Ten Good Things on a Monday...Plants

I've wanted to do this one for a while, so this evening I'm joining in with Nina at Brush Up On Your Reading with her 10 Good Things on a Monday.  It's for all us list lovers out there, and I just love a good list!  It doesn't matter that I might not finish them, but I am a compulsive list maker.  I'm going to do ten of my favorite things for my first time here.  Here goes...

Ten of My Favorite Things Plants

1.  Succulent Collection. 

This is a small grouping in what I refer to as my tub.  It includes three of my absolute favorites...'Mother of Millions' Kalanchoe, 'Lilypad' Aeonium and one that I've never been able to identify, but she's in the corner and her leaves are trimmed in purple...beautiful!!

2.  Pineapple Lily

This has to be my absolute favorite right now, or rather a tie for first place.  I picked up a white one too this past week for my mother.  I'm going to take some of mine and share with my mother, and take some of hers to share with me!  This is made easier by the fact that I have them both here!!

3.  Passion Vine Bloom

This is the most whimsical bloom I've come across yet, and she is the other "most favorite" contender.  As though her beauty isn't enough, her fragrance is intoxicating!

4.  Balloon Plant

I have had this little gem for a number of years.  She pops back up in the spring and then dies back when the summer months get too hot for her.  The blooms start out like very small balloons and keep growing and growing until they burst open.  What makes this year especially exciting is that I remembered to collect her seeds, hoping to have a row of these next spring!

5.  'Lady Slipper'

The real name is around here somewhere, but I'm being a little lazy tonight.  This is my first year with this succulent, and am I glad a bought her!  Her blooms darken to a deep pink as they mature and are supposed to look like an old fashioned lady's slipper.  You have to turn them around though to get that, my personal opinion is that they look more like elf shoes!

6.  Pitcher Plant

I lost my original Pitcher Plants in my greenhouse mishap this past winter, but I found replacements in February.  They stayed in the house until it warmed up, lost all their pitchers, but are getting new ones.  This is a first for me, so I check on them daily and am extremely excited that they keep growing!!

7.  Bolivian Jew

Also known as 'Mouse Earred' Jew, this is hands down my favorite non-flowering, non-succulent plant.  With her purple undertones on the bottom side of the leaves, she's extremely dainty, but at the same time extremely hardy...perfect fit!

8.  Red Hibiscus Bloom

Of all my hibiscus plants, and there are a number of them, this one's bloom is my favorite!  She's frilly, she's fluffy and she's solid red...enough said!

9.  Bachelor Buttons

If you would have ever asked me if I liked these, much less wanted them, the answer would have been a flat "no".  I was desperate this year for something that the deer wouldn't eat, and these are not supposed to be attractive to them.  Well, let's just say that the hungry deer in our neighbor hood missed the memo and snipped the ones I put out right up.  I didn't know what to do with the rest, so I stuck them in a pot in the backyard.  I'm really glad the deer ate the one in the front yard, these little guys have grown on me.  They keep getting bigger and bigger and are just as bright as the day I brought them home.

10.  More Succulents!

These are in my mailbox pot, and are still relatively new.  After the verbena died, what else do you put in when it's already 100 degrees outside and it's not even officially summer!

This has been fun, hopefully I'll remember to do it again!

Happy Monday!

Elephant Ear?

So, Titania over at Yesterday Today and Tomorrow In My Garden had suggested I look out for an 'Elephant Ear' Kalanchoe.  After a quick Google search, I think I might already have one.  I've got it in the same little pot with a little 'Fang' Kalanchoe, but if this is the 'Elephant Ear', I might need to be moving it to it's own pot.  This is my second 'Fang', I had one last year and I bought it quite large (on sale, of course) and dummy me let it get frost bitten over the winter...I was bummed to say the least! Since these were both small, I just put them together until they grow.  The 'Fang' is the shovel looking bumpy one.

I think this is either a Kalanchoe 'Felt Plant' or an 'Oak Leaf'..not sure which, so if you know, please set me straight!

I picked up a Kalanchoe 'Golden Girl' over the weekend, but I was going to pot her before taking a picture...need to get that done.

Now on to non-plant conversation...

Tonight on the way home, I was talking to my mother and she was telling me that she made Chicken and Dumplings for dinner.  Now, that happens to be my absolute favorite meal that my Mamaw (mother's mother) would make when we would visit and then taught me to do.  Out went my plans for hotdogs!  I had the biscuits here since I'm making it this weekend for a friend who just had a baby.  All I needed was chicken...no cooked chicken, but I do have canned turkey (sounds odd, but it's awesome) from the turkey farm in Ohio that I thought I'd try.  It was awesomely delicious (if I do say so myself)!!  

After that, I thought Goldie and I needed a walk.  She made it one mile with me and after jogging a bit decided she needed to stop constantly, so she got dropped off and and I finished up the other two by myself with my music!  I haven't jogged or walked since the Susan B. Komen 5k that me and a friend ran a few months ago...man am I out of shape!  To cool off, I repotted my Hibiscus tree into a much needed, much larger pot!  

Sorry this was so long...I think I miss my girls and the conversation that comes with!  Not to mention my jogging buddy, who pushes me to keep going even though I want to sit down and cry!

Good Night!

Mandy 

Hibiscus and Succulents

I can't believe that it's already the end of the last day of the long weekend...it went by much too fast, as usual!  Our neighbor friends decided to finally tackle the crushed granite path they wanted to make from the front fence all the way back around their back porch.  We always work together, this one my husband represented our team more than I did, but from Saturday morning through 2 p.m. today they got it done! There's something about mud that does nothing for me, so I was much more useful today than the other two days.  I dabbled more at cleaning my house and getting the back porch in order; still have a ways to go with both!  I did however get the succulent hanging baskets done for the front porch.

Other than the Kalancoe 'Chocolate Soldier's' in the middle, everything should grow and hang over.  There's a 'Brown Bean' Sedum, 'Vera Higgin's' Apenglow and a few other Sedum and Echeveria varieties.  Hoping that these should do better in this spot than the Chocolate Mint did...that got repotted and put in the back yard in a shadier spot.  I also worked on the succulent pots that my mother bought and left for me to pot.

This one's my mother's.

This one is mine.

It was dark when I finished these, but I figured I'd take more as they fill out.  Julie, the 'Mother of Millions' you sent me has done really well, so much so that I shared one of them with my mother.  I put my Kalanchoe Serrata, 'Magic Tower', on the top of mine with an Echeveria.  The 'Magic Tower' is more pinkish than the 'Chandelier Plant' that I already had, and it's leaves are serrated, whereas the other is more tubular.  I bought another Hibiscus Saturday morning, my neighbor and I couldn't not leave Home Depot with them.  This is her first and I did warn her that they're also addictive.  They had these great little bushes called 'Carolina Breeze'...a gorgeous orange! 

Off to make an enchilada casserole before we start wilting!

Hope everyone enjoyed their long weekends!

Mandy

Hello Hibiscus!

A co-worker friend and I decided we "needed" to make a run to Schultz Nursery down the street from our office during lunch before the rain made it our way.  I really was hoping to find some succulents so I could work on my hanging baskets for the front porch...none that I needed, but we stumbled on some lovely Hibiscus bushes and both took home two!  I saw this one first, she's a Flamingo Plume...had to have the ruffles!

She looks a little coralish here, but she's just a pretty shade of pink with a lot of fluff! My friend spotted a gorgeous one called Mrs. Jimmy Spangler, and helped me sort through them to find one for me to bring home.  Mine doesn't have any open blooms to show, but she's got a dark pink egdge with an orange center...will compliment this one nicely.  Now, where to put them!

Orange Sherbert                                                               

Dark Orange

They both grow on the same tree...below is what she looked like at the end of the season lasts year. She's much larger this year, but needs to be tamed before she's ready for pictures!

This one is potted with a solid deep red one.

I saw a really cool Pitcher Plant, but at $45, they could keep it! I'll keep working with the one I have before I'm willing to spend absurd amounts of money on something I know very little about.They did have some gorgeous Kalanchoe Donkey Ears and Fangs...big ones, but I exercised self control even though they are giant compared to mine! Next week, we're going to hit Shades of Green in search of the Flame Bouginvilla...a must have for three of us in the office!

Have a great night!

Mandy