Wanted: Green Thumb

My grandmother has a green thumb. Granny Dorie would prefer to be outside, in her garden than inside..any day! Me, I absolutely prefer to be cleaning my baseboards and scrubbing tile and hardwood on my hands and knees in the air-conditioning rather than pulling weeds, dead-heading flowers and fertilizing in the heat. However, in my imagination and dreams, I would love to have the beautiful flowers that Southern Living makes look so easy.

I do fairly well with the easier classifications of flowers (however, I did just kill 3 wave petunias after only one month...what could be easier to care for than a wave petunia).

When we moved into our house after getting married, Bill went a little over-board with western cedar. As most know, Bill built the house while I planned the wedding. He did an absolutely wonderful job and since our house is the smallest in the neighborhood, he decided to give it some "curb appeal." So, we have beautiful western cedar window boxes, beautiful western cedar planters on the front porch and western cedar shutters that completely set our house apart (oh, and don't forget the western cedar arbor in the backyard that he built me for our first anniversary).

So fast-forward to each spring of our married life. Each spring I get my April copy of Southern Living and get my inspiration for the window boxes and planters. Every year is different and I spend hours at the local nursery picking out the perfect combination with the idea that, by chance, the editors of Southern Living are going to drive by Fairview and put me on the cover of the May issue!!!

Each year, I am so excited about my flowers. I have all the right tools. All the right potting soils. Fertilizers, check! I go to planting these beautiful combinations of beautiful flowers. One year my theme was pink and yellow. The next was purple and white. This year, it is red, white and yellow.

With the visions of being a May (or even June) cover story for SL, I go to work. I transfer and plant. Fertilize. Water. Dead-head. Water some more. For about two weeks. And then it gets hotter. And I get tired of watering. And the excitement of being a cover story diminishes. And the dead-heading starts to seem that every flower is dead. So by late July, everything is brown and I head to the backyard to dump my flowers and potting soil and hope for a better year next year.

However, this year "was" going to be different! I am embarrassed to say how much I spent at the nursery this spring. I won't ever tell, but just know that I justified it by saying that our return would be in when the heavenly rays shone from heaven on our flowers and buyers flocked to our house to pay more than the asking price! (Remember, our house is on the market and we are moving on to the next house with all the western cedar of this house, plus front porch posts...will someone let me know if western cedar is out of style!)

I chose some harder classifications of flowers this year because I wanted the eyes to be drawn to the house. I never have done well with geraniums. For me, simply, they are high-maintenance. My mom has said, "Don't get their leaves wet because they will turn yellow," "Don't over water them, wait until the soil is a little dry and then give them a big drink of water...this is when they bloom." I think that is a needy flower and what about the poor flowers next to them that have to wait 2 days to get a drink of water...maybe that's why my petunias have already croaked! And to know that I spent so much on these high maintenance flowers. The pressure is on to keep these flowers alive until the house sells.

So, in conclusion, I need a green thumb. I have to help these flowers survive past July. As I sit in my comfy "computer chair" looking out the window at my dead petunias and happy geraniums, I wonder if anyone will ever look beyond all the western cedar of the new house and notice if I go to silk flowers next spring!!!

I'm going to dead-head and fertilize!

P.S. As you can see from the video below, Claire did not inherit the green thumb either. She is not helping my mission of healthy and happy flowers!