Burst of Color

I keep trying to take a good photograph of my blueberry bush this winter. None of them really show off just how red it looks, almost like a burning bush. It's particularly spectacular because almost everything else in my back garden is brown and bare other than the privet hedge and nandina and the neighbor's pine trees which form part of the horizon. The blueberry bush is pretty much the only bright color left, with the exception of a few holly berries in the front of my house and the nandina berries in the back. On the right hand of this picture is my 2007 Charlie Brown tree. I have it picked out and will see what a year's worth of growth does. Bill thinks it has too many bare spots but isn't that what makes a Charlie Brown tree? The little volunteer cedar I lopped down this year is pretty full but even so, it's size alone gives it that slightly funky look under the weight of even the few ornaments I hung on it. It does amuse me that I am letting volunteer pines and cedars grow in my garden with the idea that they will provide the rest of my christmas trees for here on out. I think the last cut Christmas Tree I bought was December of 2004 and it was almost a hundred dollars. Pretty silly for something that was going to end up on the curb after a few weeks. Last year I bought a couple of potted trees which are sill alive but they are pretty sad looking so I'm shifting to the garden volunteers. The potted trees would do better if I got them out of the pots and planted them but I have plenty of volunteer Pines which is what they are and even more volunteer cedars. I love the way one man's weed is another man's volunteer. I even have volunteer bulb flowers. I guess the squirrels dig them up and bury them somewhere else. That's the only idea I have for how I end up with irises and tulips in spots that they weren't planted. The lilies have big seed pods so I understand how they travel around the garden but I don't think that's what happens with the other tubers and bulb flowers that volunteer in unexpected places. I need to remember to pull up the little trees volunteering at the base of my pecan tree. Not sure what they are. I left them for the burgandy color but that is not the spot for them to join the multitude.