The Beginner's Garden, Phase 10

In late spring, you'll note, even the weeds look pretty. But pull them up. Think of it as editing—you're removing the excess so that the remaining things make a clearer point.

There's time still to redecorate your bed or rearrange plants that have gotten crowded, before the height of summer. It's true that you can move anything any time, as long as you water sufficiently, but heat pulls water out of the leaves and puts a lot of stress on the plant.

Sun gardeners: Take a walk through a nursery and consider adding tender salvia to your bed. This is the sage family, and there are some beautiful ones from South America that will bloom for months, though winter will likely kill them off. Consider the silver-leaved plants. Make your bed a little bigger and add perovskia, aka Russian sage (silver with a purple flower), or echinops, aka globe thistle. These are tall plants. For a very inexpensive form of redecoration of the front of your bed, plant some seeds of alyssum or nigella.

Shade gardeners: Think about adding some subtle yellow. The name corydalis may seem unfamiliar, but when you see it, you may well realize you've glimpsed this small plant growing in the cracks of walls or beside rocks. Alchemilla, aka lady's mantle, another front-of-the-bed plant, will give you yellow-green velvety leaves and a spray of similarly hued flowers, a good contrast with the dark green leaves of ferns or hellebores.