Okay, so it's not a cottage, but I hope the garden is starting to get cottage-y. This is my rowhouse in Baltimore. I've struggled with this garden this summer. I had a beautiful heirloom sweet pea that I didn't know to deadhead (but I saved the seeds for next year). I started seeds in the early spring, but most didn't make it. Hollyhocks are one of my favorite plants and I put in a lot of them -- not knowing that they'd only be rosettes this year. I knew they wouldn't flower, but I thought I'd have tall foliage. Now that I know about the rosette stage, I feel better about them, since I have next summer to look forward to. I planted a lot of viola, and last week they all finished and turned brown. I didn't know that would happen! The pepper plants are stuck at 6", even though I started them in early March inside. My one victory, a single huge sunflower, was destroyed in a storm two nights ago.

The only reason the beds look this full now is that I went crazy at the garden center sales last week and packed the beds with annuals. When I came out this morning (actually, I woke up and raced out of the garden to look at it again!), butterflies were everywhere and I even saw a bee. Exciting!

This is my first summer in this house and the only plant here when I moved in was a clematis. Oh, and a ton of weeds. Weeds, weeds, weeds. There are cinderblock pavers in the middle of the yard (for now) and getting the weeds out from between them is a battle. I hardly have any dirt at all, but it's been a ton of work.

I love seeing pictures of your beautiful gardens, so here are pictures of mine. I'm a beginner and my home is modest, but I love being able to grow things on my own property and I can't wait to see my beds mature and flourish. Here they are:

Walkway bed

Zinnias in walkway bed

Thyme in walkway bed

Parsley in walkway bed

Paste tomatoes in walkway bed

Gomphrena in walkway bed

Front bed

Front bed, corner

Heirloom peony in front bed

Lavender and rosemary in front bed

Angelonia in front bed

I love passionflowers. I planted a caerula and a maypop. The maypop was bare root from Park and I thought it was dead three times -- but about two weeks ago, it exploded. I love these vines!

And here's the caerula:

Thanks for looking!

Jay