R is for Roses

For those of you who have been faithfully following along on my journey from A to Z, allow me to apologize for the lack of a new post last week.
Out-of-town conferences and field trips had me all out of sorts.
(4 hours on a school bus can really mess a girl up).

I will also admit that I am struggling with the letter "R."


I have a few ideas, but nothing sounds all that great. Okay, honestly I have only had one idea and that is "RED." But that seems kind of boring to me.

This post came about after a trip to Lowe's yesterday. We moved into this house in October (I know, I know I've said that a million times...) and I can do just about anything INSIDE the house. I have ideas upon ideas when it comes to INTERIOR decorating.
Take me out the door and ask me to look at the yard and well, the
inspiration just STOPS.

I have little to no talent in the landscaping or gardening realm. Forget green or brown thumb, let's just say I have NO thumb. I can't keep things alive and I have no idea what to even plant so that I can kill it later.

My house is crying for some color. You have seen pictures of the front:
It's all beige. The back is even worse. More beige, on the house, on the deck...it's really bad.

Anyway, this post is not about the color of my house. Nor is it to try to make you feel sorry for my beigeness. It is about a little gem of a plant that even I cannot kill. Actually, can't kill is not even accurate.
Here is a plant that I can make GROW!!!

Knock-Out Roses.
Have you ever seen them?
(You probably have because you all probably have
nice, chartreuse colored thumbs.)
Anyway, in our old house I planted three double knock-out rose bushes and they grew HUGE in less than 2 months.
(I drove by the old house the other day and they have bloomed again this year in full force.)

This is not the old house, but this is what most of the bushes in this area look like. They will bloom like this all summer. I prefer the "double knock-outs" to the regular
knock outs. Here is a close up of both:

This is the single variety.

This is the double knock-out. These look more like traditional roses.

Here is the kicker. I had thought about replacing some of the bushes that run along the back driveway with these roses, but that was going to mean buying about 6 rose bushes. I wasn't ready for that price commitment.

I went to Lowe's yesterday with plans to buy some ferns. As I was eavesdropping, I learned they had marked down many of their plants.
(I bought three hydrangea bushes for $12 each--those are my absolute fav, but that is a post for another day).
The double knock-out roses were marked down to less than $10!!! These usually are $25/bush. The only draw back was the pink ones were the only ones that were on sale. I didn't have any I was trying to "match" so I went for it!! I was so excited. I came home and put them where I wanted them to be planted and it is so nice to drive up on the backside of the house and see the sweet pinkness there to greet me!!

It should be mentioned that in my excitement I managed to lose my cellphone.
That too is a post for another day...