Summertime

I took this pic a few weeks ago, right when my hydrangea started to bloom. Right now, with 90 degree plus days and no rain, it's not looking as lovely, but hanging in there none the less. When I planted it, we had just put in the retaining wall, so there was quite a bit of masonry grout and some crumbled stone mixed in the soil. I had meant to clean it up more, but ended up amending with some good soil and just threw in a transplanted hydrangea and gardenia. Now these two shrubs are huge and thriving and are my favorite things to see when I walk past them each morning on the way to the car. A little tidbit, I found out that we don't normally grow pink hydrangeas in the south because of our very acidic soil, depending on the acidity is how you get blue or pink hydrangeas. The soil in my retaining wall is very alkaline because of the stone and cement that was mixed in years ago. So now I know why I get pink hydrangeas!