Mitch McConnell Don't Know the Words To "My Old Kentucky Home"

Mitch it's your state song. You sure you can find your way back to Kentucky without help?

Hillbilly Report:: Is this the man we want representing us?

Hillbilly Report:: Is this the man we want representing us?

Man have I been neglecting my blog or what. Sorry about that I wont let it happen again. I was having so much fun on my patio that I forgot to let you see it. Well never fear I documented it all. This year it's been so nice out that I've already got a lot of my plants out. My herbs from last year came back and I've worked with seeds more this year because of the early start.

It's been kind of unseasonably warm here this year. It's not even the middle of May and I've already got blooms on my tomato plants. But I digress, let me show you some of what I did last year.

These are my coleus. I got a variety pack of colors and planted them randomly in an approximately 18" wide pot. I love coleus because of their diverse color scheme and they worked out well with what I had planed on doing with the patio as you will see in my next picture.








This is how they looked after about 6-8 weeks. You would not believe the pictures I got last year. I just love the colors in this picture.
The purple grass in front is one of my favorites. It's tassel are purple then it drys to a soft tan color. The blades of grass are streaked with purple.
Then you have the contrast of green from the banana trees in the back ground and the red geranium. Nature is beautiful.






If you give coleus plenty of food and sun shine they will reward you handsomely. The trick to growing nice bushy coleus is pruning the center. If you will periodically prune the top four leaves of each individual shoot. What I'm saying is that once the plant has developed sufficiently to produce at least four leaves at the tip with some leaf starts just below them, trim the top four with the stalk, and the ones underneath will multiply your foliage.





You know, the fun thing is I probably had no more than$20.00 dollars invested in those pictures. I had the pots and if you short on pots you can find really nice ones at yard sales and some areas, such as Louisville, have what is a day that certain areas fo town can dispose of large waste and items that are not normally picked up as trash. People throw pots out all the time. A few dollars for the coleus. The banana trees are off a plant someone gave me years ago and will reproduce like rabbits if you treat em right so they didn't cost anything either. Really the purple grass was the most expensive thing and the two of them probably cost me ten dollars. So you see you can have a really nice garden no matter where you live.

The Flowers I had...

I really didn't intend to have all that many flowers this year. But as it turned out I didn't do all that bad. I buy most of my plants for pots on my patio but if a plant comes back the next year I like to try and plant them in the yard somewhere. These Daisey's are a perfect example. I had them both in pots last year, so this year they are in the yard to stay.



















I am terrible with names if anyone knows the name of this flower please leave a comment but I love it. I've had it for four years now and it only blooms in the spring. The blue flowers in front are Sage.













My Irises are always a springtime treat. I just love the rich velvet blue colors they seem to flow at times.

























The nasturtiums were so vivid in color. Prominent orange and red the colors liven up any salad. They have a slight peppery taste that goes good with a poppy seed dressing

















Last but not least my Portalucas or Moseroses as some would call them. You'll notice in this one that a bee is inside one of the flowers gathering pollen.



Not to bad huh?

Sorry everyone I guess I kind of got side tracked. Things have really been growing on the patio as you can see. The Banana trees have done great as usual I have a nice little grove, and to think that a friend of mine gave me the first one four years ago and it has produced all of these. I've also given some away, so as you can tell, all you have to have is the initial tree and some patients and you could have a patio banana grove also.

My Nasturtiums have loved the bigger pot I put them in. The flowers are so good to eat with a salad. I even eat them by themselves at times.To me there's nothing like being able to enjoy the fruits of your garden. I don't have any fresh pictures but I planted some green beans cucumbers and carrots in my back garden. We've had several meals off the beans and a few cucumbers so far. The carrots are about right so it wont be long for them. I've just been experimenting so far this year, next year I hope to really be able to eat out of my garden.




My herbs are my pride and joy this year my Rosemary came back and she has really produced. I've trimmed it back a few times already I'm hoping to be able to keep this one at least another year.







This Tarragon I've had for three summers now it's a French herb, I use it some for cooking, specially poultry.








Basil, another of my favorites. My best friend came over this past weekend and I gave him all my leaves off this plant. He makes a great Pesto sauce from them and I'll get a share.





Now this is oregano. I also have some Thyme, Sage, St Johns Wart and other herbs growing around the house. Several nice things about herbs. 1) the majority of them are perennials meaning they will come back year to year 2) they are very useful, my Chamomile I use to make tea other herbs I use in cooking and they all have a fragrance all their own. I love to just run my hands over them to smell the aromas.

For starters

When we first moved into this house we already had the 24x24 patio with the privacy fence so the hard part was done already but what I needed was some way to elevate my plants to get the most from the area I had. I decided to go with a five step riser and 2x8 steps. This was the most expensive part of the project but it was a one time cash outlay and it has been well worth the investment.

I was able to find a couple risers at an old construction site plus a friend had a couple so they didn't cost me anything. The 2x8s were treated lumber and more expensive than regular 2x8s. I got 10, 8foot long ones and that cost me about $45.00 plus a box of deck screws (galvanized)and some water sealant it ended up costing me in the neighborhood of about $75.00 total.

I put the risers up two on each side of the fence then put the 2x8s on. I cut the 45 deg angles on the steps and placed them on the risers before I cut the ends off. This way I was sure that they would be even and all I had to do was take my circle saw and trim them once I got done. I used deck screws to fasten the whole thing together as they are easy to use and if you have to take the project down they are easy to remove as well. Now everything's in place to start planting. I would advise though that you treat the lumber, risers and all, with a good water seal to protect against water damage because it will see a lot more water than what mother nature provides.

Now what do I grow?

I already had some house plants to start with so I used them to decorate the risers. I'd wanted to make this more than just a flower garden, I wanted to produce something useful but you have to be careful, just like anything else living your plants grow and take up more and more space, what may seem sparse in the spring could over grow themselves by August if your not careful, so don't let your enthusiasm overload you. I stared out with some peppers, Jalapeno, Habanero, Cayenne etc etc. I've grown about five different varieties at one time. Of course these plants are seasonal and you have to replenish them every year so I decided to try some herbs as well, these are perennial and will come back each year. Thyme, Oregano, Basil are good ones because they are hardy and easy to grow. As you can tell I added some decorative plants and flowers to fill in but this was what it looked like in 2006. I've since gravitated to more eatable plants. Mose roses, or Portulaca is a good flowering plant to have, it has beautiful colors and is very hardy. Coleus is a good one for color also. I'll get more into the particular plants next installment. I hope this has given you some helpful ideas, gardening is fun so go on get your hands dirty.

Get Ready for this.

I have out done myself this year. Now I'm working on the chronology. I want to take you through step by step and show what I've done to my back patio so that you can do the same next year. Cool huh?

Be patient don't go away I'll, be back promise.



Here look at this till I get back.