May's Parade of Roses and Blooms, Part 2

May is the month of roses here in the Rosehaven Cottage gardens, particularly in the front garden where most of the rosebushes reside. Over the next couple of posts, let me take you on a photographic tour of our front gardens in all their May splendor. All the color makes this one of my favorite times of the year.

Above: My Dover Beach bearded iris is a late-bloomer this year compared to the rest of the bearded iris,

but I'm glad it is so that I can enjoy its cool blue loveliness all by itself.

Above: One of my favorite flowers is the biennial foxglove with its leopard-spotted throats and tall stems.

I first remember seeing them growing in the landscaping along the queue at Disneyland's Matterhorn Bobsleds attraction, and foxgloves have always reminded me of Disneyland ever since.

Above: Little touches of white blossoms are garden essential, in my opinion.

Right now the My Fifi rose (left) is covered in petite white blossoms and looks far more mature than

I thought it would be since it just joined the garden as a bareroot in early 2007.

Over the past 8 years, the Princess Diana bower vine (right) has draped itself

all of the front pergola that welcomes visitors to Rosehaven Cottage.

I brought it in a pot from the apartment we lived in before coming here. This bower vine has become a symbol of the act of putting down roots somewhere and finally having a home of our own.