HI
I intend to try do some winter sowing. The reason, I spend way to many $$$ at the garden center in the spring!! And I have no room in my home to start plants indoors. I just learned about winter sowing recently, and decided to give it a try.

Jenny P

Oh Jenny- Watch out! It is addicting and soooo rewarding! There is no turning back once you start! You will love it! Start collecting containers now- because soon, you will not have enough to fill your desires! Especially if you try a seed Round Robin from the Exchange Forum........
Julie

One of my intentions is to do more planning this winter so I can get the jump on next spring. I have several areas I want to 'adjust' and transplanting in the summer is too much work.

I have a survey of the yard, so I printed it out in sections and will mark plants on them, then I can decide how I want to change things around next year.

Another intention is to get out earlier in the spring to cut down last year's growth so I don't startle so many momma bunnies and so on.

My intentions are good. LOL

heh heh heh...yeah, that's what everyone says. However, the truth is in the details.

I firmly resolve to have fewer plants in my car returning from plant swaps than I took..............Yah, right!

I think I'm ready to plant MORE of the plants that I really like and that like me: big purple Alliums, Euphorbia cotinifolia, Gomphrena, annual Butterfly Weed, Cannas, Coleus 'Coco Loco,' various orange or vermilion daylilies, various martagon and other smaller lilies, Thalictrum, and a few others. To make room, I'm going to dig up and give to my next-door neighbor: all yellow daisy-like perennials, most of my gold daylilies, all my spiderwort and vervain, all the goldenrod except 'Fireworks,' and some alpine strawberries that we always forget to pick and eat. So, in general, a lot of bluish-purple and yellow wildflowers are going in order to make more space for more burgundy and orange and tropical-looking stuff. More vines, too.

My other big intentions are to BELIEVE how big some of my non-perennials are going to get (I'm looking at several 8-foot Tithonia out of the office window....), to take better care of my containers, and to try to pay more attention to the whole shapes of the plants and to things like whether their, uh, lower parts need to be decently covered up with other plants. Oh, one more: I WILL NOT be digging up more lawn, I will just work with what space I have for once.

There was a very funny thread about a year ago about gardeners' resolutions, but I don't remember where.

It's " Garden Resolutions I'll NEVER Keep."

I plan on starting my new gardens this fall by covering the grass with newspaper and farmpost rather than wait until spring and rush the process. Well at least one that is. Who knows what I will plot over the winter. I will have all of that winter sowing to find homes for.

My intention for next year is to finish this year's intentions.lol. Which was to expand the garden and get it into order according to size, color, and bloom times.

I also plan on adding more annuals to the garden next year. This year I did more than in the past and really enjoyed the extra color.

I had to chuckle reading through all your 'good intentions'. I hope you Minnesotanees don't mind me barging in on your forum. I feel left out.;) There are no forums for NDakotans. I do read and enjoy the Far North and Northern Gardening forums, but most of the members there are from Canada and give out information relating to nurseries and other things for Canada such as weather in celcius. ha ha I do visit Minnesota on occasion (if that helps), in fact I will be there next summer for the National Daylily Convention. ;) And, I buy lots of plants at your really neat nurseries, such as Rice Creek, Busse's and Bachman's.

I do have numerous gardening intentions for next year also. I plan to really analyze my plants and move them around to make great looking vignettes. Unfortunately, I am a plant collector and have many individuals plants. I have such a large yard that I can't afford to buy 3's of the same plant. I usually have good intentions of growing more plants from propogation or seeds, but sadly I don't seem to make time to do this. I am going to work towards creating sweeping swatches of color using foliage plants and planting other perennials in 3's and 5's rather than all these individual plants which make things appear busy. I WILL move my plants around next year and not procrastinate...I WILL move............

I also want to work more on the bones of my gardens. When I first moved on this 20 acres of pasture land, I did not want to ruin the view by planting too many trees. Well, time has changed things and we now have houses popping up all over. Now I wish I had planted more trees and will continue to add trees to make my flowerbeds a bit more cozy and give my plants a bit of respite from the powerful sun and crazy wind.

I also want to finish all my unfinished projects, such as building my birdhouses, building and adding more seating, adding more mulch, finding a source for manure, planting more conifers, planting more lilies, and more fall blooming plants, watering much more than I did this summer, stop adding more beds and perfect the ones I already have....etc. etc. etc. Heck while I am at it I might as well quit my full time job and just finish all these resolutions. ha ha ha

LotusLady- Welcome!!!! We here in the MN forum live up to and swell far beyond "MN nice"! You are part of the family now! Have you ever tried wintersowing tree seeds? It works! Same with shrubs and such!! If you are planning to stick around and watch them grow- it is a great way to add to your gardens! You may want to add rooting cuttings to your must try list- many trees and shrubs will take to this treatment as well-
OH crocosima- the colors in you bed are amazing! I am trying to do something like that in my front beds with a bit more washed out colors- buffs- pale yellows- terracotta- burgundy- mahogany- and brownish pinks. A few favs I have from this year that may work for you as well are spilanthes-6-10" bronzy foliage with yellow and maroon centered heads- no petals! Bishops Children Dahlia- Deep chocolate/burgundy foliage with many different colored flowers- Chocolate salpiglossis- red cannas- castor beans- I still do not know how many seeds I may get harvested- but if any of these trip your trigger- let me know and we can sure swap seeds or what ever!
I am going to try to start less than 300 different types of seed this year.... It gets a bit hectic trying to plant them out- But boy I sure LOVE seeing the new types of plants that can come of them!
No more sweet peas- I can't make them bloom.
I also want to make my beds look more like garden beds- and keep the "nursery" items in the nursery beds.
I think I am going to try to be more hard hearted and just chuck some of the things I have way too many of instead of trying to find them all homes- who needs well over 100 Rudbeckia fuldiga in one 6'x13' bed- not me- thats for sure- especially when they keep making babies all over the rest of the garden! Or HUGE clusters of amaranth just because they decided to grow where I never intended them.
I am still going to continue to LABLE THE PLANTS as I go- I don't like seeing a forest of lables- but I do want to retain the names of the plants that I should know! I do need to be better at this- even though I am improving!
I intend to enjoy my gardens- and others as well- I intend to share what I can to those who enjoy as well- I truely think that is the best part of gardening- especially here on GardenWeb- the sharing of what we can with those who will enjoy or learn from what we can offer!
Happy Gardening to you!
Julie

I just cut down all the hollyhock stems today, and harvested seeds. My 'good intention' for next year, is to tie a ribbon (or something) on the stems that are particularily lovely, and cut the rest early so that I don't have that forest of dry hollyhock stems and maybe even have a few rebloomers (just read an article today that said hollyhocks will sometimes rebloom (shorter stems) if deadheaded properly - the article didn't say if there was a difference from one zone to another so will just try it and see). BTW, the seeds I harvested are from a really beautiful mix of hollyhocks that I grew from seed that came from a GW forum member in Tennesee. He said his mother had grown them for over 30 years. The mix was gorgeous! I'll have lots of these seeds for winter blues.

One other intention, if I can only restrain myself, is to plant less new plants and work more with the ones I already have, rearranging some, culling a few, and so on. This is going to be tough. I know I can't keep adding so many every year. I'm running out of space! But it is so tough not to bring home all those beautiful new plants. Wish I could GROW a few acres of ground around my house :-)

0. Do some winter sowing

1. Remove all the 30-40 ft boxelder trees the crazy former occupent let grow two feet from the foundation of the house

2. Make the front garden more formal with gravel (or mulch) paths and a large urn focal point

3. Put up window boxes/paint boxes and trim to match

4. Plant Russian Sage, Lord Baltimore Hardy Hibiscus, and dahlias behind the Hope for Humanity Roses in the foundation beds at the front of the house.

5. Plant a couple of Tina Crabapples and some red rose standards in the front bed to screen out the view of the street.

6. Use some Majesty Ferns as landscaping plants

7. Plant a couple of dwarf Honeycrisp Apple trees, and maybe two small cherry trees in the backyard.