January Chores =)

After the Christmas mess is dealt with, and I have done some reorganizing. I completely cleaned out and reorganized two spaces. My bedroom cupboard, and half of my great room closed shelving.

I got rid of a bunch of messy baskets with handles on them and slimmed down this storage space

Then I found these under the bed fabric boxes that work good as a slide out for these hard to reach shelves.

I even found a good place to store allllllllllllll the clickers...ugh

So now that all that is good to go, I turn to my beloved January pastime of perusing garden catalogues, dreaming and planning for this years summer bliss.

The catalogues start arriving in early fall. I do not have time for them it is just not their season. I am too busy lingering over the last of the rose blossoms and veggie harvest. The catalogues all get chucked into a big wicker basket for a later unveiling. Okay, okay... I did take a quick peek at the David Austin Rose catalogue. My all time favorite roses. Who cares that they were bred for England and moist wet climates. I have tested and tried and I have found some great candidates for mydesert plateau garden. The great thing about our heat and drier climate, the roses may not flourish and grow quite as lush and juicy, but seriously, I have very little disease and bugs. So it is fairly easy for me to grow roses. I can fuss, but they actually thrive quite well on my usual minimal care. I have found you just need to know your roses. Picking roses with a high 8-9.9 rating from the A.R.S. handbook is a sure bet. You can also do some experimenting and hit on some winners on your own. Okay as you see I can get easily sidetrack by my roses...another post...lol

The other thing I like to do in January is to reflect on last years garden efforts and get ideas for the up and coming summer. When I first moved into our home it was Feb. 2006. At that time I started a journal for this new and perhaps last garden I will be making...you never really know though do ya? Any way here are some of my designs and ideas. I like to record my purchases and my future wants, and any rearranging I have in mind. Some of you might remember last summers iris re dig. That was certainly needed since I had no idea what colors had landed in what spots. I have this fuss buckety thing about coordinating the iris colors with the roses since they bloom together for the first flush. It took me years in my last garden. This time I know the winning combinations...so I might be further along. I am sure I probably got some of them mixed up a bit. We will see.

Here was my first vision of the back garden
assessments of what I had, and what I wanted...I had brought a lot of cuttings that made the move!
Here is the first go at the general layout of my garden


My vegetable garden is also a delight for me to plan. This new propriety is quite small, so I do have a quite small kitchen garden. All the more reason to do some good planning!