Tool Time: FreezePruf
Like everybody else even vaguely associated with garden writing, I have received a bottle of FreezePruf in the mail.
The product, made by the people who produce Liquid Fence, is new this fall, and it is designed to increase the cold tolerance of your tender plants by 9 degrees. This includes annuals, ornamentals, fruits and vegetables.
According to its makers, the product strengthens the cell walls in the plants so that they stay in tact when the cell expands in the cold.
The goal here is not to have your tomato plants last until Thanksgiving. The goal is to protect your tender plants from one of those dreadful Arctic blasts that comes and then goes. And it is also designed to protect seedlings in the spring from a sudden cold snap.
"It is like moving 200 miles south," the manufacturer proclaims.
"Like anti-freeze for your plants," is a less appetizing claim.
The weather has been wet but warmish here in my part of Zone 7. But I am going to apply FreezePruf to a few of the tender plants on my deck and in my borders, and wait for that first frosty night. The application should last six weeks, according to the manufacturer.
I will let you know how it works.
Totally, absolutely, completely impractical for gardening. But aren't these wonderful hand-painted canvas shoes to die for? 
Bubble wrap for your containers? Whoda thought?
The replica of the White House vegetable garden, created by the home gardening company, W. Atlee Burpee & Co., at its 
And we thought we were in charge in the garden.
The saga of the rain garden installation, which was completed late Friday, took a dramatic turn on Saturday when a series of storms swept through Annapolis, causing not one, but three "gully-washers."
I love projects that involve shopping!
Rain gardens are often new gardens, installed in public spaces or at new construction where there are water issues. Or by homeowners who have water problems they want to solve. 
Today begins the installation of my rain garden.
The power of the press.
Matt Lehman, the Kansas college student who is growing vegetables in his dorm room, has posted an update on his blog, Dorm Room Garden.
A very young vegetable gardener is one of People magazine's Heroes Among Us.
It only seems appropriate that on the weekend of the fall White House Garden Tours, Garden Variety should take a look at a new coffee table book about the White House interiors.
For today's Tool Time post, Garden Variety is going back in time.
Hostas are easy to grow and, apparently, even easier to propagate. There are hundreds of species and thousands of cultivars out there, and they all have to have names. 
While the school children and the first lady were busy growing vegetables on the South Lawn of the White House this summer, the bees were busy, too.
Friday, 6:30 to 9:30 p.m., 
I'm not an ornithologist, but I thought birds were seed-etarians. Or worm-etarians. 
We are all better gardeners in the spring.
Winterizing the Water Garden
Calling moles "the Taliban of mammals," and describing a campaign of military proportions, "Arthur" of Connecticut is the winner of Sweeney's third annual "I hate moles because ... " essay contest.
