I have the thumb of green, passed down from the love of generations. With that I've come to understand the truest gift of the garden is sharing. I have been very blessed to have the sharing bug deep within my being. I love to give babies from my garden to someone that either has just started a garden, or doesn't yet have the newest color of flowers.
Thanks to my family and friends I have many beautiful colors in the garden. I greatly appreciate all the freebies I have gotten through the years from just sharing. I still remember every plant and where we got them.
Our biggest garden is the Iris bed, it runs along a dirt road that circles the very back part of the RV Park we live in. The bed itself is three tiered. Two of the tiers are filled to the brim with our Iris'. These beds are forty feet long and two feet deep. The third tier is the retaining wall that makes up the lower garden.
With the exception of a few new colors over the years, this garden was all free. The great thing about Iris' is that they have babies constantly. All the books I have read about plants throughout the years has said every three years Iris' need to be thinned. Not so in our garden, we have to thin them every year or they push themselves out of the beds.
We keep two of each to replant and give the rest away. That is still way too many to try to find homes for, so sometimes I sell them to the nurseries in the area. Last year I gave away somewhere in the area of five hundred Iris', and still ended up selling another two hundred and that is after replanting the two from each plant. They have always been a great return on the money we put out on them. Every few years I see a color I just have to have and Wayne makes sure we get it ! One year for my birthday he bought one that was twenty dollars for one rhizone, a lot to pay for just one. This year the RED AT NIGHT Iris, gave us so many babies, I was able to give six of them away and still planted several in other beds.
When we give special ones like that away it brings, not only us but the people that receive them , a joy like no other. Iris Alley, again this year, will be filled with so many colors, some from the very first Iris we were given so many years ago. We await each one like it's the first flower ever to bloom, anticipating the sweetness and beauty, marvel in the perfection of the standards and falls.
So, come in the spring, see the beauty of the poor mans orchid, take some photos, leave some memories, we welcome visitors.
I will leave you with some photos of last years Iris blooms...ENJOY
Time for the Prompt tease....FIRST AND LAST
Hope to see you joining in too
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ENJOY
JL&B
