For the 2,500th time...

For the 2,500th time...

Blogging With a shared love of gardening

These tulips keep coming back!

Dear Readers,

For the 2,500th time, I am posting on my blog to share with you a bit of my garden.

I've been thinking for a few days about what I should write for this particular milestone post.  Should I post as normal and just mention at the end, "Oh, by the way, this is the 2,500th post"?

Or maybe I should write a retrospective post with links back to some

Dear Readers, Thank you!

Dear Readers, Thank you!

Blogging With a shared love of gardening

Palm trees in Pasadena

I've just returned from the Garden Writers Association's annual symposium in Pasadena, California, which is about as much fun as a garden writer can have, outside of being covered in one's own garden dirt after a day of gardening.

Just imagine if you were with all kinds of other people from all over who shared your passion for gardening, nature, gardens, flowers, plants

Dear Andrea, Thank you for your hospitality

Dear Andrea, Thank you for your hospitality

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Andrea,

Thank you so much for the wonderful tour of the Elizabeth Lawrence garden and house, maintained by the Wing Haven Foundation.

The garden looked wonderful, and full, and one could just imagine how pleased Elizabeth herself would be with it right now. Though the crinums and camellias weren't in bloom your descriptions helped me imagine what it must be like when they are in bloom,

Dear Jo Ellen, Do you remember?

Dear Jo Ellen, Do you remember?

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Jo Ellen,

I was thinking back this evening to when I attended my first Garden Writers Association symposium back in "the aughts", as in '09, and remembered that is the year I met you in person.

Two years before my first GWA meeting, I met Mary Ann from Boise, Idaho at the first Garden Bloggers' Fling in Austin, Texas. She suggested I join GWA and go to one of the symposiums.  Wait, I

Dear Cindy, How hot is it today?

Dear Cindy, How hot is it today?

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Cindy,

Greetings from the Hoosier State where we've been enjoying some rather mild weather these last few weeks.  And by mild I mean I don't think we got to 80F today.

Even for us, that's unusual in August.  How hot is it where you are, on your Corner of Katy down in Texas?  You mentioned in your last bloom day post you were desperate for rain and then I saw you posted after that about

Dear Layanee, It's been too long...

Dear Layanee, It's been too long...

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Layanee,

I was looking at your blog, Ledge and Gardens, this evening thinking about how it has been too long since you wrote a new post.

Poke, poke.

Well, actually, it hasn't been that long, but before the last post it was several months! I know, I know. You've been busy traveling to England to see gardens with good friends and family.  I'm envious of you, because I know it wasn't your

Dear Robin, I love that you are blogging again

Dear Robin, I love that you are blogging again

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Robin,

Welcome back!  I love that you are blogging again on your Bumblebee blog.   The new design is quite nice, too. Well done, but not over done, which is how I imagine most of your projects turn out.  You are to be admired for that!

How are the little dogs, Sarah & Sophie?  I noticed from your recent post that one of them, not sure which one, was sick through the night and kept you up

Dear Leslie, So nice to see you again

Dear Leslie, So nice to see you again

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Leslie,

It was so nice to see a new post on your blog, Growing a Garden in Davis, this weekend. It really has been too long between posts, but I see now why you were so busy.

I admire you for setting off on a new path, in your garden and in your life.  May both turn out beautifully for you!

I thought of you the other day when I saw an online video about how different generations play.

Dear Frances, How you inspire me

Dear Frances, How you inspire me

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Frances,

I've wanted to write you for the longest time to tell you how impressed I was when I learned how much of your garden, Fairegarden,  you transplanted to a new location last fall.

Wow, is all I can say.  You dug up and transplanted so many plants to your new garden and planted them all in the ground, while moving mundane stuff like clothes and furniture, too.  I know you had help

Dear Kathy, Thank you for the memory keeper plants

Dear Kathy, Thank you for the memory keeper plants

With a shared love of gardening

Surprise lilies

Dear Kathy,

I've wanted to write for awhile and tell you thank you for being such a faithful participate in my blogging meme, Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day on your blog Cold Climate Gardening.

I'm sure it isn't always easy living and gardening in a colder hardiness zone than almost anyone else, or at least anyone else I know, and watching and reading about all our flowers

Dear Mary Ann, Do you remember my tomatoes?

Dear Mary Ann, Do you remember my tomatoes?

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Mary Ann,

I was out in the garden this evening picking more tomatoes and thought of you and your blog Gardens of the Wild, Wild West.

Do you remember when you visited me in late summer in 2011 when you were here for the Garden Writers Association symposium?  My vegetable garden was such a mess that summer.

Earlier that spring, I had a crew tear out the old raised beds which were made

Red Dirt Ramblings, May I Express My Gratitude

Red Dirt Ramblings, May I Express My Gratitude

With a shared love of gardening

Dear Dee,

Thank you for your latest lovely blog post on Summer Flowers for Summer Heat.  I know you feel the heat in Oklahoma much more than we do here in Indiana.

But we are gardeners and somehow we make the best of it, don't we?  Whether it is too much rain, as is my good-to-have problem this year or not enough rain, which we wouldn't wish on our worst enemies, we figure out what will grow

Wildflower Wednesday: May I express my gratitude?

Wildflower Wednesday: May I express my gratitude?

wildflower wednesday With a shared love of gardening

Bee on Cup Plant flower

Dear Gail,

I'm writing today to express my thanks to you for coming up with this wonderful meme called Wildflower Wednesday.  Through your garden, which we've all come to enjoy through your blog posts on Clay and Limestone, we've learned so much about the importance of planting wildflowers to attract pollinators.

I thought of you when my garden designer sat down with