Pinstripe has got to be in the top 20 of my favorites. It's so damned CUTE!

Closeup of something so adorable!

Pinstripe

A White mini that I got as a half-dead rose from Home Depot last year (you know, the ones that are in the tropical plant section w/the African violets).

The red NOIDs are coming in more pink this year. Huh.

This is the one in the corner that gets to be about 2' across.

Here's the one that was mingled in w/the yellow mums so beautifully last year.

I now have to call this one a pink NOID. :(

Tequila Sunset has such little bitty flowers...

And my Stainless Steel in the front has a magnificently beautiful bud!!! Perfect! (the fuzzies you see on the unopened buds is from the neighboring cottonwood trees.)

Magnificent bud, indeed.

Escapade didn't do much for me either. I was almost relieved when the gophers ate it.

This past weekend was 3 days of steady rain. Rain rain rain rain. But sure did help some of the roses decide that they want to open! I actually have buds on plants that are about 4" tall. Pathetic.

Anyways, here's a second set of pictures taken early this morning. Early I mean about 8:30am. But, since the sun doesn't pop over the neighboring houses/trees until after 8:30-9am, this is early. So there'll be a lot of shadows in some of the pictures and I had to fiddle w/the brightness on some of them to get closer to true-to-color.

Starting with my "flowerbed" in the front of the yard, here's my petunias & others.

Now we're going to jump over to my mini bed. I need to count how many minis I have here. I also need to move the humungo mums that I planted there 3 years ago (they were the little bitty $1 plants from Home Depot.. some of them are already over a foot tall). This is the corner red/pink NOID from Walmart (you know, those little potted roses that they sell for like $8).

Baby Faurax is really going to town.

Bees Knees is already starting to flower out!

This particular bed is "L" shaped, so now we're on the long leg which is alongside the garage on the east side & gets little sun. Which will be rectified on Sunday as I'm having my massive aspen removed from the front yard. It shades the wrong part of my house during the wrong time of day, and all the benefits are for the neighbors as it shades their house nicely in the afternoon. I hate aspens...

Anyways, Heinrich Karsch is really ramping up now. Too bad it's a one-trick pony. :(

In front of Heinrich I have a couple of microminis and some standard minis. Here's Julia Ann (closed bud) w/a NOID white from Walmart.

Closeup of the white. Beautiful.. too bad no scent. I may dig this one, the two red NOIDs, and the apricot NOID and give those away so I can put roses that I *do* know about. Ah, the follies of being a new gardener and putting in everything and their cousins w/o thinking & planning.

Here's the other red NOID. Great blooming machine, though...

Almost hidden next to that red NOID is my Pinstripe. She's adorable, totally adorable.

Along side Pinstripe is my Vista, which is decaying now, so I didn't take any pictures (who wants to see dead buds?). However, my Ring of Fire (?) is starting to put out a bud or two. (At least I *think* this is Ring of Fire.. need to find the tag)

Across from my minibed is where all the main roses are in the front yard. I have to actually sit down & count, but I know there's over 70 roses there. And that's why I have.. 5? blooming. Yikes... not good odds. EVERYONE had buds, though, so when they all bloom out, it'll actually look like a rose garden rather than a brown mulch mess. :(

So here's one of them: Tequila Sunset. I don't remember this rose being this full or orangey last year. I guess it's because it was a new rose & hadn't settled in well yet. Just wish that the flower was a bit larger.