Every year we have to put new annuals in our deck pots. Last year it was nasturtiums, salvia (Flaming Lips; the hummingbirds love them), and carnations. I admit I killed off the nasturtiums and carnations (we have coir baskets; with the kind of summer we had last year I should have watered every single day because they’re super evaporators) and ended up replacing them with geraniums and some kind of weird weed-looking thing with purple tips. This year it’s marigolds, impatiens, petunias, fuschia and other things.
In the actual pots we still have the jasmine and ornamental oregano and those weird weedy-looking things. In one of the coir baskets many of the herbs survived (not the basil, though; it never does) and the lavender in the hanging basket also survived, so we added some annuals and now it’s the Basket of All Purple.
The Flaming Lips look as though they might be trying to come back, too, but they’re so small you can’t see them. We’ve already had a couple of hummingbirds coming by and being decidedly irritable that there’s nothing for them yet.
So here’s a wider shot of the deck. This is where I sit after lunch while I dwell in the still quiet place before writing. Summer is finally here.
Nicola Griffith 
Looks idyllic. Unfortunately if I took a picture of my backyard all you’d see is a big ass tree that decided it had had enough and fell over. Fortunately, it didn’t take out anything of consequence.
Your deck is lovely, especially with the treetops in the background.
@Brooks: Oh, I hate it when trees die. In our last house we had to take down the most beautiful
Rainier cherry tree. It was still giving cherries but big limbs would fall off more frequently and it was getting dangerous to the house, cars, and people. I still miss it.
@Ro: One of things I like best about this house is that when the leaves are full, I can pretend I live in the middle of the woods.
Looks very “homey” Nicola. Tomorrow I find out if my troubles of the past two years is in part due to MS, we’ll see. Keep on keeping on.
@OldGymRat: Good luck.
Beautiful!
That looks beautiful and serene. Just lovely. Do you get to see a lot of bees? I love watching the bees.
Around March we get huge, slow-moving bumblebees. Towards the end of this month the shrubs that grow between our house and our neighbour with hum from dawn to dusk: the bees are so loud you can hear them over the birdsong, constant vibration. Some of them will venture to the back deck and investigate the flowers.