Before & After - Plants

Thought I would share a couple of Before & After pictures of my plants from this summer. I have what some would call a minor addiction to flowers and have now got the itch to start to garden but since it is a good possibility that we will build a new house at our land within the next year or so, I haven't been inclined to till up a portion of our yard here. So instead, I did a little container gardening this summer. Only some tomatoes, peppers and cilantro. You know...the good stuff that goes into Texas Caviar. YUM!
These are my pepper plants back at the end of May.
And here they were in July! Lisa, if you are reading, those were the beauties I gave to you :)
And here were the tomatoes at the start of summer (and Grant's Maple Trees)
And here they are in July as well. They still didn't even have tomatoes on them yet, just flowers. I did 4 roma plants (good for fresh salsa) and 4 cherry tomato plants. My dog LOVES to eat the cherry ones so they are for our snacking pleasure. Nothing better than a sun-warmed cherry tomato right off the plant!
I didn't get a picture of the cilantro though. Sorry to disappoint!
But here was how my Morning Glory vine, Vinca's and Dianthus started out. (Roma tomato plants in the green planters)
Now would you look at them!
Onto what was my most fun plating project of the summer. Last year I had some annual grass and Gerber Daisies planted around the back patio. This year I went with sweet potato vines along with the fountain grass and just check out how it grew and transformed throughout the summer...

This last picture of the patio was taken about 2 weeks ago so everything is even BIGGER now. Crazy, huh!
These are the hanging baskets I get every year. They are called Tahitian Bridals Veils and I love them dearly! I have even wintered them over before but since they take up so much room, I had to just suck it up and buy new each year. And it is hard to see but the backs of the little leaves are a purplish color and during the day they are covered with hundreds of tiny white flowers. Believe it or not, but these bad boys are now almost down to the white railing.
These are a couple of the planters I have in front of the garage and shed.Ohhhh, here is my Gerber Daisy trough. This is when they were still alive. Something happened and 1/2 of the plants died so they look pretty pathetic now.
On to my new favorite plant...
This is a perennial Hibiscus that I planted last fall so this summer is the first I have seen it bloom.
The blooms are the size of a dinner plate and are absolutely stunning! They are so big you can see them all of the way across the yard. And I couldn't resist getting these pictures of them on a foggy Sunday morning before I set out to do some rollerblading.
Speaking of rollerblading, I only have a little over a week before the marathon. I have been getting some good training (my longest was 22 miles last Sat) but I am getting a bit nervous for the race. I don't do good with races. Luckily the long holiday weekend coming up and Grant starting school next Tues are good distractions. Plus, I have a photo shoot to do of two little girls tomorrow evening. Should be fun. Just hope the weather is nice! Oh, and for anyone wondering how Grant's sleeping in his own room is going...he hasn't set foot in our bed all week which means he's almost got a whole week down already. So proud of him!