It’s the 15th, and time for another Bloom Day post. This week, we’ve had nothing but rain, and lots of it. About eight inches, which is just crazy for this part of Texas. The garden has had a good, long, deep watering, courtesy of Mother Nature, who doesn’t often help out with the water bill. On the minus side, it rained so hard that a lot of the blooms have been knocked off the plants—but that’s OK, because in a few weeks, the whole garden will explode in appreciation.

Anyway, here’s what’s blooming in the garden today:

My three little four nerve daisies are valiantly blooming away, come rain or shine. I just bought another gallon-sized plant to put in behind them, so there will be a nice little cluster of yellow daisies right by the front door. Sweet!

The roses seem to be holding their own. The yellow rose at left is the one with all the fragrance, and despite its checkered past, it seems to be steadily blooming, and farily disease free, which is a small miracle. The yellow Knockout roses, below, are still sort of under-sized, but one is blooming abundantly, while the other is not blooming at all. I think Miss Not Blooming At All will be moving to the yellow bed with her sister soon. I’m thinking she’s just not getting enough sun.

In the shade bed, the iris is blooming here and there. In the Dallas planting guide, it says to divide iris now, which makes me nervous. I think I’ll wait a little longer.

While I’m dividing, the Mexican petunias below are prime candidates. My three small plants all look like this one now—huge, with obvious multiples, and covered with blooms. I need to do some reading, and find out when prime time for dividing these might be, because I really want to spread them out to cover more of the bed, almost as edging.

Moving back out into the blazing sun, the gaura is so tall that the rain made it bend forward. It’s covered with white blooms, which look so pretty when they’re whirling in a breeze. I love this plant, but I’m not convinced I should have planted it in such an open area. I wish the white cherry sage in front of them would grow faster, and provide a little support.

Across the walkway, the coral cherry sage is blooming. I lost the center portion of two of the three bushes this summer, so they’re both sort of fan shaped right now, but this plant is so forgiving, I have a feeling that when I cut them back, they’ll fluff right out into shape again.

The lantana is going through this interesting cycle where it blooms like crazy, then all the flowers fall off, and black seed pods appear, which I knock off—and then, it bursts into bloom again. I have visions of thousands of little lantana sprouts…

Moving to the backyard, I have some of the tallest, craziest marigolds blooming in the veggie beds. They’re HUGE! I’ve had to pull some out, because while I wanted them to shade the tender bush bean plants, they’re now blocking out all the sun.

Fall tomatoes are blooming, but so far, no fruit has set. I have high hopes for this latest group of flowers, since the weather has been cooler, and we’re now dipping into the 60s at night. I’ve harvested three fat, squishy green tomato hornworms this week. Am I the only one who says “you little bastard” whenever I find one of these chowing down on my tomato vines?

The fall zucchini are blossoming, but mostly male flowers so far. Only one squash has set, and I whisper encouraging words every time I weed—which is daily, because the nut grass seems determined to take over this part of the yard. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for some decent zucchini this fall, because the spring crop was sparse.

My sweet little ichiban eggplants are blooming, and I’ve already harvested one decent fruit. These grow long and slender, like cucumbers.

That’s it for this month. Here’s hoping for a brilliant fall!

This post is for Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day. On the 15th of every month, gardeners from around the world snap pics of what’s blooming in their gardens. If you blog about your garden, join in!