Summer Rhododendron Shrub....

 

Green Grow the Leaves.....Oh!

I assume, Dear Readers, that some of you might be wondering whether I was keeping up with making the Summer Rhododendron Shrub. Well, I can assure you that I am on it! No slacking at all! I had calculated after assembling the Blossoming Shrub, that I would need somewhere in the Vicinity of 40 batches of leaves for the Summer Shrub. The Blossoming Shrub had 125 blossoming stems (with leaves) and about another 80 or 90 stems with only leaves. Each stem has about 7 leaves on it (a few have more or less). There are 40 leaves to a batch, so 40 batches makes 1600 individual leaves. At a certain point I decided that I needed to assemble the leafy stems as I made the leaf batches.... one batch of leaves per day for forty days! Yesterday was the completion of the 40th batch! (I took weekends off for the most part.)

Here is the fortieth batch under way....

And here it is completed!

This is the assembly area....

Once each batch of leaves is dry

 I fold the stems and cut them apart 

and collect them in this dish.

Here is the collection of assembled leafy stems

 waiting to be attached to the Shrub...

Here is the daily batch while the glue is drying....

You have to keep them from bumping anything....!

So while I have been busily making

 the leafy stems, Dear Readers,

 I have also been planning the "storage box"

 for the Blossoming Shrub.

And today was the day to get it built!

You might recall that I did the same for the Lilac Shrubs 

so they are protected during their "off seasons"!

Of course, it needed to be labeled!

It was trickier than the lilac boxes because 

the Rhododendron Shrub leans around the corner

 of The Folly Dollhouse and hangs down over the embankment.

I had to construct a support structure

 of a similar shape inside the box 

so the branches that go around the corner

 are not permanently squished!

I used builders foam... 

the same as the base for The Folly Garden itself.

And now the Blossoming Spring Rhododendron Shrub

 is safely tucked away in its own protective box

 until next Spring!

And I am madly assembling the leafy stems onto the Summer Shrub....

I got about twenty more leafy stems glued on today!

That on top of the thirty I had glued on since the beginning of July...

So give or take a week or three and

 the Summer Leafy Rhododendron Shrub

 should be completed!

And then, Dear Readers, 

All I will need to do is make another 40 batches of Leaves

 for the Winter Snowy Rhododendron Shrub.....

'Cause the Rhododendron Shrubs

 are Evergreens... Oh!