Happy Friday! We’re ending the week in Mill Creek, Washington (Zone 8b), with another visit to Lila’s garden. We last heard from Lila in August, when she shared the progress of her ‘Sparkling Burgundy’ pineapple lily and celebrated her 60th wedding anniversary with her husband, Dave. Today she’s back with a look at her October garden.
We’ve been in our home and yard north of Seattle for almost 30 years, so we’ve been gardening a long time!
Like us, our garden has evolved over the years, although my husband prefers “neat and tidy” plants, and my taste is a bit more wild. I love baby’s tears ground cover (Soleirolia soleirolii, Zones 9–11) rambling over stones and around the fountain; Dave does not love it as much. We do “battle” over where it should wander.
We have a very oddly shaped garden, larger than most in our cul-de-sac community, but we benefit from many different areas: shady and fertile, sunny with hardpan, and part sun/part shade with decent soil.
We try to attract birds with our plantings, although we only have hummingbird feeders in our garden. We also have shelter, water features, tall trees, and lots of perennials and summer annuals.
We both love having our garden looking lovely. October is a wonderful time for our hardy fuchsias (Fuchsia cvs., Zones 7–10), so I’ve included photos of them. This has been a warm autumn, and we still have a regular fuchsia basket in full bloom.
This hardy fuchsia doesn’t receive enough sunlight but somehow gives us fun October blossoms. It’s surrounded by hostas (Hosta cvs., Zones 3–9) and a laceleaf Japanese maple (Acer palmatum var. dissectum, Zones 5–8) and grows under several trees not shown here.
Hardy fuchsia in October
Blue sky in October! ‘Olsen’s Frosted Strawberry’ Japanese maple (Acer palmatum ‘Olsen’s Frosted Strawberry’, Zones 6–9) flanked by western red cedars (Thuja plicata, Zones 5–8) and vine maple (Acer circinatum, Zones 5–9).
Just part of our October garden
Thank you, Lila, for sharing another look at your beautiful garden with us! I love that after all these years, you and Dave are still debating where the baby’s tears should grow.
Have a wonderful weekend, GPOD!
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