We gardeners are like farmers. Every morning it’s the same question,

“What’s the weather?”

Every year is a different growing season.

2012 too dry — my most important job — keep the watering system working.

2013 it’s too wet — just TRY to keep the weeds down.

I have a hill 100 ft long by 20ft high filled with perennials – and weeds. Now, on July 1, I’m about halfway across the hill with weeding, Preening, and chipping. And I’m ahead of most years.

I try to hire someone from the nearby high school to help, but there is no teen in the 2013 generation who wants this job. Besides, I truly enjoy the feeling of accomplishment when I do it myself.

Oh, I don’t do it totally alone. Do you?

My husband, the critique king of my writing, is the shovel man and the muscle for pulling out the little Poplar and Sumac trees that take root and show up between the Hydrangea and the Hibiscus. And he’s actually become quite the horticulturist when it comes to remembering the names of plants.

Are you a Master Gardener who knows all the names?

Send me a reply and let me know you gardeners out there can relate to this one — the delight I find in the hours of communing with nature. I sit on my garden stool, breathe the soft summer breeze and listen to bird calls as I pull creeping Charlie from between the Sedum in my little rock garden at the foot of the hill.

Gloves, long pants, and long sleeved shirt are needed on other parts of the hill due to the poison ivy. Do you have this problem, too? My whole body responds in a big way if I touch the beast. And since my hill is actually in the middle of a wooded area there is no getting rid of it. Just have to pull out the stems at the beginning of gardening season.

Right now, on July 1,  I wish that gardening season was all year ‘round. But then by the end of September (about the time Mr. Trumpet Flowers and Ms. Naked Lady Lilies start blooming) I’m ready for a rest. Here in Wisconsin our rest is a little too long (end of October until first week in May). By May my heart is giggling at new green beginnings, the wall of daffodils, and tulips by the front door and mail box. And my fingers itch to be in the dirt. How about you?

Come visit again in a couple of weeks when we can discuss wood nymphs we hear in the garden, little Shrews who burrow there, baby birds coaxed from the nest and my Cat Bird who comes to visit.

Leave a reply about how you enjoy your flower garden and your name will be entered in the drawing for a copy of Emma’s Garden, A Jessica Tyson Mystery to be announced in August.

Emma is living proof of my belief, “You can’t raise flowers and children at the same time.”

Fiona McGier is the winner of The Queen Anne Fox from my June blog drawing.