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It's a woman's prerogative to change her mind (In a Vase on Monday)
There are still flowers in my garden but nothing I haven't used in a vase at least once this year. I cut some of just about everything I had in the warm color range and stuck it all in a vase. It...
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Wednesday Vignettes: Summer Views
A variety of summer views caught my attention over the past week as I sat in my home office staring out the window looking out on the backyard (when I should have been focused on my PC screen). I...
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Bloom Day - August 2015
We're in the midst of a heatwave and that, combined with our water restrictions, is making it hard to find blooms fit to photograph or exclaim about. In prior years, I complained that my September...
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Foliage Follow-up: Standing up to the heat
It's hot! Maybe not Texas "death-star" hot but hot. Our temperatures soared during the middle of last week and reached 103F (39.4C) yesterday. We're hovering around 100F now. Even Agave...
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In a Vase on Monday: Precious little
While there are lots of plants in flower in my garden, there are precious few blooms suitable to show off in a vase, if that makes any sense. For most of the last week, the heat bore down and, with...
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The State of the Lawn (in my neighborhood)
I took a walk recently to check the status of the lawns in my neighborhood. Since June, my area has been required to reduce residential water use by 36% in response to California's severe drought. As...
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In a vase on Monday: Summer and Fall
The pink Eustoma grandiflorum are putting on an encore of their jubilant early summer performance with almost every plant bursting into bloom at once. Although I'm usually loathe to cut stems when...
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Wednesday Vignette: Cactus Garden at Lotusland
Lotusland is one of the most famous - and unique - gardens in Southern California. On land purchased in the Santa Barbara area in 1941, Madame Ganna Walska, a Polish-born opera singer known as much...
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August Favorites
On the last Friday of each month, Loree at danger garden hosts a roll call of her favorite plants. I usually participate but I admit I'm having a hard time getting excited about my garden right now....
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In a Vase on Monday: An Experiment
The heat that plagued us last week is slowly ebbing away. Other than my pink Eustoma grandiflorum and Gaillardia 'Arizona Sun', there's not much in bloom that looks good right now. As both those...
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Wide Shots - September 2015
This month, rather than posting wide shots of all the major areas of my garden, I thought I'd provide a visual history of one area, specifically the back garden. We moved into our current house just...
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Wednesday Vignette: Harbor Views
Anna of Flutter & Hum sponsors a weekly post featuring images she and other bloggers have found interesting. I'm joining in again this week with a few photos captured while looking out onto the...
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Buzzz...
Working out in the garden one afternoon recently I caught sight of something I hadn't seen before: a flying creature, bigger than the average bee but smaller than a hummingbird. I ran to get my...
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In a Vase on Monday: Back in the Pink (Again)
The pink Eustoma grandiflorum (aka Lisianthus), still going strong in the back garden, was the obvious choice for my vase this week but when I went out to make my selections for "In a Vase on Monday,"...
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Are painted lawns a sensible response to the drought?
California has been in a serious drought for 4 years but the public response changed dramatically in 2015 when the governor declared mandatory water restrictions. Water districts were ordered to...
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Wednesday Vignette: Puffy Clouds
We're in the middle of yet another nasty heatwave. It didn't cool down much at all last night. At 7:30am today, it was already 85F (29C). The temperature hit 90F (32C) before 9am and continued to...
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Lynda's Succulent Garden Revisited
In July last year, I posted photos of my friend Lynda's succulent garden. Being both an artist and a perfectionist, she's continued to futz with both her design and her plant selections, which is good...
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In a Vase on Monday: More Succulents!
We had another horrific heatwave all last week, or maybe it just felt horrific because we've had one too many of these events within the past 2 months. After temperatures in the upper 90sF (35-37C),...
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Bloom Day - September 2015
It's been hot here - very, very hot. Monsoonal rain to the east of us raised our humidity levels, adding to the heat's misery. My mother took me to a sauna once when I was a child as an introduction...
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Foliage Follow-up: Stars that get no respect
For this month's Foliage Follow-up, I found myself focusing on plants that don't get the respect they deserve. They're not new and they're not flashy but they require little to no care to look good,...
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