Mother's Day Rhododendron

I got a present.

A day before Mother's Day my husband gave me a sturdy little Rhododendron Tigerstedtii 'St Michel'. Well, it had to be planted as soon as possible. We placed it among other rhodos under the big aspen trees in half shade.

Now, I know that under the aspen trees is not the best possible place for that plant. That is why we bought a bale of bog peat and gave a special rhododendron fertilizer to all of them. If it is true that the dead leaves of aspens make the soil limy, we will be in trouble.

But for the moment all the rhodos look fine, they are full of flower buds and the older ones are branching and growing new leaves nicely. And the evergreen group under the big silvery trees is making that part of the garden so nice and inviting.

We are planning to make a little woodland on that spot, with ferns and trilliums and other shade plants. There are already some native high blue bellflowers and a tiny little mahonia. Funny, we have the big forest next to us, and now we are longing for a woodland!

I think it is that special spot, the genius loci of that corne, that makes us think the woodland is needed. That place has a special poetry of its own, which has to be enhanced, kind of. If life is like a garden, this woodland will be romance.