Brunch

This past Sunday I went to a friend's brunch with my duplex-mate/friend, Lani. It was the most perfect day ever, pretty much. It was somewhere in the 60s or 70s, breezy, and sunny, sunny, sunny. We sat on the porch and drank mimosas and ate homemade food and played Apples to Apples. Lani and I wore white summery dresses to complement the weather, which is very unlike both of us. It was that spectacular.


I made tahini-zucchini bread. I think it was a little underbaked, but it seemed to be a hit. (It also had ginger in and sesame seeds on it, two things almost guaranteed to make something delicious. Then again, I sometimes eat tahini by the spoonful.) There was also oatmeal with walnuts, muffins, fruit salad, and delicious Morroccan mint tea. Life is good.

Cold Damage

The poor camellia tree. Right when it gets going with a full head of blooms, the temperature drops. Then all the gorgeous red flowers turn brown and fall off. Then it warms up again. And the camellias bloom...and it freezes...and the camellias turn brown and fall off.


I got tired of the seesaw weather, with its endless variations on hot-cold, hot-cold, so I gave up trying to cover all my plants each time. Whatever was in the large planters definitely suffered. I have been leaving the frost-damaged foliage intact, per IFAS recommendations, to protect whatever parts of the plants may still be alive from future cold snaps. But I have to admit it's driving me crazy. I can't stand staring at the dessicated ruins every day.

What's Growing around My House, Pt. 3

In one of my planters, I took out the bits of remaining plant matter that clearly isn't salvageable and put these new Easter lily bulbs in (Emily got them for us from work). We'll see if they adapt to my "low-key" gardening style!


Hanging strawberries: I don't know why I bother--the dang birds nibble little bits out of each strawberry before I get to it. But every now and again I get an unsullied one. They're not as sweet as last year.


Pulled a crop of radishes the other day. I cut both the radishes themselves and the greens up for a delicious salad I've been eating all week. They're spicier than store-bought radishes--tasty.

What's Growing around My House, Pt. 2

When I moved into my house a couple of months ago, I started a compost pile. Since then I keep waiting for something I discard to sprout, 'cuz when the compost sprouts, I get free plants.

It's easier--and cheaper--to try to grow new things this way, rather than go to the store and pick some plants out. At the old house, I got all kinds of seedlings, some more successful than others. But I've been sorely disappointed at the new house, as my compost has remained singularly barren.

So I watered the compost, and I added more leaves, and I stirred it up, and I waited patiently. Finally, the other day I went to dump my food scraps and voila! Some seedlings had emerged. But I didn't recognize what they were. My compost had never sprouted such plants before!

I carefully dug out one of the plants and looked at its origins. A kernel of corn! Exciting. One of these days I may pull up all of these seedlings and put them in pots. Until then, I just admire them as I dump my scraps.


One of my uncles gave me this ivy plant over the holidays. He had a bunch of them hanging from the pergola on his patio in Ft. Myers. There was some story about some teachers he bought them for...I don't know. Anyway, he had a bunch and offered me one. I loaded the thing--it has vines at least six feet long--into my hatchback and went to St. Pete for a few days. When I drove home, the cooking I had subjected it to in the hatch didn't seem to have affected it.

So naturally I concluded the thing it was invincible (I do test my plants awfully, I know), so I brought the ivy into my bedroom. I was super stoked because it's my first bedroom plant. Imagine--a plant in your bedroom! I never had imagined that, so when it finally occurred to me it blew my mind. I stared at it lovingly every day.

The only problem is that my bedroom is like a cave. It's some shade of dark 24/7 and always kind of cool. I put the plant up and forgot about it for a couple of weeks. Then I started noticing it was shedding a lot of brown leaves. I took it down and realized that the wall-facing side was dying. So I put it in the ICU, i.e., the backyard. I've been leaving it there to soak up some sun and rain, and hopefully it will pull through.

I do like having a bedroom plant. Maybe when I bring it back in, I'll rotate it more frequently so all the sides can suffer equally. "Nobody puts Baby in the corner!"


My Florida violets are thriving, although one much more visibly so than the other--don't ask me why, since they get the same amount of light and water. This native plant is sadly considered a weed in most people's landscapes. But I love it--my favorite plants seem to be considered weeds by most people--and am looking forward to the delicate blooms in later spring.

Firestarter

I got this wood over a month ago from Emily's farm, but nevertheless haven't had a fire since last year. Next cold snap--maybe tomorrow night!--I'll see if I can get a fire going without the help of the biker guy next door (who's been known to start a fire for us at 2 a.m. in a pinch).

My woodpile-covering--surprise!--has been pretty slack. I put the wood on a tarp to keep it off the wet leaf-humus layer under the magnolia tree, but it doesn't stretch all the way around the top of the pile.

Then, in my usual haphazard fashion, I got this piece of heavy-duty black plastic free from the local feed-and-seed--the guy who gave it to me actually said, "If it don't have four legs I don't know nothin' 'bout it"--but that keeps blowing off in rainstorms. So basically I'm hoping that the wood was already pre-dried enough to withstand the various soakings it's accumulated.

Otherwise, back to the biker. He seems to know what's what when it comes to fires.

What's Growing around My House, Pt. 1

It's been alternately cold and rainy, or both cold and rainy, a lot lately. I guess I can admit without shocking anyone too much that I have also been lazy. So I haven't done much new planting in the past month or so--but I do check on my plants every few days to see if they need water, if the weeds are taking over the pots, etc.

In December or January Tom gave us all beautiful bromeliads. I know Kim gave me some instructions about planting the one I got, but to get it off the floor of my bedroom I just plunked it down into one of my planters that was otherwise filled with the brown, frost-killed remains of ye olde plants. The bromeliad seems to be doing ok, even though I haven't protected it during the cold snaps we've since endured.


My cyclamen has been loving the weather recently. I've been surprised that this puppy has survived at least two Florida summers--by all rights it really should have died of heat stroke by now. But I've been pretty careful to keep it in the shade.


My winter annuals are geeked about the weather, too. I love these things--they require no maintenance whatsoever. I planted the plugs in pots willy-nilly two or three months ago, and they've been growing and growing and growing and blooming ever since. I park in my driveway right near where I have them, and so I stop and admire them every day. Granted, my design skills are non-existent, but I don't care. It's all about the color.

I gave one of my pots (missing from this photo) to my grandmother to keep her company when she was in the hospital recently and was surprised by how excited she got about the pansies. "They look like they have little faces, Sarah," she said. I think they brightened her day a little.

I'm Back!

I've been remiss. Kim lent me a small chip for the camera a couple of weeks ago, but I hadn't really used it. To make up for my long absence, I will be posting a flurry of posts to catch up on everything going on. It all goes back to my age-old conflict between inertia and chaos. Or whatever it is.

Before I get into all that, though, something fun. We went on a work trip a couple of weeks ago to Balm (do you know where that is? I still don't) and saw this along the way. It spoke to me, since I love being on boats so much. Also, it's just a funny name for a boat.