Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. Getting lost in the intricate lace fairyland of the hydrangea blooms…
I love how a garden changes every day, season, and year.
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. One of my writing nooks. We also have lessons and picnics here…in the shade of the cream umbrella. The lavender and cleomes circle this garden. We renovated the gardens last year. Previously a lawn, this space is now full of flowering trees, perennial flowers, and herbs. Plant seeds of goodness for pollinators. It heals all. We even have some tomatoes up here, as it is the sunniest area of the garden.
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. Weeding a bit today, and I got my first ever bee sting, right through my glove! Not too bad…just put some ice on it. Bees love me…ever since I was little…they loved to explore my golden curly hair and just hang out… My Nonna used to say it’s because they think I’m a flower. I love that idea, and I paint flying pollinators into all of my stories. I always sat calmly with them, and then they’d move onto something with pollen. I must have tread on a nest. Sorry, little friends! Nature tells us important things. Listen. I usually do leave the ‘weeds’ as they’re a helpful part of the garden, but we do have some rather aggressive imposter vines that take over and under the garden. I do minimal editing and pruning. Plants have their own design plans. It’s fun to learn of their endless stages. Also, any broken or old pieces are just left in the garden to become a natural compost. After making the pathways last summer, the cleomes seeded everywhere, which is the intent, but a few had to be moved out of the gravel and back into the soil. These rhodies were quite ill when we moved in, so we cut them back hard and now they are full up with new green lovely leaves. They form a nice border hedge and create privacy with a dense leafy depth and height. Blooms next year, I’d expect. In pink!
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. I adore these mixed plant tangles… They’d make a gorgeous textile print. This one is mostly: Queen Anne’s Lace/Wild Carrot, Thyme, Sage, Salvia, Vinca, Clover, Anise… Babies love these little fairy nests.
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. The incredible Blazing Stars have just bloomed…grown from scattered seeds. Easy as tossing them into the bed. There are hundreds and the wildlife love them. Such fancy feathery dresses!
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. The front herb patch went wild this year, but we love to watch the pollinators favour this swaying sea of lace in the breeze so I will only tame it back a bit next year. The new kitchen looks out onto this stone garden that we made a few years ago. There was a bed of overgrown shrubs, too close to the house, and a paver pathway. We took everything out, painted the house a warm heavy cream, and made space for more meadow wildflowers and three Japanese boxwoods. The pathway was removed and recycled into the back pathway. We made a stone wall, new pathways, and steps. Soon, a mudroom door will go nearby. We have the kitchen door here, too. Little gardeners can pick some fresh sage for dinner! I am working on some lace-like snowflake/floral design stencils in the front doorway, which I will post about when finished.
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. Many greens…living together. Permaculture matters. Everything depends upon the next and the one before. Replace lawns and pollutive machines with native plants that form a perennial carpet to keep you cool, hydrated, and full of life!Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. Every window has a view of the garden! Wake up to nature, go out and converse with her, learn how to be peaceful, bid her a good slumber and get ready for bed… Sustainable life cycles for: you, wildlife, the anti-pollution layers of fungi in the soil, the air, water, and for all plants who connect in their own language and routines. Tread softly in nature. We are the visitors of the earth, be gentle.
Amor Milagre Organic Cottage Garden Design. Grow flowers from seeds to self-seed and spread each year! I love these large areas of various wildflowers. In the wind, the whole garden is alive and dancing. Drought-tolerant is the way to go with climate change, and we have always just let the rain water the garden. The plants grow stronger this way, and you can enjoy doing other things you love.
New blooms are coming soon…
Love to all of the bees who warn us to be more gentle.
Without you, I cannot think what we’d be. ~ Amor Milagre
