Visiting The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center

Back in the spring after touring gardens all around Austin for Gardens on Tour sponsored by the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center I headed over to see the wildflower center gardens.  I hadn't been there for a while--since they first opened which was back in the mid-1990's and the admission to the gardens was included in the tour ticket.  I arrived with the heat turned up to high, the sun high in the sky, and facing a bit of garden tour fatigue with just about an hour and a half to go before closing time.  After a fairly quick tour with equally quick photos I headed home.  Over the next week I posted the five gardens from the tour and planned to get back to the wildflower center photos later.

Now is later isn't it?  It's fun to go back in time and see how pretty the gardens looked that day.  Perhaps it's the faded brown of late summer putting things in perspective but the gardens looked better than I thought at the time.  Wildflower Wednesday is this week and why not start the week off with a visit to the place which claims wildflower.org as its web address.

White Rock East Garden Tour Dallas: Tour Wrap up

During a recent weekend in Dallas I toured nine gardens in the White Rock East area near the Dallas Arboretum.  The gardens on tour covered three adjacent neighborhoods and ranged from new homes with very standard landscaping and huge lawns to older homes with lots of character and personal backyard retreats.  I featured four of my favorites in individual posts and this post combines highlights from the other five.

Our tour of the Breedlove garden in Casa Linda Estates begins with a beautiful stone and brick home on a very large lot.

White Rock East Garden Tour: Sherbet Garden

The third garden in my series on the White Rock East Garden Tour in Dallas is the Sherbet Garden.  During a recent weekend in Dallas I toured nine gardens near the Dallas Arboretum.  The gardens on tour ranged from new homes with very standard landscaping to older homes with lots of character and personal backyard retreats.  I'm featuring my favorites in individual posts and will combine highlights from the rest.  The third garden in the series, the Nady Garden, is featured in my previous post.

Our tour of the Sherbet Garden, which was featured as part of the Casa Linda Estates neighborhood, starts off with a look at the house surrounded with greenery, ground cover, and lawn fairly typical of front yards throughout Texas.

White Rock East Garden Tour Dallas: The Nady Garden and Eustis Avenue

The third garden in my series on the White Rock East Garden Tour in Dallas is the Nady Garden in the Little Forest Hills neighborhood.  During a recent weekend in Dallas I toured nine gardens near the Dallas Arboretum.  The gardens on tour ranged from new homes with very standard landscaping to older homes with lots of character and personal backyard retreats.  I'm featuring my favorites in individual posts and will combine highlights from the rest.  The second garden in the series, the Wright Garden which was also in Little Forest Hills is featured in my previous post.

The Nady Garden is set around a pretty Craftsman house built in 1938.  The tour brochure describes the house as "architecturally entertaining" which earns points for accuracy considering the use of modern tile on the column bases.

White Rock East Garden Tour Dallas: The Wright Garden and neighbors

This is the second post in my series about the White Rock East Garden Tour in Dallas where nine gardens were featured in three neighborhoods near the Dallas Arboretum.  The gardens on tour ranged from new homes with very standard landscaping to older homes with lots of character and personal backyard retreats.  I'm featuring my favorites in individual posts and will combine highlights from the rest.  My first post in the series was the colorful and relaxing Collins/Spalding garden.

The Wright Garden in the Little Forest Hills neighborhood featured a modern home with a no-lawn front yard which included a stock tank vegetable garden. 

Gardens on Tour in Austin: Highland Terrace West Part 1

This is the fourth in my five-part series on the Gardens on Tour for the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin.  Last Saturday I joined Austin bloggers Pam Penick of Digging, Catherine Jones of The Whimsical Gardener, and David Cristiani of The Desert Edge from Albuquerque for a fun day of touring.  You can see the third garden, Placid Place, in my previous post.  After lunch we headed to Highland Terrace West and the second of the homeowner-designed gardens on tour this year.  This was a beautiful garden full of ideas.

Bruce Baldwin built many of the items in the garden and Colleen Jamison handled the planting and accessorizing.  Jenny of Rock Rose spent several hours as a volunteer in this garden so check out her post for the best scoop.  Pam at Digging also has a great take on this garden which is in her old neighborhood.

We were greeted by this bright and inviting front porch.

Gardens on Tour in Austin: Kathy Cove Garden

In honor of National Wildflower Week, the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center held their annual garden tour in Austin on Saturday.  I joined Pam Penick of Digging, Catherine Jones of The Whimsical Gardener, and David Cristiani of The Desert Edge for the tour of five gardens. There's always a sense of anticipation when the gates open on a garden tour, and this tour was exceptional for its quality and mix of properties.

The gardens were labeled by address so the first garden we visited was Kathy Cove.