Don't blooming, full, flowers make everybody smile?! here's a fun little tour of my flowers around my property this year!
unfortunately, where I live (Winnipeg, Manitoba) it's winter here for 6 months. Therefor, we cannot plant anything until about the beginning of June and then nothing starts "blooming" and becoming full till about end of July and all of August, with frost sometimes hitting us mid September, so our growing season for vegetables and enjoying the hundreds of $$ we spend on flowers is very short, Sometimes you got to take what you got and find the joy in it anyway!
fun fact before I start, until this year, I always got "perennial" & "annual" mixed up... TO ME, I feel like "annual" means to come up every year.. right, once a year?! BUT NOPE, that's the freaking "perennial" … whoever came up with that … SUCKS! oh well! I don't get confused anymore hehe!
Hollyhocks! I'm going to start with the perennials, because... this is the only one I have! hahahahaha. (untrue) I have a few other perennials in my yard, although they only bloom once, mostly in the spring. . and I didn't take pictures this year! will be a post for next year I suppose!
did you know? The stems of Hollyhocks can be used as firewood, AND the roots have been known to be used medicinally! This plant is mostly just a ornamental type plant and is native to Asia & Europe. Gorgeous, Stunning, and so soft looking.
on to the annuals...
these here are "Coleus" or in my mind... the dinosaur plant, or Jurassic Park plant! hehehehehehe. This is a popular ornamental plant that is used to bring a lot of PUNCH to your garden when it comes to colors. Don't put her in DIRECT sunlight, because she will fade in color and we definitely do NOT want that to happen, she likes a little bit of shade, and mostly some morning sun if possible.
Dusty Miller! weird name, pretty plant … ESPECIALLY when it is in full growth like these one. They like to bush out and are a great filler for pots on your deck, front porch or back patio. Fun fact; this little guy is actually from the Sunflower family!
(sorry for the not so good pictures, awkward angles and hard to move plants!)
This here is a spike! which comes from the Dracaena Family, this particular one I'm posting about was purchased the 1st year me and my partner (ate-bit-dave) met. 2.5 years later and it has grown SO MUCH! just like us :) this plant is normally only a annual, although we actually have been bringing her in every fall/winter as our winters get to -40 degrees and Mr. Spike would not survive the outside world! Mostly these plants are used as fillers in a pot as well, ours started as that but it has grown so much we decided to give her, her own pot as we plan to care for it for years to come. Also, they can grow to as tall as 2 feet and look like as full on tropical type palm tree!
*** this is a stock photo I grabbed from google of a full grown spike and what it could potentially look like ***
Petunias! My partner got me into my love of gardening, and since I've known him he's kind of let me make the pots around the property, my own and pick whatever I like. Normally, every year I choose something different! In the past I always thought the petunia plant was such a "baba" "grandma" -ish looking plant and thought only old people used them in their gardens... until this year when I decided they were really cute looking! 1st time owning them and they bush out like crazy! you are technically supposed to pull off the dead flowers and cut them back every so often so new flowers can grow through, but personally I like them this way, bushy.
one day I would like to actually make a "goth garden" which essentially is just all black/dark colored plants, and those black petunias would look so nice in something like that, with a few little stone fairy's.. EEK! A girl can dream, eh!
Oh! before I move on, the purple and white ones in that pot, they have a friend in the pot with them (sorry not the greatest photo) but that is a tobacco plant! wanna know a fun fact about that one??? it actually smells BEAUTIFUL in the evenings.. weird but awesome!
This here is a new addition to the plant family, the Umbrella Plant! I spotted it when I was at RONA and immediately had to have it! this guy is in it's own pot and will be brought in with the spike in the fall/winter as this one can potentially grow up to 6 feet in size! This rubbery looking plant is easy to take care of weather in a home or an office with it having the properties to clean the air for you! win win in my books.
I have spots in my backyard off my pergola that can hold 3 hanging plants, so this year I went with one of my top 5 favorite plants which is the inch plant, or most commonly known as "wandering Jew" I just love the colors and the uniqueness of the plant and finding it in hanging basket form was a good buy for moi!
the next one was a plant I had never ever seen before & unfortuanly I threw out the tag and I cannot for the life of me remember what it's called (if you know please tell me in the comment section below!) . I loved the tropical look to it and the vibrant red color caught my eye instantaneously! though it is in hanging form, we recently were at a restaurant where they had this in a pot on the ground and it was climbing up the fence! so this guys a climber and will grow vines galore!
this guy is a story to tell! HIBISCUS! like the spike, this was purchased the 1st year me and David met, and is going on its 3rd year with us. The 1st time we brought it inside, we found out it went extremely dormant and was all like "ahhhh, what are you doing to me? what is happening" but around Christmas time in December, it blooms about 10-15 new flowers and is such a nice relief when its -40 outside and all you see is white from the snow everywhere, very refreshing to see! THIS YEAR we brought Mr. Hibiscus outside and he completely freaked out and died. It was just a truck of a tree, no leaves, no nothing... so sad panda! we got frost in June and it completely had an impact on a lot of our flowers. LOW AND BEHOLD it came back to life! still going strong just like me and David! Tee-Hee :)
as some of you already know, a very popular type of teas is "Hibiscus Tea" or many other names around the world and is served either hot OR cold being known for the bright red color and tart flavor profile.
last, but not least... is the Castor Bean plant... or also known as a very toxic poison called "Ricen" I saved this one for last because I took a lot of photos of it at different angles because this plant, even though very poisonous to animals and if humans eat the pods... its so beautiful and can grow up to 40 feet tall if in the right environment!
Castor Bean is the source of Castor Oil which is used for a variety of different things such as a natural moisturizer, help to fight inflammation and reduce the looks of acne scars.
those red spikey pods that you see, they house the bean that is poisonous. Although very unique and pretty, very dangerous to consume. In adult humans, the lethal dose is 4-8 seeds. FUN FACT; according to the Guinness book of world records, this plant is the most poisonous common plant ever, where if not treated within the 1st couple days, death is to be expected in no more then 5 days, however, a full recovery can be treated if an accident were to happen.
*** ^^^ this is a stock photo I found on google, just to show you how tall and beautiful this plant can grow! ***
well guys, this was a long post and if you made it this far, I thank you and I would appreciate some feedback and love in the comment section! deciding to join steemit was one of the best things I could have done for myself. I love the art of writing down my thoughts, taking you into parts of my life and sharing wonderful, joyous adventures that come my way in my life. With sharing it in a growing community, such as steemit… a piece of me grows every time I post and makes me realize that life is full of great things to capture in the form of blogging, vlogging or even photography to have with you for the rest of your life.
*** most of my sources for information came from #wikipedia. ***
XOXO,MM
