Why I Oughta...

We typically have a few plants and flower projects around Christmas and this year is no different.  Most years, we do at least two kinds:  amaryllis and a store-bought poinsettia for the kitchen.  This year, we added a third thing:  Paperwhite bulbs .   We've had the typical poinsetta in most years.  Usually red, sometimes white or more interesting coloring.  But this year, we were at the orange big box store doing one of those kids projects when we wandered out into the nursery.  That's where we saw a rack of something that looked *kinda* like a traditional poinsettia.  But, was a little different.   The 'petals' (which...are really just different colored leaves) were curled under.  And were clustered on the top of the plant.  What is this?  Turns out, it is called a Winter Rose.  It is a poinsettia.  Just tweaked.  Here's a few photos of the red Winter Rose: I pulled out the tag of the plant and...

Back in the middle of November, we moved ahead with our annual tradition of planting Amaryllis bulbs in an attempt to have some "Christmas Flowers".  Here's the post showing all five of the bulbs (2 large ones, three smaller ones) planted in their containers from earlier this month.   And, here's a post showing the tags of all three varieties of bulbs that we're going with this Winter .  About 10-or-so days after planting and watering them in, we have some good news:  all five of the bulbs have sprung to life.  Some more than others.  But, life in all five never-the-less.   First up, the trio of Red Lion bulbs from Home Depot.  These are the smaller ones.  All three have taken off and are showing not just some foliage, but all three of them appear to be sending up their first flower bud out of the bulb.  Those Red Lions are below: Next up, the Lemon Star.  This is one of the larger ones from Wannemaker's and was the one I...

Earlier this week, I posted photos of the three tags of the Amaryllis bulbs that we selected for Christmas 2021 .  We went with a few smaller, more common Red Lions and two larger (more expensive) flowers - one red/white (Sunshine Nymph) and the other one greenish (Lemon Star).  That means that this year we have five total bulbs planted up.  Below, is a look at all of them after a couple of days in the soil. The trio of Red Lions (on the right) are in a low, wide pot.  We topped that one with a little moss and a couple of rocks.  The Lemon Star is in the slightly smaller pot on the back left.  That, one too, has moss.  The largest bulb (Sunshine Nymph) is in the larger pot with no moss. Below is a look at the Lemon Star.  This is the one that The Bird picked out and is the only one of the five that hasn't gotten started just yet.  Still dormant.   Below is a closer look at the trio of Red Lions.  All three of these have small g...

The last time I posted photo showing off this season's Christmas Amaryllis bulb was over this past weekend , but the photo was from 10 days ago on December 28th.  Today - these photos below are *from today* - our wax Amaryllis bulb is still throwing off blooms.    Here's how it looks from what I'm calling the front.  Blooms are closely packed together and the height is just - Chef's kiss - perfect.  Not too tall and leggy which means they usually flop over.  This waxed bulb is compact and short. And, if you look closely at the flowers, you'll see that it is even producing new, about-to-open blooms like the one you see below: Around back, you'll see some of the blooms in decline that I need to pinch off. I'm not ready to give a final analysis of this waxed bulb Amaryllis experiment, but, right now, despite getting a late start, this thing has been pretty great.