{Lily's Garden} May Tour

Welcome to another little mini garden tour! I wanted to take some recent photos of the garden to show the growth that has already taken place this year. I'll be back in a few weeks with another mini tour to show off some of the lilies once they bloom. 

The above photo shows the whole garden as viewed from our newish sidewalks. The fence looks great and the arbor is about to have the moon vine planted next to it. Last year it took over almost the entire arbor! Let's hope for a repeat!! 

On Sunday, we had Lily's 6th birthday party and we had a lot of people over. The garden was definitely talked about as many hadn't seen it in years. This has been a work in progress for 6 years now and after the rocks were installed last year, I finally feel that it's almost done. It'll never be completely done because it's a garden and I like to add plants here and there. 

Above is my collection of containers that I started adding to the spot between the first raised bed (made out of old foundation stones) and the arbor. The space bothered me until I realized it would make a great little area for annuals in all my random containers. The pink vintage container (with the vertical lines towards the back) was my aunt's mother-in-law's (hard to follow, right?) and my aunt gave it to my mom who gave it to me after I said I liked it. The pot with the painted butterfly came from one of my best friends when she moved. The short galvanized container came from my grandmother's house. The terra-cotta container behind the galvanized container was my husband's grandmother's. The rest were all bought. The fireplace insert was here when bought the house. 

Behind all the pots is this purple beauty below. The bees absolutely love it! 

Around the corner of the raised bed, towards the house, is the fairy garden I created last year. It needs some TLC thanks to a very active mole but the plants are all doing great. Below is just a few plants: a miniature hosta (on the left) and three sedums, one is just hiding behind the hosta. 

Below is another plant in the fairy garden that surprised me this year with the amount of growth it put on. It's a type of bleeding heart, but I can't remember exactly what.

The second raised bed is all full of lilies. It was actually the first raised bed we made all those years ago. Around it are more lilies, a hosta (split from our original plants that came with the house) and some more sedum. 

Below is the bed I made two years ago while pregnant with Nate. It's become one of my favorite areas in the garden because it's a great mix of plants. It has day lilies, Asiatic lilies, coneflowers, daisies, and lots of random plants too. I added a few annuals this year to add some color while the perennials grow. The blue bird bath on the left is new to its spot and the bird feeders were moved to hang over our driveway to limit how much actual germinates from the seeds this year. Last year it got a little crazy (scroll down until you see the sunflowers). 

The blue pot kind balances out the blue bird bath and is another spot for some annuals. It's also the home of our water gauge with the hummingbird bottom. 

At the back of the garden is this giant, super heavy fireplace insert my dad took from a house he was working on. The blue bird bath from above is behind it and I planted some annuals in the pots. It's surrounded my lilies, coneflowers, and other plants. The large rock in the pot is from a job my dad worked on and is one of many rocks throughout the garden.  

Below is the back of the garden with the privacy fence that divides our side garden (known as Lily's Garden) and our back yard. The trellis was added a couple years ago to help the climbing hydrangea. Another trellis was added on top to divide the area even more (and can be seen from the very first shot in this post) and will hopefully be covered soon with the climbing hydrangea. It also keeps my dog, Zoey, from jumping off our deck into Lily's Garden (she didn't seem to mind the 6 foot fall when she did it, even though she's not exactly a pup anymore). To the right of the climbing hydrangea is a giant oak leaf hydrangea. 

Looking back towards the front of the garden is this small trellis my parents had. It came from a house they used to own that my brother lived. They have one piece in their garden and now I have the other. I'll be adding a small climbing plant to it at some point. At the base of the trellis are the hostas that were split a few years ago. There's a piece of drift wood too and four old weights from Lily's room remodel that were in her old windows. They were laying on our front porch and I thought they'd be better off in our garden. 

Back to the front, this is the little garden I made with the butterfly bush. You can see from this post that it is growing. I added two Tiger Lilies and the rest were already a part. Some of the sedum didn't make it back, so the space between the butterfly bush and the bricks will probably be replaced with something. 

I had this old metal hummingbird art laying around and so it found its home in the front of Lily's Garden. 

I hoped you liked the little mini tour. Check back again later for more photos of the flowers as they begin to bloom!

Linking up to: The Creative Circle, Outdoor Extravaganza, DIY Challenge Party Outdoor Projects