… I end up sitting on a rainbow.

Lack of planning, reliance on hindsight rather than foresight, failure to learn from one’s mistakes. Guilty, guilty, and guilty again.

Perhaps on a frosty evening in January,  or with the first inkling of Spring when the snowdrops are blooming, then we’ll delve into the commission of these sins, and pledge to follow a steadier, less perilous course for the coming year.

I doubt that it will come to anything, and why should it? Despite these transgressions, the garden is glorious today.

The coarse leafed Tatarian daisy ‘Jindai’ (Aster tataricus,above) has begun to bloom on the back slope of the swimming pond, a position in the garden reached only by walking the full circumference of the pond, and planted with only tall, late blooming sunflowers (below) and this aster. Jindai grows to three feet, tall enough to be seen from the patio on the near side of the pond.

In a rare display of forethought, this aggressive aster has been hemmed in by a large Tardiva hydrangea to one side, and the shade of the variegated leaf ‘Wolf Eye’ kousa dogwood to the other. At some point the aster might struggle with the sunflowers for dominance of this back corner, but it’s likely they will commingle beautifully. Such is the plan.

Little planning is needed for the Autumn crocus, they require only a small space and no care. Colchicum byzantium (above) is blooming near the upper stone patio and ‘Waterlily’ (below) by the pavilion near the swimming pond, both tucked into voids between larger perennials.  

The latest of Windflowers in the garden this early Autumn, the Japanese Anemone ‘September Charm’ (below) is blooming now. I mistakenly left this windflower unprotected by deer repellent, so they were pruned severely in mid-Summer, thus flowering weeks later than the name would promise. Another incidence of luck trumping good garden planning.