Tag Archives: flowers

blossom…

14 Tuesday Jul 2020

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the water lilies are doing very well and I think the fish are enjoying the shade they provide…

I purchased two from RPGC and have been checking daily in the hope that there might be a bud coming…

on July 10 I spotted something that might prove to be one…

I’ve been checking everyday and was thrilled to discover I was right…

it takes a long time for one to emerge from the base of the pot and climb up through a couple of feet of water…

waited patiently… and on Sunday it popped to the surface…

yesterday, it opened a little bit and today it opened completely;-)…

happily…

14 Tuesday Jul 2020

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enjoying time in the garden…

the dahlias are doing well and happily they are opening at different times so there should be some blooming throughout the weeks, rather than all at once and then nothing…

when I planted them I put the plastic bag they came in into the pot and now I can’t read the name, lol…

so far a purple one has bloomed next to the house…

and then a delicate white with purple tones bloomed… 3 flowers last week and 3 are blooming right now…

I cut them and put them in a vase to enjoy in the house…

currently that plant has 4 more buds on it… looks like another white one is starting to open… looking forward to how beautiful it will look when it is completely open…

that leaves two still to develop buds… can’t wait to see what colour they turn out to be… when I ordered them I asked for purple and white varieties…

with my retirement, I am enjoying the ability to spend each day in the garden all summer long…

sunburned…

13 Monday Jul 2020

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yesterday the hibiscus finally bloomed for the first time in many months…

it lives in the house over the winter and hadn’t flowered since Christmas…

it was really unhappy when I moved it outside for the summer… the first few days after the move were very hot and it got sunburned… since then many of the leaves have turned yellow and fallen off…

last week I spotted the beginning of the first buds… and a few days ago the first one started to open…

yesterday it was fully open and even after the rain it looked gorgeous…

and there were three blooms ready to open…

and this is what I saw this morning…

nature really is amazing… and beautiful…

seriously…

11 Saturday Jul 2020

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the morning glories are opening everywhere… and everyday…

as I was looking back in my posts I noticed that the first morning glory of 2018 was on August 8… planting them from seeds early has made a huge difference as the first one this year was June 27;-)…

they look amazing… as I am home all the time I get to enjoy they more than when I worked as they would be closed by the time I got home at the end of the day…

had to giggle when one went right between two of the boards on the bench around the deck… it seriously wanted to get to the other side, lol.. so cute…

pinching…

08 Wednesday Jul 2020

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so, I signed up for a 3-part video course on flowers in the garden… it is from @floretflower on Instagram… they are located in Washington State and have a flower farm and seed business…

yesterday I finally got around to watching the first of the two that I have received so far…

it was all about pinching the plants… this morning I decided to give it a try and it was difficult, because it does feel counter-productive to trim back a plant that is growing nicely… but I did it, and I also removed the flowers on the dahlias and put them into a vase…

it will be interesting to see if it really does double the number of blooms produced…

I will watch and see…

stronger…

07 Tuesday Jul 2020

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another busy day…

up early, put out all the cushions and had my breakfast in the garden… lots of visits from the house finch couple and the chickadees…

went into the pond to clean the pump and filled half a pail with string algae… waterfall is looking better now and the flow is much stronger…

then a good friend came over for a garden visit and we had a lovely time… the garden is looking nice and there are still five or six caterpillars to search out on the milkweed…

she had just left when the lawn mowing service (the middle grandson) arrived… we had a visit before he started and just as he was done the chauffeur (oldest grandson) arrived with a new umbrella which will provide shade in the afternoon sun… we couldn’t put it up as we are waiting for the base to arrive…

then, before I knew it, they were all gone and I was back in the peace and quiet;-)…

lots of reading and nature watching for the rest of the day…

obsessed…

05 Sunday Jul 2020

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maybe, just maybe, I am obsessed with the Monarchs… I can’t even think of how many times I have gone by the milkweed to check on the caterpillars, lol…

saw more butterflies landing in the plant and maybe leaving eggs;-)…

there are small caterpillars, medium sized caterpillars and large caterpillars…

such fun to see where they are on the plant and how much they have munched through…

both of the biggest caterpillars vanished this morning… I was worried they had fallen off the milkweed because they were in leaves that were bent way over…

wasn’t sure if they were getting ready for the next step, but then found both of them in the lily of the valley… so I put them back on the milkweed…

now that I’ve done some research maybe they were moving on… apparently they can travel up to ten metres away from the milkweed to move to the chrysalish stage…

if they move again I will just search to see where they end up…

molt…

04 Saturday Jul 2020

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it was overcast when I got up yesterday morning, but I went out before 7:30 to see what flowers were blooming and what the caterpillars were up to…

there were a bunch of morning glories and two dahlias were almost completely open…

the caterpillars were going through some of their instars… during the caterpillar stage they molt five times…

I was very excited to spot the largest one with the molt left on the leaf… after a while I noticed that another much smaller one went through the process…

this was exciting as I’d never seen this piece of the lifecycle previously…

the remainder of the day was spent quietly as I was not feeling well, so I slept and read in the shade, although I did check out the caterpillars now and again;-)…

eggs…

30 Tuesday Jun 2020

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so excited to have spotted monarch eggs on the milkweed…

after a bit of research I discovered that it takes four days for them to hatch…

I’ve been checking every day to see if any have popped out… and I found some;-)… they are the teeniest little things…

I’ve watched them before, but only when they were large, so it is very cool to see them at such a small size…

a number of times each day I check over, under and around the edges of the leaves…

now I know to look under the leaves with brown spots as they don’t always eat right through the leaves at this stage… it appears they like the newest leaves as they are clearly more tender…

sometimes it is easy to spot them and other times I don’t see any, lol…

very exciting;-)…

irises…

29 Monday Jun 2020

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a few days ago a great friend came by for a garden visit…

she brought me some gorgeous dark purple Japanese irises and a branch of lovely mock orange blossoms…

we had a nice time as we checked out everything growing in the garden and then watched the birds for ages… she knows lots about birds so I even learned a little, lol…

the house finch couple came by to visit and the house sparrows had a feeding frenzy as the parents and babies flew around and parents fed some babies and encouraged others to find their own seeds…

it was such fun to watch the way the youngsters fluttered their wings… and tried to land in various places… a few times I thought they were going to land right on us…

the sound was amazing as everyone was chatting and calling their family members, clearly wanting to be recognized, lol…

great fun to spend time with someone else who can happily listen to the water and bird watch for hours at a time;-)…