Still a Few Flowers in this Crunchy Summer

I don't water my perennial beds, just my small vegetable garden. We have been fortunate enough to have a little bit of rain (enough to fill my buckets under my downspouts, but not more). Despite these arid conditions, I do have a few things which have managed to bloom. Perhaps you have also had these same blooms in your gardens.

Delphiniums which usually get beaten down by the rain have stood tall for a greater length of time this July.

I love how iridescent they are. They remind me of carnival glass.

This dark wine, almost "black" daylily is one of my favourites. I don't get many blooms from it, but it is thick and meaty, unlike my other rather spindly daylilies.

Very dependable snowball bush which just seems to thrive on either neglect, or severe cutting back. It doesn't wilt like my little decorative pink hydrangeas.

My trumpet vine took forever to become established enough to bloom. This year it is doing very well and the hummingbirds are enjoying it. It is difficult to tell from the picture, but it is covering a wooden arbour attached to rail fences.

I'm not totally certain what this flower is, some sort of coreopsis, I think. It is tall and big and doing very well. I don't even remember its origins, whether I purchased it as a plant from a garden center, or whether it was gifted to me from someone's home garden. Regardless, it provides nice, bright colour right now.

My hollyhocks have been dwindling over the years. I had so many that were gorgeous dark pinks, light pinks, and a whole variety of other colours. Now many of them are washed out shades and too solitary to make much of an impact. I'm considering whether I should renew my supplies, or do away with them altogether.

You simply cannot go wrong with limelight hydrangeas. It would be the one I would recommend to anyone in any setting.

A traditional daylily. I have others which are more orange in colour, as well as a pure lemon yellow. Even though daylilies tend to be pretty bomb proof, mine are suffering in this drought and aren't putting on much of a show.

Of course, I don't feature my sad, dry, lifeless plants, or the strangulating bind weed which threatens to take them down, or the grasses that grow amongst all of them. I did pick a cucumber this morning and I have eaten three tiny tomatoes - candyland is what that variety is called- smaller than cherry tomatoes.

How doth your gardens grow?