Back To The Blog's Gardening Roots

I started this blog with the intent of it being a backyard gardening blog. That is evidenced by a number of other gardening blogs I had linked to 'share". But, because family member far away were reading it and hadn't yet found FaceBook, it turned out to be a life activities blog. I would like to change that now and get back to my gardening roots with sprinkles of foster dogs and life events. So, here's my backyard walk though this morning.

My giant dendrobium? (tags been gone for years) has a  - 6 bloom spike although it's bent from touching ceiling of screen porch 

This one is called the upside down orchid

Bromeliads galore at my house. This one was part of a living bouquet received when Jerry's mother passed in 2014.

Phalaenopsis from the live bouquet when Marge passed.

Peace lily - a potted plant from my step mother's funeral (2006)

I've never figured out what this plant is. tiny blooms directly on the leaves.

This is my deciduous dendrobium that everyone thinks is dead. Even I have thought it was dead a few times but, as you can see, here it comes for 2018!

We haven't done any maintenance on the planters yet and they were looking pretty sad until the rains. Now if it would only stop raining long enough to fresh them up for the season.

I thought the elephant ear were dead this winter but with the rains they have returned!

We used to have grass on this small strip of yard. Then we planted a tree, cut down the tree, planted it (no sprinklers here due to walkway installation), unplanted it and now it remains I dunno what. Usually the ladder is not there. Jerry was using it to trim the palm. So, I went thrifting and painted picture frames to give the area some color at least until we decide what to do with it.

Broom border

Bleeding heart vine on the fence. The gate really - not a great spot.

The weird from cousin Erica. Shocking how heavy that thing is. I think it is made of concrete.

This area of pots held much more delicate plants. Can't wait to get into refreshing them. 

Hopefully someday I will have the whole patio bordered in liriope and oyster plant. 

Marge Turns 92!

Happy Birthday! The facility where she lives had a party for her on the Friday before her actual day and we got a better photo that I will try to remember to scan. Here's Jerry helping her open her Belgium chocolates.

Just a random shot of orchids from my yard. I took them to the nail salon when I got my last pedicure.

Green Thumb Sunday

Daisey on the patio wondering what I am doing
What's left of my succulent garden after two years in what turned out to be a bad spot for succulents. My beautiful big jade tree did not survive the winter.

I've moved my succulents to the screen porch, and the orchids out to the key lime tree, so that I can better control how much water they receive.

This pot is actuallty broken but i like it so much that I am going to plant some string of pearls in it anyway. When my succulents were outside, something kept digging them out of this pot.

Orchids in key lime tree

My "pot" garden ;)

My backyard is a series of border gardens really.

The jasmine arbor freshly cut back.

Another bromeliad border.

Why is Blogspot adding these crazy spacings between my photos? I go to keep going back and deleteing the space but it never leaves it as I set it.

Nighttime Gardening

When we first moved to Florida from Alaska I was excited to work in the garden (bought Florida gardening books from Amazon.com as soon as I knew we were moving) but I hadn't adjusted to the climate and it seemed too hot during the way. My fix was to garden at night! Well we are having a hot summer this year, as many of you are, so I am back to night gardening. Makes it hard for photos but here's a little glimpse of my orchids tonight.

Green Thumb Sunday - Orchids

My upside down orchid


Phalaenopsis

Encyclia Tampensis saved from a chopped down tree about 5 years ago. Was about to go in the shredder, yikes! Notice all the bloom spikes.

Oncidium

Catttleya. The fragrance is similar to lilac.

Dendrobium nobile. I always think it is dead because it drops it's leaves and blooms on the old canes.

Dendrobium

Green Thumb Sunday

While green thumb Sunday is still on hiatus, er, more correctly I am on gardening hiatus, I do need to report the death of about a dozen orchids and the critical condition of a few more.We had some dangerously cold weather (by orchids standards) during one of my many trips to Arkansas and they were not brought into the house quickly enough.

So what I have now is a group of survivors and they do deserve more respect and care. The saddest part is that some of those lost were my favorites and that I lost the bloom on some once-a-year bloomers. I will be better, I will be better, I will better.......