More friends!

I'm not sure yet what kind of bee this is yet, but he was wounded and died soon after our meeting.


Beautiful monarch butterfly caterpillar munching away on the butterfly weed.


Again, not sure what kind of moth this is, but he loved the agastache.

Spicy Gazpacho

This is my gazpacho I made the other week. Mmmmm. I am calling it Spicy Gazpacho despite the fact that it wasn't really that spicy. Next time I'll have to add more peppers. Regardless, it was the best gazpacho I ever made. My resources included Ina Garten's recipe from one of her cookbooks and about ten other recipes I looked at online. I was inspired to make this by my neighbor, who left me the roma and unidentified tomatoes and a container of her gazpacho before going on vacation.

2 roma tomatoes
2 big girl tomatoes (just picked - still warm!)
1 large unidentified tomato
10 tommy toe tomatoes
2 small red onions
1 jalapeno (NEED MORE!)
1 green pepper
3 lemon cukes (2 processed, 1 diced and added later)
Process; transfer to bowl
couple slices sourdough bread soaked in water
couple cloves garlic (forgot in first part)
1/4 cup olive oil
Process and combine with previously processed ingredients
salt & pepper

Tricyrtis

Toadlily

I want that one!

Last Friday, my parents and I visited the Burpee's Fordhook Farm in Downingtown, PA for their Fordhook in Bloom event. The cicadas were buzzing, the sun was beating down, the thermometer was pushing 100 degrees and the gardens were dazzling. It was quite a surreal little expedition; everything else felt very distant. Equipped with maps and plant lists, we wound our way through each garden, every turn revealing another perfectly composed image. Needless to say, by the end of our tour, my lists were pretty well marked up with ideas for my garden.
After this overload of botanical inspiration and in the face of a plant sale of quality cultivars, I managed to procure a magnificent speciman... the most beautiful thyme plant I've ever seen in my life. Hmmm.