First Rose & Farm Pix

A few years ago my daughter asked me if I'd like to go to visit a rose grower down the Willamette Valley from Portland.  She'd gone there and was very impressed with the roses as they are all fragrant and "real" roses, not roses grafted onto "root stock".  I so enjoyed going there and bought one rose - a climber called "4th of July".. this is that rose below, we planted it by the deck and it's doing well there. It's named that as it blooms near the 4th of July and it's striped, kind of like the American flag, or possibly looking like fireworks.  This is the first rose on the farm to bloom.. it smells great, isn't it pretty?

My friend told me about a local man who helps in the garden and we hired him for a few days this week and he really helped hubby out!!  Here he is holding the ladder for hubby in the bed of the pickup so he can cut a few branches off the Douglas fir that was pressing down on my Star Magnolia tree.  I had to cover my eyes as hubby balanced on the ladder holding a running chain saw above his head as he cut branches that fell down on the truck with a bang! Eek!

I was taking the photos from the old time front porch on our house and shot this photo Southwest - the helper cleaned out my flower bed in the front entry garden.  So nice!

Here is another rose..

The pink rose bud Azalea is at it's peak now.  SO pretty and bright!

Here is the front of the house.. I had asked the helper to prune out some of the Rhododendrons in the planting to the right.. it looks a LOT better.  After the large lavender Rhodie on the left of the porch blooms, it's getting pruned WAY down.  He also planted a row of "Lamb's Ears" in front of the porch for me that were given to us by a friend when she was removing them from her garden.  I think they'll look nice here.

Before this area was thinned, you could not see through there at all and we had a "volunteer" big leaf maple taking over, plus an old Fig tree that had lost it's use here.  After the Rhodie on the left is done blooming.. it's going to be pruned way down.

The pink azalea and the white one.. and hubby.. :-)

And lastly.. I put a grouping of candles in my lantern and lit them as the evening was darkening.  Funny thing.. I had visited a favorite blog of mine.. Mias Landliv from Norway and saw her lantern that she pictures often (it's there on her coffee table)... so I left a message on her blog and she kindly emailed back and told me where she got hers!  Mine has a different finish, but the same shape.  I finally found mine on eBay.  :-)

And so.. I just wanted to say hello.. and tell you I'm happy you came to visit.  I loved your comments about our trip to the zoo.  Today I met my daughter, granddaughter, 2 sisters and my sisters DIL for lunch and my 6 yr old GD sent us 2 drawings she'd made for us.  One of the beach and one of the zoo.  They are soOOoo cute!!

OK.. toodles for now.. I'm off soon to go to dinner at my younger sisters house, our brother and his wife are in town for a visit!!

((hugs)), Teresa :-)