Sweet Buds for a Tuesday Blues Day.

Rescued from the dollar table, Ms. Cyclamen makes a fancy comeback.

Oh, I do love a 3-day weekend. Don't you? That one extra day seems to put everything right with the world.

Pinkie, here, is the only mini rose who likes me well enough to re-bloom.

If only we could have a 3-day weekend every week. Wouldn't life be grand? But that, of course, requires the torture of the obligatory 4th day...

 Howsabout an A+ for me being DISGUSTINGLY late with delivering the goods? This Amaryllis bud is a Christmas gift that may never get to her rightful 'owner.'

That 4th day, what I call the Tuesday Blues Day, is the first day back in the office when a surprising number of people are demanding the same dang thing:

Where's this?

Where's that?

Where's the other thing you promised to do??

How they amass such a coordinated effort over a long weekend is beyond me.

 

Seems there's no end to Ms. Orchid's polka dot party. Two plump buds promise fun stuff.

So, this Tuesday Blues Day could have been a nightmare were it not for the most amazing discovery in the kitchen window...

 

Oh, good Heavens! You're looking in the wrong place!

Look again:

Okay, so maybe it's not a bud. But, it's a promise of a bud! On a Phaleanopsis Moth Orchid who has been sound asleep since July.... She's workin' on a re-blooming. My very first attempt at the scary Orchids and this young lady has tossed her proverbial Orchid hat into the ring. 

PS! Did I title this blog post 'Buds'? Perhaps I should have called it BUGS. Because that's the threat from these little white specks below...

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day ~ January 2010

Find more blogger's blossoms at Carol's May Dreams Garden. She's the inventor of Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day.

Luscious Cyclamen

Every once in awhile someone will ask ~ if you're so into gardening why live so high up in the mountains?

My very first Cymbidium Orchid

I guess it's like a lot of things in life. It just happened. And, now that I'm here I'm not terribly interested in leaving. I love my mountains. The bright sunny skies, crisp fresh air. Living in the mountains makes winter fun.

Phaleanopsis Orchid (I fell in love with her polka dots.)

I suppose it would be harder on me if I lived in a normal house. But, this place has massive south-facing sunny windows that let me 'garden' all winter long.

Which is why I was so thrilled to discover that Carol's Garden Bloggers' Bloom Days allow indoor goodies. Because there's lots of little pretties smiling in my sunny window right now.

Snowy White Azaleas

Crazy Orange Kalanchoe

Over-achieving Edna, the Christmas Cactus I've owned since college. She began flowering in early November ~ showed off at least 100 blooms for Christmas and is now aiming to be my Valentine cactus as well!

Little help please? :)

And, then there's this sweet little hitchhiker ~ who sneaked indoors when I brought the house plants inside last autumn. A long, lanky vine with bright red buds. And, I haven't a clue. Do you?

Wordless Wednesday: Shred Betty and the Red Balloon

* For more Wordless Wednesday participants, click here.

If I Plant It, Will They Stay Forever?

"Did you watch it? 
Wasn't it enchanting?"

That was the coffee shop chat, earlier this morning, as my Hummingbird loving friends talked over 'Magic in the Air' ~ the PBS Nature Series Sunday episode. If you missed it, I've got you covered. Ditch this blog, click this link and prepare to be dazzled! (But please leave a comment B4 you go because I get really insecure when nobody says hi.)

This episode was all about Hummingbirds... those itty bitty darlings of my Western garden, who come and go though I wish they'd stay just a wee bit longer.

Interesting that every one of my gardening buddies picked up on the same thing... That the Hummers have recently revised their migratory pattern, doing a fly-by to enjoy the native plants in Baton Rouge.

Which got us wondering if we could do the same thing here!

I imagine that entails upping the ante on native Western flowers. (The natives have lots more nectar but then you already knew that, didn't you?)

They love my Honeysuckles, Penstamon, and Agastache Mints but those all bloom too late in the season... What, pray tell, do they prey upon in your garden? 

If you know of good EARLY bloomers, Spring and Early Summer flowering perennials, that hummingbirds just love, please let me know!

* Yeah, yeah, it looks as if I have no room for more plants, but that's not the case! Around this joint, there's always room for another flower...

F.A.C. and My Little Red Bird

"Oxygen into your lungs, brings fresh hope into your heart." - an Anonymous Smart Person

Does anyone have a recipe for homemade Finch food? Now that red bird and I are BFFs I'd love to keep him fat and happy.

I was madly trying to get my work done by high noon on Friday because it was the kick off to another fine year of fooling around for myself and KC.

As I pounded away on my computer, I heard a noise, glanced up to see that my little red bird was back again. This time, peering through an open window so I could snap a better shot.

 Morning frost sprinkles sparkly diamonds on the snow.

Allow me to repeat what I typed up above, just in case you missed it. Red Bird was peering through my open window.

While it's 26 BELOW zero at my brother's house, (he gets no sympathy from me; I told him to move) and miserably cold in all corners of the blogosphere... We're blessed with bright skies and comfy temps.

Which prompted us to don our snowshoes and hit the trail on our first 2010 FAC snowshoe adventure.

* FAC is short for Friday Afternoon [Hiking] Club, invented last year to stave off boredom, get in shape and embrace the wild world that surrounds us.

After 12 solid months of regular meetings we still only have 2.5 members: KC, Bad Dog and me. As I type this, all stiff and sore from yesterday's hard work, it's dawning on me as to why it's so hard for us to recruit new members!  :)

PS: This is my backyard. Those tracks behind the always stylin' KC is proof positive we actually left the yard. Dig that bright red flower adorning her cap!

Owning Up to '09

One of my 2009 resolutions was to hybridize my very own Columbine.  Of all the things I pledged to do last year, that's the one that got me a ton and a half of emails.*

I'm finding it hard to come up with 2010 resolutions when I'm still fretting about the stuff I resolved to do last year.  So I revisited last January's blog post to see what, if anything, I had accomplished.

Owning up to '09:

2009 Resolution #1: Finish Rock Garden, part two.
Done! Not only done ~ extra credit!!! In the form of 287 spring bulbs squeezed into that pretty little spot. So, there.

'09 Resolution #2: Grow all of my own summer veggies.
A couple heirloom tomatoes, a few squiggly carrots, rotted beans and awol snap peas (bad rabbit!) though I am NOT calling this a complete failure because 1) I tried and 2) having nothing to eat fit quite nicely into my next resolution....

'09 Resolution #3: Lose 1 pound, per month, throughout 2009 
Done! Losing a pound a month was a piece of cake! Oh, fine... I avoided the piece of cake but what really did the trick was saying no to the most important food group for this Irish Lass: potatoes. Plus, I snowshoed. Everywhere. Did you know that snowshoeing burns more calories than blogging? 'Tis true.

'09 Resolution #4: Install a water feature.
I plugged in the old one. Does that count?

'09 Resolution #5: Go on vacation with the horse.
Spoke to the powers that be (that would be me!) and I got an extension on this one. Bella and I head to Arizona on our first ever horse and rider vacation, March 20th, 2010.

'09 Resolution #6: Hybridize my very own Columbine.
This got a lot of people talking! Blogging friends were very impressed! While I appreciate the fact that some folks thought I was a botanical brainiac this resolution was nothing more than a cross-pollinating magic trick. You see, Columbines have the loosest morals of any perennial I know, happily messing around with whatever Columbine is growing nearby.

It goes something like this...

Purple meets Yellow.

Yellow thinks Purple is kind of cute.

They go out on a couple of dates...
Things are working out pretty well...

Bada bing,
Bada boom...

Twins!

Okay, maybe not quite like that but you get the picture.

* Full disclosure. I can't even tell you if the chemical term K means potassium or phosphate. Haven't a clue how to hybridize Columbines (though I loved all of your emails!) I leave Columbine pollination up to the hummingbirds.

Late Bloomer

YOU, SLACKER!

Oh, sure... Now you decide to bloom.

Now that Christmas is over and gifts have been given.

After you were shoved to the side, another plant purchased, and gifted instead. Was this a secret plot to remain amongst your friends in my sunny window?

Yeah, yeah. You're pretty. But, no A for effort from me.

Howsabout an A+ for dragging your feet?

I planted you the same day as the rest of the gang ~ with all my Amaryllis bulbs ~ who are out the door and off to happy homes. 14 long weeks ago!

 

* Okay! I'll admit it... I talk to my plants and sometimes I give 'em hell. Don't you?