we showed it to you, it was still kind of, you know, maintained. And on the small side, it was only 60 days in at that point. And we have kind of just let it go at this point. This is also hooked up to our drip irrigation. So every time the irrigation runs, this is getting watered. And I mean, the diamond frost euphorbia has really taken over. I didn't think this was going to do this. And, you know, I think what it needed was some consistent heat. And it has really grown a lot. I love how, you know, the things that we planted, you kind of got to see them in their own moment. It started with the licorice plant and then it was the superbena and then it was the potato vines. And now I feel like it's the diamond frost euphorbia. I mean, it's really the star of the show right now. And then the tricolor sweet potato vine. If you'll remember, there is there is an obelisk under here and we kind of trained it up to the top. And then our goal was just to kind of let it go and kind of take over. And it's doing amazing. I think this is my favorite potato vine ever. I just love the interest of the white variegation. And then you get a little bit of pink on the new growth. It's just really, really beautiful. And we got to find somewhere to put this next year, maybe even in the ground. I mean, I want this in the garden every single year. It's stunning. You know, usually this time of year, I'm like ready to pull this planter box and everything just looks so tired. But since we did so much foliage interest this year, it still looks good. And I'm like, we're going to we're going to sweat this box as long as we can before we pull it out for fall, because it is just so beautiful. Now, we might have to start trimming on the potato vine here because it's getting a little crazy. I mean, it's going to be on the sofa here in a couple of days. And I think Brian might have fertilized this once since we've been back from the beach. But we have not kept up on our fertilizer regimen this season. And clearly it didn't matter. These are super happy. So I'm very, very happy with the planter box this year. I think my only thing I would change is we do have the stratosphere white gar here and at the other end. And it just really didn't do anything for us this year. It was in the center right here. And for some reason, it has fallen all the way over to the side. And the past month or so, it just hasn't even been in bloom. So really unfortunate. But otherwise, I mean, the planter box is beautiful. And the supervena is coming back into bloom, getting some purple right here, which is awesome. Now, let's talk about this plant. So this is I think it's a Japanese false nettle. Everyone always asks us what this plant is and neither one of us can ever remember what the name is. But we got this at Plant Delights and we kind of did a little feature of this in our Plant Delights tour that we posted a couple of months ago. And it was not nearly this big last year. I think last year it just had like two little sprigs, almost kind of looked like a coleus. And so we thought, oh, we'll just pop it right here. And now it's huge. Brian has already cut it back once this season. And I think that maybe we should cut it back and take the cuttings and grow some more of them because it's really, really cool. I love the variegation in it and just like such a bright pop in this garden. You know, the entryway garden is a lot of shade. And especially this time of year, you know, everything starts to look really dark. And so I love having this chartreuse green here just to kind of brighten up the area. And, you know, it's really kind of taking over the sidewalk a little bit, which I love. Now, sometimes when we come through here with our gorilla cart, we run over it a little bit. But I really love softening the sidewalk and just kind of narrowing that path. Just makes everything feel so much more lived in. And it feels like the garden was always here and not something we just put in in the past couple of years. All right, so let's look at our second diamond trellis here. So Brian added this one at the same time he did the front. On this trellis, we have a climbing hydrangea and we thought this one was going to take a while to kind of lift up. They're planted kind of behind the fountain here. And I mean, they're very, very happy. This is a really wet area and hydrangeas do love water. And so they've put on a lot of growth. Now, we do need to come in and kind of train them along the trellis here because the back of it's probably already stuck. Yeah, it's kind of sticking. The back of the vine has these little tendrils that just kind of attach to whatever surface it can grab. So eventually we won't care because this whole thing is going to be climbing hydrangea, I'm sure. But starting here at the beginning, I really want to see that diamond pattern. So we've got some work to do there to attach everything. But I can't wait to see that bloom next spring. I think it's going to be really, really pretty. Now, we've got our dining table here, of course. And this container needs to refresh. It's been a hot summer here. And this is like a visual depiction of how I feel right now at the end of summer. This was really pretty. This is a supertunia, I want to say persimmon, but I know that's not it. It's a double supertunia that basically looks like Bordeaux. But it has this double petal in the middle, which is really cool. We've got our collection here from our trip. So we picked up this beautiful lavender topiary here from shop in Birmingham, Alabama. And then we got these two beautiful Campo de Fiore pots at Clay 30A. And I'm still, we haven't figured out what we want to put in these yet, but they do feel really special. And I love, love, love how whimsical this container is. All right. So let's shift this way. This is our first time showing off the parterre on an official garden tour. Welcome. It's looking so beautiful. It was really fun to come home from our trip and have this be here. I mean, I can't ask for a better summer project. Everything is just so full and lush. I mean, the basil is just really going for it. Now, we have lost a couple of things. So there were two lavenders here. We lost one because there's a lot of water there. That one is on its way out as well. So, you know, we're learning this is all kind of new planting, all new irrigation in here. And so it's going to take us a bit of time to kind of learn the clay soil here because it really is different everywhere in this garden. Some areas it's super compacted. And then when you get up in the back corner by the pine tree, it's almost like sand and we can't get anything to hold water up there. It's like super interesting. But the parterre just looks so amazing. And I know it's going to get more and more full as time goes on. The roses, I mean, my gosh, we got to walk over here and take a look at these. So the poet's wife was super beautiful and it dropped like all of its petals yesterday. The Martha Stewart rose. Oh, my gosh. I mean, perfect bloom. There's so many petals in that. I mean, just imagine this next spring when it's covered in blooms, this is going to be insane. And then we have top cream right here, which also has a lot of blooms, not as many petals as Martha Stewart, but it's still really pretty. I'm interested to see next spring if the blooms on that one are going to be bigger. I find that sometimes at the end of the season, roses, while they still might bloom, the blooms are a little bit smaller. So I'm excited to see that one. Then we've got our carding mill here and then check this one out. Oh, my gosh. So this is Loves Me, Loves Me Not from Bloomables. Now, this one has up to 200 petals per bloom and you can see how full it looks. And it just is really striking from far away. That hot pink color. I thought it was going to be too much for this garden, but it just I think it's the right amount of brightness and the bloom is just so, so full. Oh, and it smells amazing. And then here we've got Winchester Cathedral, which is kind of also out of bloom. You know, it's the end of the season. I'm not surprised here, but it's really nice to see some color here in the parterre. Now, behind me, we've got a world of color up here in the Peninsula Garden. We've got Golden Dreams Coleus here. We've got another Cleome. This is Senorita Rosalita. So it's kind of a purpley pink color. And then here we have Mahogany Splendor Hibiscus. Now, this was a late season addition for us. I saw these somewhere. It might have been Yulia, Why Do You Garden, posted about them. And I told Brian, I was like, we got to order some seeds and we got to grow those. And so we started growing them maybe like late May. And then just got them out here in the ground as soon as possible. And my gosh, it's like the coolest foliage texture ever. Our garden has so many foliage interests in it this year, which is so different for us. We're like bloom heavy on everything, I feel like. And it's really fun to just have some areas that are foliage because you don't have to worry about like, is it not going to be in bloom and kind of what you're going to plant around it? It just is like there. And these were, you know, just little twigs when they started, but they continue to branch out over time. And it's just stunning. Now, I don't think this typically flowers. It is just foliage only. And I read that they can get six to ten feet tall and wide. So if we had started these earlier in the season, I fear for how big this would be right now. But it's still really, really pretty. Typically under here, there are Midnight Masquerade Penstemon. And so we love that red color. But by this time of the season, the Penstemon are kind of done, you know? And so we thought, why don't we pop these in there in between and kind of carry us over? Now, we've also got White Wands Veronica here, and this is probably the easiest perennial to grow. It comes up in early spring and you have these beautiful white blooms. And we typically don't cut this one back. But I thought this year, you know what? We've got all this construction down here. I'm tired of seeing the like lanky blooms. And so we cut it back and it kind of didn't do anything for two or three weeks. And I thought, well, that was silly. I shouldn't have done that. But then it took off again and bloomed just like it was early spring. So can't recommend this enough. It's an awesome perennial. And it just kind of carries you through the heat of the summer. Now, as we walk this way along the cottage wall garden, we've got so much growth in here. I mean, I'm just super impressed. Again, you know, as we plant in these new areas, it's kind of a gamble on what the soil is going to be. This was also super compacted. And if you think about it, there used to be a hill here. And so we're technically like a few layers down of soil. But everything is doing really well. I mean, I think we've only lost a couple of things. There was a euphorbia here that I think Brian pulled earlier. But even like the sedum is doing really well. And the nephritis put on a lot of growth. I mean, I'm just super impressed. And this is going to be even better next spring. Once we get some good plant tone on everything and it has a chance to rest for the winter, I think this is going to be super full. And I hope that it kind of caresses the edge of the pathway here. That would make me super, super happy. Now here we have a couple more items that are not doing so hot. So we have our Millbrook blue spruce here. And as I mentioned up front with Monty, blue spruces here are somewhat of a gamble here in the south. Now, Brian's mom has one of these in her garden. Beautiful. She's up in the mountains. They get a little bit more of a break than we do. This one didn't like it here. So that's OK. We'll pull it out. We'll plant something else. And then also our Greensleeves dogwood. You might remember during all of our irrigation issues, this irrigation zone was not working for a few days. And so we kind of lost a little bit of goodness on the dogwood. But it's still alive. I still think we're going to get some really, really pretty fall color from it. And then next year, we'll get to enjoy all those blooms. And it'll be like this never happened. I forgot to mention our wedding rose. Look at this. It just is like blooming all season long. I love it. It's like just when you think it's over, it pushes another flush. And this is just, you know, it's not a David Austin rose. It's not a bloomables. We ordered a David Austin rose for our wedding, actually. And when it arrived, it was dead. But they were really great. They replaced it. But the way that David Austin ships, they can't replace until the next year. And so we had to find something in a hurry. And so we got this just random yellow rose. Beautiful, stunning. If we ever move, we're going to be digging that up and taking it with us because it's really beautiful. So let's keep walking around this way. We've got the Parkland Pillar birches that I mean, I'm just amazed at the growth they have put on since we planted them. And you can see we're getting to the end of the season here. We're starting to get some yellow. These are just going to be pillars of yellow behind me. I mean, can you imagine what that's going to look like? That's going to be so awesome. And then we have our fountain here. Brian has started to put some algaecide in this because, you know, it's a small basin and it seems to get dirty pretty quickly. And so hopefully we can keep this clean. And then underneath, we have swapped out our headcoat lavender for Phenomenal Lavender. If you missed our parterre episode about this, all the folks we talked to in the industry that have planted and gardened here in the South for many, many years said that Phenomenal Lavender is the only one that will survive here in our humidity. And so we took their advice, swapped everything out. Now, I think if this lavender survives, it's going to get really, really big. So this might not be permanent here. We're going to see how it goes for a couple of years. But if we can get this to bloom and have some really pretty purple blooms around the base of this fountain, I mean, that would just be like chef's kiss with the boxwood hedge and the hydrangeas. I mean, that would be awesome. Let's take a look at the Union Garden. Now, something that we experienced with the Union Garden over the years is a difficulty with the soil. So when we first started planting over here, I mean, it was like super hard to dig. It held so much water. And we lost a lot of plants due to overwatering, underwatering. I mean, it's really hard to get that mix right. But the more that we've planted over here, the more that we've used compost as mulch, it has helped everything. And I mean, it is incredibly lush this year. I love that we added the Playing the Blues salvia in here because there's a lot of perennials. We've got Nepeta. We've got I think it's Indiglo Girl salvia in here. And by this point in the season, most of that is done. And so by having the Playing the Blues, we still get a little bit of color late here in the season, which is awesome. And then we've got these iris. So I think these are Siberian iris. And, you know, I wasn't so sure how this was going to work out over here. And the first year that we planted them, the bloom was kind of like a wine color, which is not our color palette over here at all. It is very like lilac-y purple to blue. But they're much lighter this year. And I love the variegated foliage. Like even without the bloom, it adds so much interest. And I really, really like it. They probably need to be dug up and divided at this point. We can just kind of spread them out in here. But I love the interest that it provides. Now we've got our hornbeams on either side and we've got the crabapple here in the middle. Brian has been trimming on this crabapple all summer long, and we cannot tame it. It's like as soon as you trim it, it is shooting out more growth. So that might be like a weekly task for us to come out here and trim on the crabapple. But I do love the formality that it adds here. And the fence is so tall right here. I mean, without these trees, this perennial garden, I think, would feel a little silly. But adding the hornbeams and the crabapple and just kind of having them flat to the fence really helps to draw the eye up. And you almost kind of forget that there is even a fence there. It just feels like a living wall, which is exactly what we wanted. Now, on this side, we've got our... What are these called? Lungworts. And, you know, these typically look like this towards the end of the season. Check out this window box, though. My gosh, it is full with the variegated ivy and the rex begonias. I mean, it's just really, really beautiful. I love having this here. I always wanted a window box outside of my office, and it's just so fun looking out and seeing it with the plants kind of growing up in the window. You feel like you're in nature and it's really nice. We've got our Golden Falls redbud here, which we transplanted earlier this year, and it is doing really well. We were nervous about it for a second because it started dropping a bunch of leaves and you think, uh-oh, this is going to end in disaster. But it took, and we're going to have this beautiful show here of purple blooms in the spring, which is awesome. Now, our hostas look like they have been through a war by this time of year. They're just, you know, the sun moves, you know, as we garden, the sun moves. And this is mostly shade. But as we get to the end of the season, we just get more and more sun on this. And a lot of the times it's hot afternoon sun. And so they just kind of get beat down. But you know what? They just look so pretty for most of the season. We have a hard time removing them and planting something else here. Now, we might have to trim on this. This is, gosh, I said it wrong last time. I think it's amber jubilee nine bark. And I think we're going to have to trim on this. It's getting a little wild. I mean, I knew this would get big, but it's like reaching out into the walk here. But it's got really beautiful spring color and it's got really beautiful fall color. So I do love the interest that it provides. We just might need to tame it up a little bit. All right. Let's head. We'll head back here into the parterre. And as I walk here, you might notice some empty holes. Now, I talked a little bit about the soil and kind of learning this garden for the first time. And what we have learned is that our clay in this area is holding a lot of water. We have lost two of the flowerful hydrangeas. We've pulled this one here out of the hole. And there is water still in the hole from yesterday. That's what we're dealing with here. So we're going to have to probably dig larger holes, get some permatilla in the ground so we have a little bit more drainage. And replant, rebuy some flowerfuls so that we can keep this going. But, you know, this is just kind of how it is when you have a new garden. I would love to say, you know, everything took and it was beautiful and it was wonderful. That's just not the case here. And that's OK. You know what? Gardening is a learning experiment. It's a science experiment. And it's just going to be even better once we get all of the water worked out. Get the proper drainage in here and then we'll have some beautiful flowerfuls next season. So why don't we head up the stairs here? And I want to show you another beautiful rose. Now, this is the star of the show here in our garden. It's like every season this just like pops right here. Part of it is placement, but part of it is just the beauty of the blooms here. So this is Mother of Pearl Rose from Bloomables. And you'll notice that this doesn't have as many petals as some of the other Bloomables roses. But what it lacks in petals, it gives you in this beautiful show over and over and over all season long. I think we have trimmed this maybe once and it just keeps kind of shooting up these new growth points and having more blooms. And then when those are done, it starts over and does it again. And it is just amazing. I doubt we have much smell that. Yeah, there's not a lot of smell this time of the year, but it is so beautiful. And again, as you get to this time of year and things start to look drab and dusty, it's really nice to have certain things in your garden that, you know, are just going to still pop and provide so much interest. I love this rose. So as I'm walking back here, I'm going to try to not get taken over by the Blue Fortune Agastachy. Now, I think there are five plants in here. And the first year they did not get this big. This year, I'm realizing that we probably could have gotten away with like two. There is a little pine tree in here that you can't even see because it's covered up. And then where there isn't Blue Fortune, there is lantana. So there's three lantana plants here. And we planted a lantana last year on the edge right here that kind of stayed like this big. And so we thought, OK, we'll get three more. And here we are. It's huge. But it's beautiful. I mean, I love how there's like a bloom on every single point of the plant. And it's just it's lush. You know, back here, there's coneflowers and daylilies. And by this point of the season, they're kind of done. And so it's nice to have these plants here that are just kind of taking over and continuing the show for us. Right here, we've got probably one of my favorite conifers in the garden. This is the Red Cone Norway Spruce Acricona, and it has put on a lot of growth this year. I was kind of nervous because you can see here maybe that the tip kind of died. And, you know, whenever that happens, I'm like, what's going to happen with the tree now? Like, are we going to find a new leader? And it did. It pushed out a new leader here. And we're getting some more growth. I mean, this is very happy. We've got a lot of luck here with Norway spruces in our garden. So before I move on, I want to talk about this little area, because I don't think you guys have seen this. And there's not a lot to see right here right now. But in the spring, there will be. So we've got more of these double yellow cone flowers. There's five planted in here amongst some purple penstemon. This is a new penstemon from Walters Gardens and Proven Winners. And so we thought that the purple and the yellow would look really, really nice together. Now, I don't know that they will be in bloom at the same time, but we'll see. We'll see how that goes next year. And then we've backed it with some Wicked Witch coleus that I love. I love having this in the garden because it's got that beautiful lime green edge that just kind of makes the dark pop. And then you'll notice the urn has changed. So we planted early this spring. We planted the same recipe in the urn that we put in the planter box. And this urn is hooked up to drip, so we never have to worry about watering it unless that drip doesn't work. And that's exactly what happened. So this irrigation zone was having a lot of issues with our construction this year. And we lost pretty much everything in the urn. And so we thought, let's just pull it, start over. We're going to do something simple. We've got three mangoves in there. They are doing really well. They've been in there for a few weeks now. And the other thing is that it's a pretty shallow basin. Like it looks deep. But thinking about those annuals and how those roots go. I mean, I think it was just one big root ball and you lose a day of watering and it's like, poof, you're you're losing plants left and right. So that's also a learning lesson for us next year to maybe plant light in the urn if we're going to do a bunch of annuals. So here we've also got a really cool canna. So this is a canna that Brian's mom gave us. And what I really liked about it was it's got this kind of dark stripe along some of the leaves. And then the blooms are kind of all different. Like sometimes when they come out, they're yellow. Sometimes they have a little bit of red in them. And it's kind of like a fun surprise here in the garden. And this is actually tall enough now that you can see the bloom all the way from the deck. And so it just added another nice layer here in the garden. There is a blue chiffon Rose of Sharon there that is finally getting tall enough where we can actually see it. I mean, I feel like it was like two feet tall for years. And now this year it's putting on some growth, which is awesome. We've got the Niagara Falls grass. We've got some rudbeckia in here. And these rudbeckia were planted like way back there and they have slowly migrated to the front, which I mean, I don't mind. Like there are certain areas of the garden where we're both like, yeah, like, come on, take over. You can have this area and the other areas where we might want to pull some of these. But it's looking really great, especially under this tree. So this tree here, I don't think that we've talked about this on our channel before. We planted this early this spring. So this is a Japanese tree lilac. And this has a beautiful, beautiful white blooms in the spring. And it's on the cusp for us here in Zone 8A. So I think this goes to a Zone 7B. And Charlotte is really like on the line between seven and eight. And so we're going to push it. We're going to try it. It's making it so far this year. We'll see if it actually blooms for us next spring. And if it does, I mean, this is going to be like a beautiful addition to this garden. So as we come along this way. Oh, look, Hanna and Jobert anemone are starting to bloom. This is the sign, you guys. This is a sign that fall is on its way. When the anemones start to pop, it's over. It's time for us to move on to fall. And I'm certainly ready for it. So there's a couple of anemone on this side. And then there's some others kind of mirrored on the other side where the second bench is. And if you've never planted anemone before, they just kind of take over an area. So we're hopeful that this will kind of just take over this little spot right here and we'll get some nice fall interest back here because there are three roses that we planted early this spring that have not put on a ton of growth. But our thought is that if the roses are done by this time of the year, the anemones will take over and we'll still have some interest back here by the benches. So we've got our benches from Oceanic Teak. This is this is called the banana bench. And we've got two of them. So we've got one here and one on the other side. And I was unsure about the shape when Brian showed it to me. I'm always a skeptic when Brian has a project, but we agreed that it would work and it really does mimic like we have this curve of the boxwood here and then we have the opposite curve of the bench and it just works. I love having the benches back here. This is in mostly shade all day. Like you get some morning sun, but for the rest of the day, you're really in the shade. So it's nice. Like when you come out and it's bright, bright sun, you can come back here and sit and just look out on the garden and still see everything, which is awesome. We've got our these are Sprinter boxwoods here. We planted these. Gosh, it's probably been four or five years now. And they were like little bitty plants. And they are finally making their way into a hedge. And they've put on a lot of growth this year. I mean, Brian cut them back pretty hard so that we'd be able to see the hydrangeas, but they've still put on a lot of growth. I want them to all touch. I want it to be like one big hedge. And we're really close to getting there. So as we make our way around to the shade corner here, there's not a ton of blooms this time of year. But another thing that we're seeing is this bright pop of this Everio grass. So this is a Carex from Southern Living Plant Collection. And we planted it here kind of amongst some heuchera. And there's a lot of hellebores in here. But it is really just like a bright pop in a dark spot. And that's one thing that we love to do in the garden. As I mentioned up front in the entryway garden in here is when you've got a really dark spot, it's nice to pop with a little bit of that chartreuse yellow. Now, back here, the show is about to start with our oakleaf hydrangeas. So, of course, the oakleaf hydrangeas bloom in the summer. And those blooms are beautiful. But one of my favorite things is the show in the fall. So here in probably another two or three months, all of this foliage that you see right here is going to turn like a bright burgundy red. And it's going to be such a nice feature. It's one of the best things about oakleaf hydrangeas. Like, of course, we love the blooms, but we also love the fall color. And that's really one of the reasons why we planted it back here. So we have this whole corner of red now behind me on the pine tree. You will notice that we've got a lot of poison ivy again. We had our arborist remove all the poison ivy. I mean, it went all the way up to the top. And that was from before we even bought this house. He cut the poison ivy last year. We let it die for a whole year. And then they came back this year and pulled it. And it is starting to take over again. So Brian is incredibly allergic. I am not allergic or so we think. And so once it cools off here, I'm going to suit up long sleeves, pants, goggles, cover like every piece of exposed skin. And I'm just going to come out here and pull it all off again because we don't get a start on it. It's going to take over again. And then we'll we're going to lose this pine tree. And we love looking at the bark, too. Like, I want to see the bark. And it's covering it all up. So that's a task that we've got to do here pretty soon. Now, right here, we've got the Mikawa Yatsubusa, Japanese maple. And, you know, this kind of looks a little flat this time of year. But once we get into fall, this is going to have a really beautiful show. And right behind it, there is a zebra grass that really just kind of sat there for many, many years. And I feel like it's finally getting big enough. Now, as the tree grows, we might have to move the grass depending on how fast the tree grows. It might kind of shade it out. But I love seeing the combination together right now because the the foliage on the Japanese maple is so pointy. And then the grass being striped just kind of makes it all pop together. It's really, really nice. Here we have one of our last standing hydrangea blooms. So this is Tough Stuff Aha. And it has decided here at the end of the summer, it's going to do one more flush before we're done. So we get this kind of nice, airy bloom from the Tough Stuff Aha's. And there's a couple more buds down here, too, that have yet to pop. Now, I've done really good with my soil acidifier on this one because we've got mostly blue blooms back here, which is our goal. Typically, there's also some mahogany splendor hibiscus planted back here. Now, something I've noticed, Brian, I don't know if you caught this, but these seem to be more just like straight up. They're not branching as much as the ones up by the wall. And I think maybe these aren't getting as much sun. And so they're just kind of stretching. They're still cool, though. I still like having it here in the garden. Here we have another blue conifer that I love. This is our Horseman Blue Atlas Cedar. And we planted this a few years ago. And, you know, typically, I think you're supposed to kind of just let these go and have their wild nature. We did have a stake on it for a couple of years just to kind of get us a little bit more straight vertical growth. And then this year we took that off and we're just going to let it go. I think it's super cool. And I love how airy it is. Like, obviously, we love blue spruces. We've got so many here in the garden now. But blue spruces, you know, typically have that pyramidal shape and they can kind of block this. I feel like you can still see through it, but you still get that blue color, which is really, really nice. And it pops like even from far away on the deck. It's a really, really nice touch. As we go along here, we've got our Nepeta here that has seen better days. You know, but when you get to the end of the season, Nepeta is just kind of done. It's just one of those perennials, you know, you're going to have some die out. And that's OK. Usually in the spring, it comes back full force. And it's it's beautiful. So I don't mind this at the end of the season. Right here, we've got this golden celebration rose that is being take over, taken over by morning glories. I think it's time. I think it's time for us to part ways with the golden celebration rose. It is lovely. I love the bloom color. I love the scent. But the growth habit is just not meant for us. It is too wild. So we're going to figure out something else for this spot has suggestions. Let us know in the comments. Yellow would be really good here, but we're open to other colors. We have the there's a hot pink spirea here. And then on the other side, there is an idea that blooms white. So something to fill up this area here. And maybe it's multiple things. I don't know. We'll see how big the area is once we pull these roses out. And then as we walk down here, we've got the caryopteris is finally in bloom. This is another sign of the end of the summer for me is when the caryopteris is in full bloom. You know that we're approaching fall. And I love how the bees are attracted to this. It really has like an iridescent purple color, which is really, really nice. And then the Joe Pye weed. Oh, my gosh. I don't think we anticipated this getting this big. Now, this is supposed to be little Joe Joe Pye weed, and it is not little Joe. It is medium to almost large Joe. Now, standard Joe Pye weed gets like, I don't know, seven, eight feet tall. We're definitely not there, but this is big and it's pretty. But now it's like flopping. So I don't know what we're going to do with this here. Maybe we should move this somewhere else. This is really cool. And then we've got hydrangeas blooming underneath. And then here, let's talk about this, because we haven't shown this yet in an official tour. So previously, the peninsula kind of rounded here and we had grass from this area all the way down to the patio. During our parterre construction, we kind of made a game time decision to just take all the grass out here and make this part of the garden. And I think it was a really, really good choice. You can see we've already added in some cone flowers here. We've got another boxwood on the other side just to kind of mirror here as you enter the garden. And this is going to be another area for us to just fill up with beautiful things and make it feel kind of lush. And then it's going to create more of our room back in the back because we're just kind of blocking that view even more. I'm excited to see how this space kind of changes over the years and what we decide to plant here. Now, we did add sod grass here as we finished the parterre and it took for a little bit, but now it has died. So it's almost time for us to reseed our fescue grass here, which is typical for North Carolina. By the time you get to this time of the year, I mean, it is done. It is finished. So this will be a nice green path here shortly. And then we'll have some beautiful things planted on either side of the path here. All right, folks, that is it for our August garden tour. Thank you so much for joining us on the walk today. If you're not subscribed to our channel, make sure you click that subscribe button down below so that you get all of our gardening content all season long from our garden to yours. We'll see you soon. Bye.