Semps and Hens and Chicks…Oh My!

It’s halfway through August!

How has the summer passed by so swiftly? The Sedum “Autumn Joy” is so full of its green buds and I will welcome the pinkish tinge which will be developing, but I don’t want the summer to be over yet. I haven’t even gone on vacation!  But who am I kidding? This year it’s just such a stressful time for school to start and a season of change. Gotta bring plants inside…(groan.)

I can hardly believe all the work that I intended to get done……and a lot of it is still waiting on me. I must get it taken care of before the summer ends. Even succulents and sedum need a little upkeep. 

The days are passing swiftly and I know I will soon start seeing those blog posts about “How to get your garden ready for fall.”  Or “What are the chores for the September garden.”

I have to take advantage of the wonderful warm weather while it is still here.

And that means making more hypertufa! Lots more! Before it is too cold.

 

 Today I will show you some of my daughter’s troughs and bowls that we’ve made. Her hypertufa pots and bowls are doing very well. She had a lot of sunshine, but had a large porch overhang (at her old house) which protects her containers from suffering from the most intense burning sun.  Even though these succulent plants like it hot and dry, extremes of any kind will stress them.

And we want them to be bountiful and multiply……..so we have more to plant……therefore the need to make more hypertufa! It is a never ending circle. But my plants have obliged and are sprouting and making me lots of babies.

 

I am so glad that Jennifer loves these troughs as much as I do. She makes them with me when she gets a chance.

My daughter is a full time working mother and I just don’t know how parents manage in these modern days. My grandson will be in seventh grade this coming school year, and just getting him through homework is a struggle.

So I do enjoy when she has time to make the troughs with me. And she comes up with some wonderful ideas for me too!  You know I like to think outside the box!

Hens and Chicks Are Thriving

We have had a hot and humid summer this year. Terribly hot, then cooling off for a time, but also a lot of rain. It has been hard to get out in the garden sometimes since the rain comes most days.

Some of these sempervivum seem to be so loaded with blossoms that they are cascading down the sides of the hypertufa pots and other planters. I think it really gives them a nice look. I see they are blooming all along the stalk that forms. I am not sure if that is typical, but I like it.

These little pink flowers are really pretty and have an intense color. Pollinators are attracted to them. My daughter has these hypertufa planters and some other urns on a paved area with soil and gravel as the base. She is hoping for seed to drop down into those cracks and fill them with more hens and chicks. I hope it will do that too!

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 I really love the shapes on these hypertufa planters. They are so different. I need to get those molds out and make more. I think they would be very popular at our fundraiser sale in the spring for our Greene County Master Gardeners. It happens every May. I would be so ahead of the game if I got all those donations ready  early. You know how busy it gets in the springtime!

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And I have to include more of my troughs too. This sempervivum or Hens and chicks bloomed so “fully” that I  hope to have many more baby chicks in the gravel around it. I will have so many more troughs to load up!

I hope you will have a great day.  Another week is half over.  Leave me a comment and remember to visit the Facebook Page too!