The gorgeousness of my mother’s hibiscus

Tags

hibiscus, postaday2016

How gorgeous are they? Believe it or, these are the first blooms she has gotten all year. Inside or out, at least she finally got blossoms, the wait was more than worth it.

Beautiful color to brighten a winter’s day

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hibiscus, postaday2016

  
When I turned the corner into the dining room and saw this exquisite bloom, my stress melted away. Hibiscus blooms are one of my favorites, I love their delicate crepe paper appearance with the strong sword of their gorgeous reproductive organs(their yellow stamen and their red pistil) boldly jutting out for all the bees, humming birds and butterflies to see.

I love having seasonal blooms outside their season in my house, it makes me feel like the best gardener in the world.

  

Daily Prompt: Morton’s Fork

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hibiscus, postaday2015, snow

If you had to choose between being able to write a blog (but not read others’) and being able to read others’ blogs (but not write your own), which would you pick? Why?

I hate these choices because they are just silly ultimatums. Rarely in life are there ever true zero sum situations; it is often only limits that we impose on ourselves for a variety of reasons.

That being said if I am going to play the game; then I have to state that I wouldn’t be able to read other blogs because as I have written many times in the past, it is imperative for my mental and emotional health to write each and every day. I would have to sacrifice my readings and it would hurt me a lot because I look forward to reading what my friends have to say about a whole variety of subjects. I have developed some very important friendships and it would be a cruel choice to have to make and so that is why I dislike these silly hypothetical questions; it’s a false premiss designed for dramatic purposes and that is it.

On a happier note; I posted two pretty pictures to brighten the post. A beautiful apricot hibiscus to warm the insides while the outside is blanketed under a thick cover of white snow.

Why poinsettias?

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hibiscus, poinsettias, postaday2014

Over the years my husband has purchased so many poinsettias and I admit that they are very pretty. I have gotten discouraged over the years because no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t keep them alive past February. So this year when my husband asked me if I wanted a poinsettia, I said no and you wouldn’t believe it but this morning I woke up to a deep red hibiscus bloom! Who needs poinsettias when you have a hibiscus ready to bloom for you. 😀

A bloom amidst the cold

Tags

bloms, hibiscus, postaday2014

My son and I were talking this morning and I mentioned that some people were simple souls, he said that he believed that he was one of those people with simple souls. I added that I thought that I was also one who was a simple soul. I pointed out that the joy of seeing an apricot hibiscus bloom was a gift and that is how I define simple souls; the ability to relish the here and now, appreciate a good song, a blue sky, a bloom or a snowflake. My son lives for music, he is happy strumming his guitar, performing on stage, all the things that nurture his musicality and all that feeds his soul.

The pictures of the hibiscus buds, that will bloom red in a day or so puts a smile on my face. They may have shed most of their leaves since they have been inside, but their hearts are still warm with blooms that they are willing to share with me. I love my hibiscus.

My favorite bloom

Tags

blooms, hibiscus, plants, postaday2014

My very first hibiscus bush has bloomed for the first time in over two years. I was starting to fret about my hibiscus last summer when I waited and waited and there was not a bloom to be found; I was worried about what I had done wrong to my hibiscus; did I have to start feeding it? I had never done it before and I hadn’t fed the other two and they were producing blooms frequently, did I prune it incorrectly? I had so many questions on my mind regarding my first hibiscus. I had specifically picked it because I fell in love with the delicate color of the bloom, a subtle apricot color. And I was beyond disappointed that I hadn’t seen the beauty of that subtle shade in so long.

I was so happily surprised to see the blooms yesterday when we arrived after the long drive from Virginia, I had thought that I was going to have to prune my hibiscus and feed it well when it was ready to go back outside. I am still going to prune the hibiscus after the blooms fade, but I think that I will forgo on the feeding, the other two hibiscus reds aren’t going to be pruned this year, they have been blooming non stop and I think that they will need keep whatever energy is stored in their branches. I can’t wait to put my hibiscus babies outside and watch them replenish their leaves and come back to the glory of their former selves. It has been wonderful to have the brilliant red blooms throughout the winter, but I have to confess seeing those red blooms at the end of spindly bare sticks is a little sad.

Here is to putting my plants back outside where they belong in the sunshine and the warmth and seeing them thrive.

Tales of frustration and patience gathering from the backyard

Tags

bougainvilla, Gardening, hibiscus, postaday2012, tropical plants

apricot hibiscus

my first red hibiscus bloom!!

the first bud on my other red hibiscus

bougainvillea, a present from my hubby

same bougainvillea from another angle

my mandevilla flowering vine, a birthday present from my bestie

the same mandevilla vine from another angle

another view of the red hibiscus

My tale isn’t a bad one, it is really about trial and error and learning from my mistakes and ignorance of plants, zones, hardiness, soil conditions etc. There is so much to gardening, it is scientific if you want it to be, it’s creative and nurturing and it can give you a good workout. Gardening is whatever you want it to be. All my pictures above are my lessons about not knowing what you are buying. An excellent example are my hibiscus, I love all three of them, but if I had known that they truly belong in a much hotter climate, I wouldn’t have purchased them. Each winter, I bring them in but my house isn’t very suitable as a greenhouse, so it’s always with crossed fingers that I tend to them during the winter as they lose their leaves and look pitiful, they brighten up in late May when they go back outside. I have been keeping them alive for five years now, so I am doing something right. The same goes for the Bougainvillea tree and the Mandeville vine, those two are tropical plants, so when they come inside for the winter, their leaves completely drop off and I am left with two corpses for the long winter. The Bougainvillea is now in its third year and I haven’t gotten a blossom from it yet, so hopefully this summer I’ll be lucky. The Mandeville is new from last year, so I’ll let you know how it likes it up here in Blandford. The key to keeping these southern plants alive is luck, patience and over the winter, taking care not to over-water at all. You just want to keep the root system alive, you needn’t worry about the leaves, even though it is so sad to see them denude themselves so rapidly.