May Day

Happy May Day! We ushered in this month of Marian devotion with gardening! We want to create a Mary Garden this year and what better day to begin?

I originally planned on devoting an area outside our kitchen door to the garden, but upon doing some reading I discovered that almost every plant we have in the various gardens around our home (there are six or seven) has a religious meaning behind it! For example, hosta (or plantain lily) is known as the Assumption Lily! So rather than devoting a single area to Our Lady, I think our the entirety of our gardening pursuits will be dedicated to Mary. Even the strawberry patch...strawberries are "Fruitful Virgin!"

Today we spent the afternoon outside, and did most of our planting and I started some rearrangement. Our fenced in area has an awkward oval-y shaped partial shade garden edged with rocks (for lack of a better, more-artistic phrase!) that's very inconvenient to running, rambunctious boys. Yesterday a friend came and took several of my peonies and hosta plants and today I moved the bleeding heart along here:

This area of the gardens has more hosta, day lilies (St. Joseph's Lily), columbine (Our Lady's Shoes), chrysanthemums (All Saints' Flower), hydrangea (Ave Maria), and now the bleeding heart (Mary's Heart).

Here's a quick tour of the other work we did today and Our Lady's flowers:

The big stump holds petunias (Lady's Praise), alyssum (Mary's Little Cross), vinca vine, and a variety of daisy...

Window boxes with pansies (Trinity Flower), petunias, dusty miller, alyssum, and lobelia...

The only tulips that bloomed this year. This is another garden that's going to be revamped. The stones have to go and the peonies (Pentecost Rose), irises, and tulips (Mary's Prayer) will probably be moved. I have enough bulbs for an army, by the way. They are out of control!

Oh, and I have to show off the wonderful gate my husband built last weekend for the front porch. Our school time will relocate out here this summer as well as playtime during on rainy or very hot and sunny days. The porch is completely sheltered from rain and almost always shady.