DECEMBER CATCH-UP

BETTER THAN DECEMBER KETCH-UP! Or at least I hope so!
Anyway, Dec. is a month of chaos for most of us - and especially for the Train Station, with the Santa-NO-Train this year followed by the Ker Place event - an enjoyable yet exhausting day - and then there is doing all the stuff one seems to have to do this time of year - even if you are a Buddhist and "don't do Christmas." Right. Try living in this country and 'not do Christmas!'

Wake me when the presents get here, OK?

           Then, to complicate things this year, the weather decided to get weird on us. I have lived here for 50 years now. At first it took a lot of getting used to when it did not snow at all – back in the day, as they say around here, we used to put snow tires on our cars. Maybe they still do up north, I don’t know. But I did it faithfully around Thanksgiving. That is also when I put the covers on the air conditioners to help keep the cold winds from blowing thru and into the house. This year, the a/c covers were on earlier, and even tho I no longer use snow tires, we have had 2 little snows in early December! Unheard of!!!!! I was once told it never snows before Christmas! Well, we are setting a record (in MY book) for cold, nasty weather this year, probably to make up for not having any autumn to speak of. We were still using the a/c after my birthday in Sept.

 

            Anyway, the point of all this rambling is the camellias have taken a beating a couple times because of the cold. Yet the warmer fall seems to have changed the blooming pattern – many of the later bloomers are opening now and then getting ‘burned’ or frost bitten by the temps in the 20s. Most surprising of all in Yule Tide, normally a very understated bush even tho it is large… the blooms are small but a beautiful deep clear red, filled with bright yellow stamens, but somehow usually going unnoticed by passers-by. This year it was covered with bright blooms – and then the temps plummeted. I was afraid it was finished for the season. But, no, it came back with even more blooms than before. A local grower who drives past my place numerous times a day stopped by to comment on it, asking where I got that huge bush, it looked like Yule Tide, what was it, and how did I get such a large bush out there – he assumed it was newly planted in that spot because it had gone unnoticed for 25 years.

My favorite camellia is either Aunt Alice, a red variegated variety, or my first love, Pink Perfection, a spring bloomer. Both have bloomed tho Pink P has only opened a couple blooms and they have been tinged with frost bite.

I found the most beautiful poinsettia at Thomas’ Gardens yesterday. I had to bring it home. Some part of me feels it is not Christmas without a poinsettia.  I had hoped to find some winter pansies, but they were real beat. So I came home without any – sad to not have some but relieved that I would not have to go out in the cold to plant them. I did buy another birdfeeder – a tiny one for chickadees. It is so cute. I have 11 feeders in the redbud so far.  The restaurant is open!

This week is Solstice… may you have a Buddhaful winter season!

KER PLACE

Please visit the SPOTS Blog for pictures and info on our exhibit at Ker Place, Onancock, Dec 9th. http://onley-spots.blogspot.com/ 

This Year's Santa-No-Train 2017

This year’s Santa-no-Train 2017

 

Well, like the title says, we did not have a train for Santa to come in on this year…mechanical problems... so we had a Santa-no-Train. Yeah, sounds dumb, but we just could not let the kids down. We expected a much larger crowd because the train did not run up the Shore this year, but we still had close to 200 people and 80 kids got to see our own Santa and Mrs Claus. We had to break in some new elves, and they were wonderful! Our staff and helpers all pulled together to make this a great success even if the only trains running were on our layouts.

            Here are a few shots of Santa arriving on a trailer pulled by one of our police vehicles driven by our police Chief. (as many of you know, we no longer have a fire department, a loooong sad story I will NOT get into here.) So we built a little building we were going to call the Elves Workshop – but a local kid pronounced it Elvis’s workshop and wondered if we were going to have Elvis at the Station (SIGH)… so we changed it to Santa’s workshop – elf entrance. That was put on a lawn tractor trailer with a bench and decorations and worked quite well bringing Santa, Mrs Claus and our brave new elves to the station. It was fun.

 

 

 

            Here are some of the folks who came to visit and a few of the cherubs who promised Santa they had been good… LOL! I remember the year one kid produced a page long list, told Santa it was his copy so he didn’t forget anything this year! He seriously acknowledged Santa was getting a little long in the tooth, and like his grandpa, maybe Santa was having memory problems. It was all we could do to keep from rolling on the floor with laughter! Bless their little hearts. Anyway – here are a few of this year’s pix, if blogger will let me do anything like that. (grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr)

 

 

 

 

 

 

            I do hope you will have a happy and safe Holiday Season, whatever you celebrate!

 

"GREENHOUSES" and STAND-UPPITY GARDENS COVER

I know I call these little things my greenhouses, I mean, that is their function, but it does sound quite grandiose for such little things. However, they keep my geraniums, some impatiens, even coleus

cuttings and most important cuttings or even potted strobilanthes(those purple leaves) over the winter. Also, this year, I am keeping the FoxTail fern out here- it did NOT like it in the house and is real messy when it drops all over the place... I also grow the cat's grass in here in the winter and keep a pot of chives growing for my twice baked potatoes.

This year I kept 2 Stand-up gardens busy. The older one had Yellow Wax Beans in it on one side, Italian Flat beans on the other half. The newest garden had Yellow Wax and then plain green string beans, but it also held a bell pepper plant that furnished half the neighborhood, and I kept Black Basil, a few lavender plants, some strobilanthes, and used it to start cuttings of Wandering Jew and a few other plants people wanted. It was a busy spot for being only 4'x4'! It is right next to the carport, so it was very handy for parking other potted plants either newly dug or to be planted. That also made it very easy to care for!

As many of you know, I get politically involved here as many of my friends and former students run for office (AND WIN!!!!! GO RALPH!!! Virginia's next governor) so I often end up with a quantity of 4x4 and 4x8 political signs stashed between the barns.

These signs have MANY uses once the elections are over. I am a firm believer in Recycling or Reusing - or Repurposing materials rather than helping to build our mini-mountain landfill here on the flat shore. The 4x8 treated cardboard signs come in great for garden covers and last for years. Best of all, they are free - unless you count your donation to Ralph's campaign, or whoever... then they become very expensive covers! LOL! And yes, I have signs from the 'other side' I use, too.

Anyway, here are a few shots of the mini-greenhouses and my heating system - a galvanized bucket of bricks and a light bulb in a brooder lamp... you can buy thermometers that you can read inside the house to monitor the temp in the greenhouse - or 'cat warmer' or any space you need to keep from freezing.

The Cat houses are on top of the greenhouse. The heating pad wires are protected with coiled wire to keep critters from chewing the electrical wires. Currently I am only heating the big bottom box - now that Spook is gone. But Hoover still insists on eating in the top box which we now call her Dining room. If she is hungry, she goes up there and sits and waits. Food magically arrives. Dogs have owners, Cats have staff. I am the official CO here... that stands for Can Opener.

Oh, the blue material in this last picture is insulation foam. I have learned to love it. When the temps go really low, I can cover the side walls and doors to the greenhouses with that blue foam.

 I also use  large quantities of it in building scenery at the Train Station. Great stuff!!!!

YULE TIDE- CHRISTMAS CAMELLIA

Several of you asked about Yule Tide. She has been here for 30 years, but in this particular location only 23 years. Floyd helped me move her when she quickly outgrew her spot beside the house and carport. The flowers are small and often the bush goes unnoticed. It tends toward the spindly side compared to the other camellias here. It has been especially beautiful this year. Here are some pictures taken Nov. 8th, 2017 - just before the BIG freeze this fall.

 

Yes, Yule Tide is taller than the power lines.

Small flower, never bigger than 3 inches across, but just the purest red to contrast with the bright yellow stamens.
I hope you enjoyed my garden!

HOOVER AND FALL CAMELLIAS AND AZALEAS before the deep freeze hit! (Front Yard)

 

Last Wednesday, the hand writing was on the wall, tho it was hard to believe. We have not even had a frost yet but the weather people were telling us it was going to be down in the 20s by Saturday morning! Really???? The yard was beautiful. Several camellias were in full serious bloom. These are huge camellias now, well over 15 feet, a couple over 20 feet tall and diameters on some of them of over 10 feet. Many of them have been trimmed back for years.

For the first time ever, Hoover decided to follow me around the yard close enough that she was not hidden. Her coloring makes for a perfect natural camouflage. She has always followed me around but has managed to stay out of sight. But not now… perhaps because her buddy Spook is gone so she is lonesome. 

Anyway, I thought you might enjoy seeing the flowers from Wednesday that are now drooping in the cold, the ground covered in red, pink and purple petals. I have never seen Yule Tide look this good. It is huge. It was a first Christmas-in-my-new-house gift from Sabra when I moved in- 1987, I think. It has been moved twice. Yule Tide is not a thick bush, but tall with a 10 foot diameter. The flowers are small but the red color is rich.

My “birthday” camellias have filled the bushes. I have one on each side of the house.

Several pink camellias are in bloom. These are some of the fall azaleas out by the street. These flowers are large for azaleas, the spring only variety being much smaller.

This is only a fraction of what is in bloom here now. And, as usual, Blogger will not allow me to place them where I want them... so, sorry for such a sloppy looking post. Enjoy the flowers anyway!!!!!

END OF OCTOBER

AND TIME TO PUT STUFF IN THE GREENHOUSES!

OK, Playing Catch-up here. I do a lot of that anymore. First, I finally managed to get the previous post here OFF the SPOTS blog. I know, for many of you that would seem a simple task, but I seem to get less techy all the time. Then I managed to get a few pictures taken and downloaded on the computer… pictures to answer a few questions I have had about certain plants. And then I managed to get what belonged on the SPOTS blog on there! Finally!

  

So, first, catching up in the garden… I told  many of you that I was finally able to go to get my newest day lilies and that included the day lily that started my love affair with lilies – Happy-Happy. I can hardly wait to see it bloom!!!!!

Happy-Happy is in the front corner of this new lily bed. I have had to cover the bed because the deer ate a bunch of my lilies down to the ground over on the side of the house… and I can’t afford to let that happen to these lilies. Some of these are rather expensive, not saying that to brag, just mentioning how bad my addiction has become. And, this is the last time I will be buying any daylilies. It has gotten too hard to plant them and care for them… I don’t have what it takes to start a new garden area.

When I picked up my lilies, one was in bloom. Of course, I was supposed to cut it off so the strength of the plant stayed in the root system to help it settle in… but, you can see it was too beautiful to cut right away. I just had to leave it for a couple of days and watch it bloom. This lily is named Passionate Prayer.

I have also had questions about a plant called Strobilanthes. I think its common name is Persian Shield?????  I just love the colors. It is seldom found in the local garden centers around here, so I work at taking cuttings or potting the plants to keep over the winter. I have a modest success rate, tho one year only one cutting survived. I also take cuttings from favorite coleus plants, or pot up small ones for the winter. I bring some cuttings inside tucking them in with the orchids that live in my kitchen window.

   

As usual, I hope you enjoyed the mini tour of the plant world here. Hopefully, more later!

 

Oh, did I mention I have been busy working to get Ralph Northam elected governor???? I first met Ralph when he was a boy in 3rd grade - my very first year teaching here on the Shore. He grew from a fine kid into a fine and HONEST man. Apparently not everyone requires- or finds- honesty in their politicians, but I do. Vote for Ralph Nov 7th!!!!!