Niece and nephew helping ( I think.)

Niece comes to visit for an afternoon, but I have to plant the roses. She doesn't garden. But she says she will help even though she is wearing white pants!

Nephew soaks the roses in a bucket. You are supposed to soak the roots a few hours prior to planting.

My new Austin Roses arrived in a box today. They are three of them, bare root, scraggly ones, but large like they usually are. They are in a box in the garage until I can plant them tomorrow. I wonder how they will grow. Where will I plant them? I will probably dig up that Terrible Tomato–yes, it is still alive. My brother explained its unbelievable lifespan as “determinate” vs. “indetermiate” plants. This must be an indeterminate tomato because it has never died despite the winter. It even had three tomatoes on it, but they just now rotted and erupted. Weird. Anyway, I will rip it up and plant the Queen of Sweden there. Oh no, I didn’t buy that one. I bought, Jude the Obscure, Harlow Carr and James Galway — I love those very British names. I love Thomas Hardy so Jude the Obscure was a perfect rose. (Queen of Sweden wasn’t recommended for my climate. Oh my!) Anyway, too bad they didn’t have Tess of the D’Urbevilles or Charlotte or The Lady of the Lake — I’m sure I would have bought those too.

P.S.  As you can see from the above photos, I had some help planting the roses. That was very nice since i did not want to leave them in the garage in a box any longer than I had to. I think my niece and nephew survived. I hope my rose did, too!