Wanna feel REALLY bad about your landscaping?

Visit the Lauritzen Botanical Gardens and be reminded that your backyard (and maybe your front yard) will never be NEARLY as nice!

Okay I kid, I kid! It's an amazing and breath-taking place that makes you wish you were a wee bit better with the ol' potting soil, if you know what I mean. (Don't feel bad if you don't...most of the time I don't even really know what I mean.)

Here's my little sister at the start of the gardens - isn't she cute? (TAKE NOTE ALL YOU ELIGIBLE BACHELORS IN THE SOUTH FLORIDA AREA):



We wandered through the Japanese garden (which is still being developed and will be even more fabulous very soon):



We sniffed around the herb garden (quite literally in Mr. P's case):





We encountered wildlife:





And we took in the children's garden which has plants you can touch and even taste, and features a super fun corn maze (or maize maze...HA! Get it?):



This month the gardens feature an exhibit of Wonders of the World made entirely of gourds, berries, sticks, etc. The sculptures have been placed all around the Train Garden - is that cool or what? Behold the Hagia Sofia:





We left with a ton of inspiration and maybe a tiny case of hay fever. But if you're ever in town make sure to add the Lauritzen Botanical Gardens to your to-do list!

Garden update...

It's pink!!! We almost have a ripe tomato! Look!



And check out these peppers - we've already used the anaheim peppers (the darker green ones) in some dishes and boy are they spicy!





This gardening thing is going really well! Maybe next year we'll diversify our crop - less tomatoes, more...I don't know...other stuff that grows in a garden.

(Forgive me for being clueless but you're talking to the woman who didn't know that the blinking lights in her backyard were fireflies. Sue me.)

Let's check on the garden, shall we?

Remember what it looked like when we started?





Well check out these babies now!





And check out my blueberries! I think soon we'll have enough for one TINY BOWL of cereal!



And yesterday Mr. P - who in a past life was apparently part of the Swiss Family Robinson - built some tomato trellises (trellis? trelli?) out of tree branches:





Not bad, huh? Now if he could only build me a chaise lounge and dining chairs I'd be all set!

In the meantime we're attempting to pump up our veggies with plant steroids:



I'm not sure how these tiny balls (that resemble green NERD candies) work but I'm told it'll help our tomatoes grow nice and big. (and I like this option better than the idea of composting rotting fruit, grass and dog poop and using it as fertilizer - I'm all for sustainability but I draw the line and PURPOSELY putting dog poop on the tomatoes that I will later EAT.)



Plus I'm not much of a sportsman and I lack patience so I love the idea of giving our tomatoes an unfair advantage.