"We come from the earth, we return to the earth, and
in-between we garden!"

(Quote credit: from a toast by Nelson Eddy.)

Thought you'd relate to the sentiment too.
Enjoy! Judye

"Weeds have rights too, ya know!"

"Rainy days come so the housework can get done."

"What the caterpillar sees as the end of its life, the butterfly knows is only the beginning."

"My neighbors don't recognize me by my face, but they know my butt well."

"Come into my garden; my flowers want to see you."

Casper

And I don't know who said this, either: "Anyone can count the seeds in a flower, but only God can count the flowers in a seed."

And I've got to pay tribute to that thing they say every time you're looking at a shrub or ornamental tree. I don't know who said it first, but some real famous words are, "It gets bigger, but you can keep it trimmed back if you want."

Henry Mitchell, "On the Defiance of Gardeners", from The Essential Earthman.

*******************

The other is not a quote, it's the song by Louis Armstrong -What a Wonderful World.
I have written the first verse out on my patio under my swing.
------ I makes me appreciative.
......cheryl

Poem by:
Dorothy Franes Blomfield Gurney
1858-1932
English poet who also authored the hymn,
"O Perfect Love"

The most noteworthy thing about gardeners is that they are always optimistic,
always enterprising, and never satisfied. They always look forward
to doing something better than they have ever done before.
- Vita Sackville-West, 1892 - 1962

Suzie

God gave us memories that we might have roses in December.
- J.M. Barrie

Who has learned to garden who did not at the same time learn to be patient? - H.L.V. Fletcher

Gardens are a form of autobiography.- Sidney Eddison

And lastly, my personal favorite:

Gardening is an outlet for fanaticism, violence, love and rationality without their worst side.
- Geoffrey Charlesworth

by
Me

It must be my favorite quote because I'm always saying it.

Ha-Ha!
Junkmanme

Annie

c.d. warner 1870
------------------------------------------------------------
plow deep while sluggards sleep.

b. franklin

The kiss of the sun for pardon.
The song of the birds for mirth.
One is nearer God's heart in a garden.
Than anywhere else on earth.

Another I love: Flowers are love's truest language.

One part soil...
Two parts water...
Three parts Wishful Thinking!

'Well I wish I had me
One million dollars
One million, to call my own
I would raise me,
I'd say "grow for me baby"
raise me, a tobacco farm' -- Joe Strummer

'I don't remember planting this' -- garden plaque given to me by my smart-aleck aunt!

Enjoy the spring time of your youth, to some good angel leave the rest,
for time will teach thee soon the truth,
there are no birds in last years nest.

Get down upon your bended knees,
God stands before you in these trees.

I find gardening a very humbling experience, thus the reason for always being on my knees.

WHY DID MY PLANT DIE?

You walked too close. You trod on it. You dropped a piece of sod on it.

You hoed it down. You weeded it.

You planted it the wrong way up. You grew it in a yogurt cup.

But you forgot to make a hole. The soggy compost took its toll.

September storm. November drought. It heaved in March, the roots popped out.

You watered it with herbicide. You scattered bone meal far and wide.

Attracted local omnivores, who ate your plant and stayed for more.

You left it baking in the sun, while you departed on the run, to find a spade.

Perhaps a trowel. Meanwhile the plant threw in the towel.

You planted it with crown too high. The soil washed off, that explains why.

Too high pH. It hated lime. Alas, it needs a gentler clime.

You left the root ball wrapped in plastic. You broke the roots. They're not elastic.

You splashed the plant with motor oil. You should do something to your soil.

Too rich. Too poor. Such wretched tilth. Your soil is clay. Your soil is filth.

Your plant was eaten by a slug. The growing point contained a bug.

These aphids are controlled by ants. Who milk the juice, it kills the plants.

In early spring, your garden's mud. You walked around! That's not much good.

With heat and light you hurried it. You worried it. You buried it.

The poor plant missed the mountain air. No heat, no summer bugs up there.

You overfed it 10-10-10. Forgot to water it again.

You hit it sharply with the hose. You used a can without a rose.

Perhaps you sprinkled from above. You should have talked to it with love.

The nursery mailed it without roots. You killed it with those gardening boots.

You walked too close. You trod on it. You dropped a piece of sod on it.

That's the way I wrote it down forty years ago--it scans better than some versions.

Can't remember where it's from.

He would've made a great candidate for GardenWeb!
Didn't he also say, "God must love the common weed, he made so many of them"?
and "A perennial divided against itself cannot fail"? ;-)

Wendy

"If you want to be happy for an hour, get drunk.
If you want to be happy for three days, get married.
If you want to be happy for eight days, kill your pig and eat it.
But if you want to be happy forever, become a gardener." --Chinese Proverb

"Like a gardener, I believe that what goes down must come up." - Lynwood L. Giacomini

"How describe the delicate thing that happens when a brilliant insect alights on a flower?
Words, with their weight, fall upon the picture like birds of prey." - Jules Renard

"Earth knows no desolution. She smells regeneration in the moist breath of decay." - George Meredith

"All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today." - Chinese Proverb

You've also reminded me of a brass sign I'd put in our raised beds last year, and now think DH must have scooped out when we dismantled them for the winter. (I'd better go check the compost pile, lol) It was something like;
"He who plants a seed beneath the sod and waits to see, believes in God."

I've found a lot of other great ones in my favorite garden decor book, "Mary Englebriet's Outdoor Companion."

THANKS SO MUCH to all you talented & creative "posters" for providing so much information, ideas & inspiration to this "lurker."

San

- An Irish Blessing.

Got this from a rose catalog years ago, don't know where they got it but it's lovely.

--Thomas Traherne (17th c.)

Live like you'll die tomorrow BUT
garden like you'll live forever!

For the mind disturbed, the still beauty of dawn is nature's finest balm.
- Edwin Way Teale

"The love of gardening is a seed once sown that never dies."
Gertrude Jekyll

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day
Tomorrow will be dying

-Robert Herrick

...and I quote this old saying regarding perennials and shrubs all the time:

"The first year they sleep, the second year they creep, and the third year they leap."

"One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh;
but the earth abideth forever."
-----The Old Testament, Ecclesiastes 1:4

"As you sow, so will you reap."
-----The New Testament, Galatians 6:7

"Gardens are not made by sitting in the shade."
-----Rudyard Kipling

"When the root is deep,there is no reason to fear the wind."
----Chinese Proverb

"Let your prayers for a good crop be short,
and your hoeing be long."
-----Albanian Proverb

"Soil is what you grow plants in.
Dirt is what you wipe off your shoes before you enter the greenhouse."

Even that which is beautiful
can sometimes bring pain

So, to love from the heart
is to invite the rain

But to reach for the rose
you must fear not the thorn

To love from the soul
is to embrace the storm

what do you think?

wstkygirl, who has dealt with lots of rain and storms here lately

Wendy (in upstate New York)

The Dog is the only garden pest to be successfully domesticated."

The Legend of the Raindrop
holds a lesson for us all
as it trembles in the heavens
wondering should it fall.
The glistening little raindrop
argues with the sky -
"I am beautiful and lovely
as I sparkle here on high."
"And hanging here I will become
part of the ranbow's hue;
and I'll shimmer like a diamond
for all the world to view."
But the heavens asked the raindrop,
"Why do you hesitate to go?
For you'll be far more beautiful
if you fall to earth below."
"For you will sink in the soil,
and be lost awhile from sight.
but when you reappear on earth
You'll be greeted with delight."
"For you will be the raindrop
that quenched the thirsty ground
and helped the lovely flowers
to blossom all around."
"And in your resurrection
You'll appear in queenly clothes,
in the beauty of the sky
and the fragrance of the rose."
"For nothing's ever lost,
nothing's ever gone for good,
but renews itself upon the earth
as God thought that it should."
"So trust God's mighty wisdom,
let yourself drop from the sky
and you will fall and rise again,
for nothing every dies."

author anonymous

"Love what you grow, and what you love will grow."

That's too funny!

How about:

I'd rather have roses on my table
than diamonds on my neck

I don't know all the names
of my flowers
but they don't seem to mind

Born to Garden but,
forced to work

God made rainy days
so some housework
will get done

Here lies the last guy
that trampled my flowers

A rose can say I love you
an orchid can enthrall
but a weed bouquet
in a chubby fist...
oh my that says it all

If Eve had a spade in that garden
and had known what to do with it,
we wouldn't have had
all that business about the apple

Jo
8-)

Steph

HE WHO SHARES THE JOY IN WHAT HE'S GROWN,
SPREADS JOY ABROAD, AND DOUBLES HIS OWN.

A Week in the life of a Gardener's Spouse

She dug the plot on Monday-
The soil was rich and fine,
She forgot to thaw out dinner-
So we went out to dine...
She planted roses Tuesday-
She says they are a must,
They really are quite lovely,
But she forgot to dust...
On Wednesday it was daisies-
They opened up with the sun,
All whites and pinks and yellows-
But the laundry wasn't done...
The poppies came on Thursday-
A bright and cheery red,
I guess she really was engrossed-
She never made the bed...
It was violets on Friday-
In colors she adores,
It never bothered her at all-
All the crumbs upon the floors...
I hired a maid on Saturday-
My week is now complete,
My wife can garden all she wants-
The house will still be neat!
It's nearly lunchtime Sunday-
And I cannot find the maid,
Oh no! I don't believe it!
She's out there WITH THE SPADE!!!

My great-uncle, Joe Moreland

Al

-Eleanor Perenyi