Gardening ups and downs

We had bought a Japanese maple at the end of the season last year when they were a bit more reasonably priced. I was so excited this spring when it started to leaf. Then the margins of the leaves started to turn brown and crisp. We tried moving it to other areas, it is a large pot for now until it gets bigger. It didn't like the flowerbed and it doesn't like a shadier area we tried. I've tried to keep up with how much water it was getting to see if that was it...too much shows the same symptoms as too little.

Today I finally googled the problem and found that it is probably just too hot and it isn't liking it so far. I know they grow here, because I had another variety of Japanese maple in the past. My husband gave it a little too much tender loving care and that was that. I'd babied it along for years from a tiny little thing. My grief was profound, but I got over it. :o)

Here is a very helpful website if you are having problems with your Japanese maple
http://en.allexperts.com/q/Plant-Diseases-715/2008/8/japanese-blood-maple.htm

Happy gardening and I feel like an idiot for waiting so long to find out what the heck is wrong with it. I'm also thinking about not planting tomatoes in our little garden. We had very poor luck with them and I think our neighbor's trees are blocking the sun too much. Otherwise we did just what we always do and in the past we have had bunches. I'm blaming it on the weird weather we had in the spring and the lack of sunlight. That's my story and I'm sticking with it.
I'm also going to buy some large tomatoes and pot them up and keep them in the greenhouse this winter. Durnit...I'm going to get the good out of that thing. It did work wonderfully to overwinter a ton of mature plants that gave us a good start this spring.

Last week we got some fab medium size mums, gold lantana, and some yellow and gold marigolds to start getting some fall color. I loved that so much last year. Our mums came back and bloomed off and on all summer. I love that! I'm not loving the strained back from lifting heavy pots. I forgot about the whole dang arthritis thing.

So far no horrors on the in law front this today so far, but the day isn't over yet. Sometimes we just have to laugh it gets so crazy.

Our youngest daughter is staying with us while she trains the woman who moved into her position this month. It is good to have her around again. She is so fun. She wanted me to make spaghetti for dinner tonight, so I'm off to the grocery store now.