City Garden Season 2

Tomato plants, herb box, and the good old lemon tree

Last summer I planted a "city garden" on my balcony. I was pretty excited to do the same thing again this summer and incorporate my lessons learned. Of course we have our lemon tree. I wish that thing would grow some more of it's leaves back, but we are constantly battling each other about something. I imagine it something like having a teenager. In the earth box this year I decided to go with just two tomato plants. This year I bought more mature plants in the hope that we get actual tomatoes earlier. I felt like we were getting tomatoes into December last year. Hopefully this strategy helps. I also brought back the herb box we had last year. This year we are doing parsley, basil, cilantro, and apple mint. Matt would not leave the gardening store without the apple mint.  What we will do with it, I have no idea, but it does smell good. 

Hens and Chicks

Lastly I did a pot of hens and chicks. I did two plants in a pot and I'm hoping since they are ground cover they will take over the whole pot and look really cool. They are already starting to sprout off so it might just work. For those of you who haven't heard...hens and chicks are the main flower, well I guess plant, in our wedding. I hope they don't look like this since I want mostly the lime green color, but they didn't have that at the store. Anyway I thought it would be cool to have some. 

I planted everything about two weeks ago. I really didn't think that the temperatures were going to get so low again. It's been a little bit of a pain really. I have had to move the plants in and out of our little water heater room on the balcony so they don't freeze. Reminiscent of the hurricane event in late August. Except right now its like an every night event. Hopefully the temperatures get warm and stay warm in the next few days. So maybe I didn't learn enough lessons last year? 

Mushroom Invasion

So one random Saturday morning I wake up and there's mushrooms in my lemon tree. I was appalled. Seriously. I promptly plucked them from the pot and told them never to come back. Low and behold about two weeks later they returned. Once again I ripped them out and told them no more. They haven't been back since. But what in the world? How does this happen? And how do I ensure they are never a part of my life again? Any advice?

The Diva is Back

As you know if you read my blog regularly, this lemon tree and I have a major love/hate relationship. Why does the lemon choose to do this to me? I don't understand why it has to drop it's leaves on a regular basis. Can someone please explain this to me? And I know you probably can't tell from the poor quality of this picture but there are flower buds all over it. Such a diva brat.

Happy Spring :)

Today marks the first official day of Spring! Yay! And miraculously it has actually felt like Spring here in Northern Virginia, allergies and all, this weekend. Friday was the best. It was almost 80 degrees and sunny. The bad news is...work got in the way and I didn't really get to take full advantage of the lovely weather. I did take a nice run/walk around my neighborhood once I got home though. More on the agonizing walk /run event in the future. Saturday turned out to be nicer than predicted and inspired my makeover of our outdoor space! My parents had got Matt the little grill that you can see in this picture for Christmas. I put it together and set it up outside and then, of course, I had to go to Target for some furniture. I'm so thrilled about this. In fact I'm so thrilled that I'm blogging from that one chair right now, and trust me it's not warm yet. I think you may also be able to see the heartwrenching lemon tree in this picture. Please note that after it bloomed and was the prettiest lemon tree ever for about 2 weeks, it has dropped all but two of it's leaves and is very bald. Tempermental. This tree is a diva, no joke. Apparently all lemon trees have an attitude. At least thats what the internet said. I hope everyone is enjoying some nice weather today! 

Lemon Tree

In 709 we have a third roommate. It's our lemon tree. I love this lemon tree. He is a very complex plant. I have been trying to figure this thing out since day one. The lemon tree's most recent development is all these flowers. I am stunned by these little white things. At the beginning of January the tree started turning yellow limb by limb and then each limb would lose all of its leaves. Naturally, I was very stressed about this. By mid-February we had lost the majority of the leaves, but then the little white buds were everywhere. They have turned into these beautiful little flowers and they smell amazing. It reminds me of how Hawaii smells. I am so hoping for some lemons, but I'm thinking not this year. So anyone with some advice on lemon tree growing is very much appreciated.