A rainy day doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t do anything in or for your garden. If the rain is light and gentle and there are no thunderstorms or threats of lightning, you can do things like plant in the rain.

I like planting in the rain. But I won’t plant in the rain if there are thunderstorms or worse forecasted. But a regular light gentle rain is a very peaceful scenario to plant in and it’s great for your garden. Yes you might get a little soggy but you’ll get your plants in.

However, on a day like today when the weather is not necessarily going to be a nice calm gentle rain thanks to the remnants of Hurricane Ida, I have other things I can do.

This morning I made sure everything was secure that needed to be secure. I also brought in some cushions to save them from getting soaked yet again.

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What else did I do today? I cleaned and sharpened and oiled some of my pruning shears/secateurs. It’s really simple you can buy a little sharpening tool and you can just wash and dry with plain old dish soap and water. Then I oil with Tsubaki Japanese Knife Maintenance Camellia Oil. You can by Camellia oil on Amazon. I use this oil because I learned about it from Monty Don and Gardeners World.

A rainy day is also a good day to take stock of your garden from the inside. I find it helpful to look out from upper floors down into the gardens. It gives me a bird’s eye view —- sort of like you would get if you had a drone which I do not. Studying my garden like this has helped me decide in the past what to add, what to move, what I need to do. It’s also just nice to look at your garden.

On a rainy day you can also catch up on your garden reading. Those gardening magazines and books you haven’t had a chance to go through. Grab a cup of tea and dig in!

My last rainy day tip is to review your garden orders for fall. Work on what things you need to order, and review what you have ordered. I will be looking at my bulb orders to decide what is going to go where when it arrives.

The sun will eventually come out and we will be back at it soon enough! In the meantime, Chester County PA is under a tornado warning ⚠️.

Happy gardening.