Well, we got a tenth of an inch of rain yesterday. Not enough to do much good.

That means we are going to have to get the sprinkler out, which I did. But it will not move now, and I can't figure out how to fix it, so that means bying a new one. Maybe I should get one with no moving parts.

So, let's go with the photos. The top one is Bright Eyes phlox, a flower that stands out in the garden. It is a favorite of Steven Palmer at Plainview Farms in North Yarmouth. While walking through his gardens last week I decided to do this Sunday's column on blossoms for late in the season, and used a lot of his ideas.

The Queen Anne's Lace in the second photo is really a weed, related to carrots, and it probably has eaten up more of our vegetable garden than it should. But it does look good, massed together like this, and it is also an excellent cut flower. But still, we should probably dig some of it out this fall.

The columbine (aquilegia) took me by surprise, mostly because I consider it a spring flower and everything is blooming early this year. But Nancy told me it is a type that blooms later, and we don't have the name of it.

And the anise hyssop, or agastache, is a member of the mint family and native to the United States if not Maine. It has an aroma close to licorice and the blossoms are almost always covered with bees.

We have our son, daughter-in-law and 3 year-old granddaughter and

1-year-old grandson coming this weekend, which will make it busy – along with all the traffic from Beach to Beacon. I expect it to be a good time, anyway. I expect to put the 3-year-old to work picking blueberries, which she is really quite good at. The trick is going to be to get her to put at least a few into a container other than her mouth. It really doesn't matter, because they are good for her.

About the Author

Tom Atwell has written the Maine Gardener column in the Maine Sunday Telegram since the spring of 2004. He has worked at the Press Herald/Sunday Telegram since 1974, about the same time he started gardening with any seriousness.

He gardens with his wife, Nancy. She not only is the better gardener of the pair, but also knows the botanical names of plants. They have two grown children and four grandchildren.

Tom was born in Skowhegan, grew up in Farmington and graduated from the University of Maine with a BA in journalism. His goal each year is to have continuous compost from his three compost bins, continuous bloom in his low-maintenance garden and more fruits and vegetables on his family table than the garden pests eat in the field.

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