I Will Survive

 I had a nice spot next in the front of my house that just begged for a garden...so I thought. 

It faces SW, and is framed by the wall of the garage and the front of our home. The area is behind the variegated Liriope, lined by the landscape hedge - don't ask me what it is, I can never remember! This area is blazingly hot. It still begs for a garden...but maybe I need to rethink the sort of plants that would love to live there! 

One would think I had taken pictures of my garden area. But, alas, I did not. 

I planted a variety of flowers; some mums left over from last fall, a few gaillardia I picked up somewhere. I had some lovely snap dragons early on, but they finally succumbed to old age and the heat. There were a few others I tried that managed to survive...some others that didn't care for their location. For example, I adore Dahlias. Of course I planted some. Dahlias don't care for afternoon heat. (But, a few have begun to grow again as the heat recedes. I'll have to see how they fare!)

I also planted Zinnias. I love Zinnias. I picked up a packet of seeds early on and spread their seeds and waited.

I picked up another packet of seeds and waited.

My wait was rewarded with a few Zinnia plants. Nothing with glorious blooms. But Zinnias they were! They have blessed me with a flowers from mid summer....and they still stumble on, despite being leggy and displaying burned-out lower leaves with the others looking rather moth eaten and ragged.

I went to deadhead flowers a few days ago. Look what I found! Did you see it? At the base of "mama"?!

Here's another:

....and more:

 

Mama (and papa) Zinnia ought to be proud! 

They will live on!