tiny garden: june growth check.

I can’t decide. Is writing a mid-June garden update the hobby gardener’s equivalent of sending around a holiday letter? Regaling weary family members with stories of your basil’s first shoot the way someone else might detail their first-grader’s loose tooth? If yes, then here’s hoping you guys fall in the camp of loving not loathing those letters. If no, well, carry on!

Truth is: it’s practically mid-June and I’m pleased as punch with my window sill garden, no matter how tiny it is. The herbs haven’t minded the part-shade a bit, the flowers are still blooming, and I was recently given two new clay pots to add to the mix.

We’ve been harvesting basil by the handful. (I might eat my words about that pesto after all.) Chives are getting snipped over all of our eggs, parsley’s getting chopped near-nightly, and oregano’s getting plucked and pinched and put on top of salads and sandwiches and anything else we can think of. Meanwhile the thyme is flowering away and making everything it touches look pretty—in the kitchen and otherwise.

Lest you think I’m all green thumb, I’ll admit that I think I might have done better to plant the purple basil at the end of the box so that it wouldn’t get overshadowed by the gargantuan sweet basil flanking it, but it’s holding its own and I’ll get to harvest it soon enough.
Chez the flowering planter that I potted back in April, the euphorbia is going gangbusters as predicted; it’s really my favorite little filler. The bacopa pops open new flowers on the daily and the variegated plectranthus has filled in beautifully without getting too leggy. There’s even been plenty of light for my little geranium.
But here’s the problem with deciding to grow things on your window ledge: it only makes you want to grow more things on your window ledge. A few weeks ago, Faye and I were out for a little afternoon amble and we popped into GRDN. Their gravel-lined rear garden is one of my favorite spots in the neighborhood and I can’t ever manage to stroll past without taking a walk around.
I scooped up a spearmint and a chocolate mint plant to add to my ledge. Mint is a spreader and a half even in a small space so I planned to pot each plant in a separate pot so that they wouldn’t choke out everything else. I planted this year’s mint in two beautifully aged Earth Fired Clay Herb Pots given to me by Terrain. I used one of their medium herb pots and one small herb pot. I’ve been giving the new mints a little time to establish in their new homes, but I’m already envisioning a summer of mint iced tea and mojitos.
What about you guys? What’s June looking like in your gardens? Or window boxes?

More tiny garden posts, HERE.