Progress report

Since you're dying to know, I got twenty daylilies planted yesterday, but I have twenty-six to go!

Turns out the clumps of five were already separated, so I planted them as singles . Maybe in the next round I'll double up on a few, considering the shortage of space I have . It took three hours - as expected . Not as expected I only forgot something once - the mycorrhizae on the first plant . I also discovered that I apply total concentration to the job at hand . (Must be the new mega-vitamins).  No meandering thoughts on off-topic issues. I wonder why that is . Ah-ha, DH's plan to get me organized has worked!!

I started out on the cool side of the house, using the one-hole-at-a-time method with the bucket of daylilies strapped to the semi-rusty luggage cart, compost in the wheelbarrow and amendments in the handy carrier all close at hand . It went quite smoothly and one might even say leisurely . Then I moved to the blow-torch side of the house . Setting sun or not, Old Sol would not give up easily . So for the last six I used the assembly-line method . Had to get it over with quick . I was starting to burn and weaken, and the GatorAde had begun to cloy .

As I progressed and looked at the work done behind me, I was very pleased . My mind framed the shots that the camera should have taken, and I smiled . I'll take them tomorrow . So the back gardens are almost full but not packed like the front . A few more spaces left to fill with daylilies . Then up the sideyard and into the front . I'll have to really think that through, since these are permanent plantings that will fill the spots that annuals have taken . That's a good thing . Annuals leave voids in the winter, and the more that's green during the long winter the better I like it.

Daylily order finally arrived

It took three months for me to decide which nursery to buy from, then about eight hours to decide which plants (a lot of googling ), then four days to get a two-to-three-day Priority Mail package . Now the fans are resting in water . Tomorrow I will plant at least some of them . Dare I hope for all of them to be in the ground at day's end?  It always takes me longer than I think it should to do this sort of thing or any sort of thing .

There are quite a few to plant . I got eight clumps of five fans and four double fans . I will probably divide the clumps into two plantings, so that's twenty holes, twenty scoops of manure, twenty handfuls of alfalfa, twenty handfuls of milorganite, forty dollops of bone meal, and twenty sprinkles of mycorrhizae . This is the third online daylily purchase I have made, and I've gotten a little smarter about assembly-line planting . The first batch (approximately 32 plants) I did each plant hole separately - dig, put down the shovel, select the fan from the pot of water, bring it to the hole - oh, I'm out of order. I skipped a step - so I bring the fan back to the pot, get the scoop of manure, form it into a cone in the hole, add the alfalfa, bone meal & Milorganite, then go to the centrally located pot for the fan of choice again, place it on the cone of manure, sprinkle the mycorrhizae and fill the hole . On to the next hole that I invariably do out of order again but differently, requiring back-tracking, extra steps, and/or emptying the hole and starting over, since I always forget the bone meal . It wasn't rocket science, but it was very tiring . So the second batch (about 19 plants) I did differently . I did one side of the back garden at a time, dug all the holes, scooped all the manure, made all the cones, added all the alfalfa, all the bone meal and all the Milorganite . Then I had to stop the mass process, retrieving and planting each daylily one at a time . I discovered that grabbing more than one fan got confusing and I wouldn't remember what went where . I had planned to write each one down as I did it, but writing with garden gloves on paper fluttering in the breeze was a pain . This process worked much better and was less tiring with less wandering around, seemingly without aim, deciding where to make the next hole . Decision-making is difficult and time-consuming .

Other gardeners speak of the relaxing joy they feel while doing this sort of thing . That doesn't really describe my experience . I'm an end-game person, get it done . The journey doesn't enter into my thinking or planning . I can't even make the journey-thing fit in my head while I'm sitting here writing this . Another quirky aspect of my brain function, I guess . Hearing people talk about the destination not being as important as the journey makes me go, Huh?

Maybe it goes back to my childhood summer vacations when my father would drive the 1,100 miles from Connecticut to Alabama "straight through" which was a lot tougher in the 50's before interstate highways . He wanted to get there (and so did we - three kids in the backseat and no auto air conditioning back then), and he had no interest in enjoying the journey . We stopped for gas and oh by the way, does anyone have to go? You bet your sweet bippy we had to go . I saw a great deal of this country before I was twelve years old - from the backseat of a car doing 70+ miles an hour . So I guess it's understandable that I'm a destination-oriented person, still missing the sights and sounds of it all .

Well, we'll see how I do tomorrow . The forecast probably isn't very conducive to an idyllic journey . Probably ninety-three degrees in the shade, but oh, daylilies prefer sun . No, probably not idyllic . Probably more like, can I get this done in five minutes per hole?  Five times twenty is 100 minutes . Surely, I can do a hole in three minutes . What do you want to bet this lovely trip takes ten minutes per hole?  Golly, that's over three hours . Sounds like more my speed . Wandering aimlessly adds a lot to the time .