All Right, Mr. DeMille, I'm Ready for my Close-Up

Two days after the tree peonies put on their exuberant display, we had 7 days of unrelenting rain.  It figures.  Peonies are short-lived to begin with.  At best we get 10 days out of the blooms -- 12 if we remember to put parasols over them to shelter them from the hot afternoon sun.  This year, however, we had raw afternoon damp for an entire week, and the ravages of that treatment were much harsher than the decay wreaked by time on poor Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) in Sunset Boulevard.


I did promise to share defeats as well as triumphs, so as painful as it is for me, here's what happens when peony blooms take one on the chin from Mother Nature.  They melt into an awful travesty of themselves, looking like overdressed dowagers whose best days have clearly passed.

Sad, defeated Peonies

There are two things that mitigate this devastation.  First, we do have one other tree peony which, because it's in a location with much less direct sun, has not yet bloomed.   And we also have two deciduous (non-tree) peonies that are also about to bloom, so I'm not entirely done creating peony envy. Second,  I did manage to get enough photos of them in their glory, so although the scent is gone, the vision remains.

This episode is a clear reminder that we enjoy the colors and odors of these and other blossoms at the very fickle grace of the weather and other forces of nature.  Sufficiently warned, I was inspired to document some of my favorite flowers and foliage currently in the garden.  And while the colors are impressive from a distance, there are some varieties which really need to be seen close-up.  

Irises are among my all time favorite flowers.  My dad, who was an artist, did many drawings and paintings of them when I was growing up, so for years I've tried to plant them in his memory, with little success. But today, the bulbs that were total duds last year have finally earned their keep.

Yellow Bearded Iris

A bluish purple Bearded Iris -- together with the yellow ones, I've
almost got the colors of the Swedish Flag!  (Mr. Mulch is Swedish)

Agastache "Acapulco"
Hummingbirds love these flowers, and so do I -- they
come in many colors, but I think this variety is particularly pretty.

These are the blooms on the standard lilacs that flank the entry to our
front garden.  As fragrant as they are delicately beautiful

Lady's Mantle (Alchemilla)
While this will put out small yellow flowers, I grow this because the foliage is so
pretty, and I really love how it looks after rain (which is fortunate, since we've
had so much) because the leaves hold each drop like small diamonds. 

This is a rose Achillea (Yarrow) which will soon be covered with clusters of
small pink blossoms with yellow centers.  But as with the Lady's Mantle, I like
the feathery foliage as much as the blooms.

By the way, Norma, you'll notice that I didn't need any Vaseline on the lens for these close-ups.  Just sayin'.