roses

The roses are blooming--at least the few that I have left. My once spectacular collection of roses has shrunk through the years. I'm going to either lose those that I have left or have to start spraying. I've tried companion planting (with garlic), but they still end up with horrible powdery mildew and being eaten by seemingly every little bug that exists. The Japanese beatles have been brutal, getting worse every year. If I start spraying, I can go back to having lovely, pristine roses, but I really, really hate using chemicals.

I have finally been able to find some weeding help, so there is hope that I may catch up with the weeding this year. It couldn't have worked out more perfectly (unless of course, my child really stuck with the weeding as she had planned), as he's from our animal lib group. He's a wonderful, bright veg college student who loves gardening and working outside. He's done a good job at clearing the front garden this weekend. He's almost halfway through!

I even managed to steal a little time this afternoon to do some weeding, though I probably should have been working on one of my many undone house chores or doing some programming for my contract job.

I had planned a much different blog post for tonight, but once I got started, I found I was too mentally lazy to write that post. I've been pretty busy all day, and it seems that sitting down with my computer has put a sleeping spell on me. I feel like I've been drugged and just need to sleep. No time for that now, but my more interesting post will have to wait for a day that I'm more ambitious.