Dahlias, Day Lilies, Butterfly Weed, and Hot Peppers

Yellow dahlia: Copyright © Phyllis Wheeler, 2015

Happy floral Friday and welcome to "this week in my Maryland garden!" I took these photos right after a heavy rain. Raindrops on flower petals make them even more beautiful.

Bicolor day lily duo: Copyright © Phyllis Wheeler, 2015

 These pretty ruffled day lilies have a nice bright center that's like a floral smile.

First butterfly weed flowers: Copyright © Phyllis Wheeler, 2015

To support the monarch butterfly population, we bought three butterfly weed plants this year and they're finally blooming. I have yet to see a butterfly on them but am hopeful.

Sights of Summer dahlia: Copyright © Phyllis Wheeler, 2015

Our sights of summer dahlia was the most expensive tuber we bought this year and the last to bloom. But it's flowers are beautiful and large so worth the wait.  

Ben's hot peppers: Copyright © Phyllis Wheeler, 2015

I started three different types of hot pepper plants from seed for my husband in late winter but once we planted them in spring, rabbits kept eating them. So he decided to get some already large ones from the store. His store bought ones are producing nicely but my seed started ones are still at the flowering stage (note to self - next year put up some rabbit fencing around the pepper seedlings). I hope the ones I started from seed do produce some peppers eventually but he's pretty glad that he bought the larger plants and can pick peppers as needed.

Thank you for visiting! May God bless you today and always!

Related posts:
Cat smelling a dahlia: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2013/08/cat-enjoys-my-first-dinner-plate-dahlia.html
Dazzling dahlias: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2013/10/delightful-dahlia-close-up-photos.html
Giant dahlias: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2014/08/four-dahlias-and-dianthus-for-floral.html
2012's peppers: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2012/06/bright-blooming-flowers-and-tiny.html

Bright Blooming Flowers and Tiny Peppers: This Week in My Maryland Garden

This is my favorite of our garden's day lilies. I think it's an "El Dorado" day lily and we got it from a catalog many years ago. We originally purchased six. One died in the first winter. The rest had survived until this spring's excavation but I won't know for sure how many we have know until all the day lilies have bloomed this year (in our hurry to save our plants we didn't have the time to tag them). Right now it looks like we have three survivors. If you like day lilies you can see a whole bunch of beautiful photos here.

I've been trying to get a decent photo of our red and yellow bicolor dahlia since we planted it but this is the best so far. It wasn't labeled as a dwarf plant but it's only about six inches high so I think that's what we got. The flowers are pretty enough that I don't mind though. You can see our yellow dahlia here.

I'm not sure why blogger isn't letting me put any words between the cosmos and pepper plants (could be the problem is with me and not blogger though for all I know) but this is an open bloom on the orange cosmos we grew from seed. You can see the first not quite opened bloom here and the whole plant in context here.

Next up is my husband's miniature pepper plants. He knows what kind of peppers they are but I don't. They're cute though. He has two of these plants.

Last week I posted a photo of our blue hydrangea and here's one that seems to be undecided as to whether it's going blue or pink. I thought the raindrops on the petals were pretty.

Although eventually I'll do a separate post about this (when I have more posts up) I'd love to introduce you to my newest blog, the benign neglect gardening journal. It's part garden journal, part tips and tricks on saving money, effort and the environment while enjoying your garden. Here's the link: http://bngardening.blogspot.com/.

May God bless you and may your gardening (physical and proverbial) be fruitful!