COVID conditions continue causing us to alter the way we do things. Everything has changed from the “normal” of just one year ago and that includes how the Fleur de Lis Garden Club of Sachse will conduct the first get together of its 2020-2021 meeting year.

The original plan was to meet in the Sachse Library meeting room as we’ve always done. Due to current circumstances and the City of Sachse’s precautionary measures to ensure the health and safety of citizens, our plans have changed. Instead, we are working on setting up a Zoom meeting for members only at 1 PM on Monday, September 28.

Our speaker at this meeting will be Dallas County Master Gardener Janet. D. Smith. She will tell us all about “Sex in the Garden” or how fertilization takes place in our flower beds and gardens. Club members will receive instructions on how to tune in with Zoom to hear the program and participate in the meeting. How nice it will be to see everyone’s smiling face after all these months!

Hope is on the horizon that this unprecedented year of life-altering events will soon be behind us. Nature has smoothed the way a bit with several nice days of rain to keep fall gardens growing. Cooler weather is coming, a welcome relief from the hot and dry summer we’ve had. It’s time to make plans to divide perennials that may have spread beyond their intended spot. Dividing them will ensure better and more vigorous blooming next spring and summer and provide you with extra plants to move to another location or to share with friends.

Fall is the perfect time for planting perennials, spring bulbs, roses, trees and bushes. Keep them watered so that their root systems can become established before really cold weather gets here.

If you have room on your property and if you can find the seeds, plant some bluebonnets this fall. Many of the bluebonnet blooming areas around Sachse have disappeared due to “progress” or housing developments. Peak blooming time for bluebonnets is April so seeds planted now should bloom this spring.

The National Weather Service predicts the first frosts in our area will likely happen this year between November 11 and November 20. Keeping this in mind, there’s still time to plant a fall garden. Carrots, collards, kale, spinach, parsley and onions are just a few veggies that should come to harvest before the predicted first freeze in the Dallas area of November 22. Local nurseries and big box stores should still have seedlings to choose from. Pick larger plants to give you a head start and keep them well watered.

Having a vegetable garden used to be a normal way of life for families. Nowadays, these backyard garden plots have been largely replaced by the produce section of our grocery stores. Smaller home lot rule out having a large veggie garden, but a lot of veggies can be grown in containers on the back patio and provide enough for a small family to enjoy a bit of home grown freshness this fall.