Today's Flowers are cold

I knew when we had a few weeks with warmer weather and the camellias were getting too far along that they wouldn't last.

Good thing for me, I love the way flowers look in the snow in spite of them being short lived.

I also like the way long dead flowers look with a new coat on.

Please visit the home of Today's Flowers for more participants.

Photohunters: Spotted

The photohunters theme is spotted. The caladium is spotted with a variety of different colors.

The sky is spotted with clouds. I guess looking at it another way, the clouds are spotted with blue sky.

The acuba bush has variegated leaves which are spotted with green and yellow.

Below is another spotted sky. I spot the clouds forming a vertical pattern as opposed to the horizontal pattern in the first sky shot.

The amelopsis vine has spotted leaves. I spot several variations in the design on the leaves.

In the last shot the acuba bush looks like the leaves are spotted with white instead of soft yellow but that's a trick of the light.

For other photohunters, visit the home site where participants post starting Saturday.

Nature Notes: January ending and a flash to the past

I was startled to look out my bedroom door and spot the hawk sitting on the top of the swingset garden, next to one of the nesting boxes for small birds.

I could hear a lot of chatter coming from the bushes where many of the birds were staying hidden. The chickadee knew she was too small for lunch and wasn't bothered by having a hawk in her garden.

Finally, I decided to approach the hawk so he would fly off and allow the birds seeking cover to come out. He didn't go far, and crouched against a tree limb he was having a bad feather day in the wind.

The next two shots are from ten years ago in July back when my garden was better tended. I thought I'd include them to give a better wide view of the swingset garden area.

The shot above is facing what was once my daughter's swing set and was later incorporated into the garden. The shot below is a side view to include the greenhouse and other raised beds.

The days of the well tended garden are long gone and at this point my garden is wild and mostly self sustaining. I no longer irrigate or grow most of my vegetables. But the birds don't care and other wildlife are happy here.

The shot directly above and the rest of the shots are back to January 2010. I have lots of nesting boxes under the roof as well as the overgrown bushes where the birds nest.

The nesting boxes against the house are more protected than the swing set ones. Last week I talked about using leaves from my front yard to mulch my back yard. There are still plenty of leaves left in the front for that part of my garden.

The smartest thing I ever did was stop trying to grow grass in the front and opt for hostas, periwinkle, ferns, variegated ivy, and other shade perennials as well as some herbs near the street where they get enough sun.

I have noticed that with a mixture of weather from cold to cool to almost warm, there is a lot more signs of life than January usually has, although the ferns and other perennials are asleep for the winter.

I love the way the ivy growing on the side of the house looks but if it gets too thick it will be a problem. Sometimes I think if I totally neglect everything the plants will hold up my little aging house where I've lived since 1984.

The problem with living here as long as I have, improvements I made like creating a garden and adding a greenhouse and storage building are already becoming aged and decrepit, sort of like me. By the way, I don't think my numerical age (52) is old. There are young 70 year old people, and older. I personally feel like I've aged a lot in recent years but that's just me.

For more nature notes people, please visit the host of nature notes.

Today's Flower: Jumping the Gun

A warm spell has been giving the wrong signals to some trees, vines, perrenials and bushes. Activity that should be started in March is starting in January.

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Photohunters: Balanced

The photohunters theme is balanced. My first shot is of my deck swing balanced by chains on a snowy day and was taken exactly one year ago. I'm using this old shot because not only is the swing balanced, the snow is balanced on all of the deck furniture.

No snow here yet this January but the recent shot below gives a better view of the way the swing is balanced on chains.

In order to see how balanced the swing normally is, I shifted the link I hung on the hook on one side of the swing to demonstrate the opposite of balanced. Below is an unbalanced swing. I'm a little unbalanced myself some days but lets not go there.

For balanced photohunters, you can check out the home site where participants post their links beginning on Saturday.

Nature Notes: Warming up considerably

The year started off quite cold but it is warming up considerably where I live. I have mixed feelings about spring like weather in the winter because sometimes flowers get signals too soon. Considering that our average last frost date is in April, this is much too early for confused flowers.

Not that flowers are starting to bloom yet but there are already starting to be signs that a few may start emerging only to get zapped in the near future. It's been a wet winter but when it's cold enough to snow it has mostly been dry and when it's wet the temperatures warm up. Still there is alot of moss which I love and which wet weather encourages.

I also like wet leaves and old fallen branches with interesting growths on them.

I don't know if there are several hawks that hang out in my neighborhood or if it's one which gets around a lot. I seem to be spotting it in the trees everywhere I look.

My back garden has lots of areas with bulbs and perennials. In the fall I try to shift a lot of the oak leaves from my front yard to my back yard for thick mulch which I rake away in the spring when the flowers emerge.

In the shot above you may notice that the first two terraced rows are covered in brown leaves and everything is still a sleep. However if you look towards the top on the left, I didn't get to that area and I couldn't believe it when I saw some plants already getting ready for spring flowers MUCH too soon.

The shot above is the other side of my back garden and I did get most of that area covered in a protective blanket of leaves.

I also got the paths in between my green house and raised bed boxes mulched so hopefully weeds won't grown through in the summer.

However I wish I'd done a better job mulching in the part of my garden on the other side. The helioborus (lenten rose) is always green but it's budding too soon. I even spotted some narcissus emerging when it shouldn't be up until March.

On these warm days, I feel like I should begin cleaning up my back garden for spring. However, although the ornamental grasses may be brown and spent, every time I get close enough to consider cutting away the dead growth they explode with little birds and I back away.

This time last year we had over 5 inches of snow on the ground. As much as I would enjoy a pretty snow, the birds are so happy with the break in cold weather that I'm happy for them.

Please visit the home of nature notes to find other participants.

Today's Flowers: Remains of the garden with hope for the future

I wandered around my garden and deck a few days ago, photographing what was left from the growing season past and considering the promise of the season to come.

Depending on the point of view, mostly emptied husks from the hibiscus (rose of sharon) in my garden above can spell an ending or a beginning. I know in a few months that new plants will pop up in the usual as well as unexpected places, coming back up from roots as well as bird planted seeds in new spots.

The remains of the purple cone flowers (echanasia) above are also signs of old flowers with the promise of new to come.

The black eyed susan (rudbeckia) above was planted late, by a bird I assume, in a pot on my deck whose planned flowers were finished. This flower bloomed months after the rest and I watched eager to see if the flower would open before a hard frost which it did, just barely. Even zapped by the cold almost as soon as it bloomed, it was frozen in this unusual form and months later still has hint of yellow flower and green leaf. All the other rudbeckia had turned black and brown, withering away by late August.

The fairy asters above were also a late volunteer in a deck pot and although the daisy like flowers faded long ago the puffy seed are still white unlike the others in my garden which long ago dropped as brown seeds. Please visit the home of Today's Flowers to find other participants.

Photohunters: Jiggly

The photohunters theme this week is jiggly. I have jiggly wind chimes hanging outside my bedroom door that leads out on my deck.

I have wind chimes hanging under the eaves all along the wall which not only has my bedroom door but also bathroom windows.

When it's windy, the jiggly chimes ring out their dischordant symphony.

It's surprising in a way that they never awaken me. I find the jiggly chimes soothing.

Photohunters post at the home site starting Saturday mornings.