Late February: What's Blooming Now

Dandelions

A crab apple tree

Our one Japanese magnolia

You see we had stormy weather today

The sedum continues to erupt under the straw.

Our southern camellia has been in full bloom for a while. They bloom in January. But a recent deep freeze zapped it.

So many perfect blooms, brown and wasted

 But the flowers that have opened since that freeze look wonderful.

And that daffodil bud I recently showed you ... bloomed overnight.

Knock-Outs

I went to Lowe's this morning to buy two more ceiling fans. I got good deals on both of them. Then I drifted into their plant area. I was hoping for some discounted plants, and I was not disappointed. Just as I was perusing the discounted ones, a Lowe's employee came up and said, "They're not 50% off. They're now 75% off. Oh, and that includes the Knock-Out roses over there."

It seems everyone down here has Knock-Out roses. They do well here, blooming all spring/summer/fall. They thrive in the salty air, apparently. These were discounted from $19 to $4.50, So I bought three, not wanting to be piggish.

Adam did the digging. You see how close we are to the road.

They look quite happy, nestled in there, and they will be well watered in tonight with a good rain coming.

The temperature today was perfection. The breeze was brisk and pleasant. No mosquitoes. I sat out side briefly and watched the wind blow Beau's fur as he closed his eyes and smiled into it. My sentiments exactly!
So I turned off the heat, opened the windows, and let the breeze blow from the front door (where I'm standing) straight through to the kitchen on the far end in this photo. Nice breeze! As I write this (10:28 PM and I'm up too late), the rain is gently falling outside.

I had pity on a sad little $1 plant at Lowe's and we gave it a home too. It has a name I never can remember that starts with "Eu ..." something. I call it "specklety bush." It's ugly. One must have at least one ugly duckling.

Hello, ugly duckling.

Baby Steps

On Tuesday I was still off work so I launched into some tiny projects around the house. Adam was out in the drizzle, shoveling manure and watering it down with rainwater from his barrel system. More on that in another post.
I addressed the chaos that is our back porch. It's not a large space. I moved that bookshelf (with the paper towels in it) down, and put up two coat hooks. I'd bought them years ago and never used them in a previous house. Sometimes it's useful to be a packrat. I'll hang one more hook there.

I have almost no closet space in this house -- one small closet for Adam and me, and an itty-bitty closet in Julia's room. That's it!! So hooks galore is one solution.

Alright ... next project:  the kitchen window. I loathe nasty old mini-blinds.

A kitchen window is important. When day-dreaming while doing dishes, the window is essential for pleasant thoughts, occasionally even enchanted day-dreaming. Rusty mini-blinds do not enchanted day-dreams make.
Mr. M. was clearly afraid his mini-blinds would come down in his dishes. He nailed them in.

And he screwed them in. See the bent screw up there?

It was fun ripping all that out!

I'd been inspired by a kitchen window photo from my friend, Melissa:

I hope she doesn't mind my lifting this photo from her blog. I'm not quite sure if it's her kitchen or one she found online. But isn't it magical? J'adore the shelf and tea things! (((Sigh))) And the little cafe curtain. And the fall berries and leaves. If I were standing at that sink, I'd be drooling in it.

Anywho, after a trip to Wally World, I returned with the correct rods to hang curtains on doors. This is the door to the back porch from the kitchen:

And right behind it, the back door to the deck. Those are matching cafe curtains, but I only had two ...

So I had no curtain left for my wannabe-magical kitchen window. I went digging around and found some tea towels I never use. Wrinkled of course.

Somehow I love a magical look, but I'm a bit challenged in making it happen in my house, haha!!

At some point I'll find the right lacy curtain for there. Or a better, bigger tea towel. Magical curtains should have some POOF!, and this towel arrangement lacks poof.

Our crazy weather has confused my gardenia bush, so it's blooming. "Is it by chance spring yet?" it is wondering.

My Japanese magnolia has one lone bloom too, poor thing.