Wedding Flowers!

Yay! Today I started planting my Ranunculus bulbs for my wedding.

For those who my not be familiar with this lovely flower, it is very similar to a rose that has 5 times the amount of petals . Also, Martha Stewart Weddings (the magazine) seems to be very fond of them, as that is where I was first introduced to them.

I have 3 varieties:
Flamenco Ranunculus, Gold Ranunculus, and White Ranunculus. The Flamenco colored ones are actually just because I thought they were pretty, they will not be used in my wedding. My colors are yellow, green, white and black. So, to add a bit of variety I also ordered White Freesias (which I planted today as well) and Minnow Daffodils as well as Tête-à-Tête Daffodils (which I will be planting on Saturday).

I was looking up information about growing ranunculus on google and I found I highly informative site: How To Grow Ranunculuses

This was incredibly helpful, especially with giving a time table. I have found that getting a more solid estimate of how long a certain plant will take to grow fully is near impossible, so this site is an absolute gem! I was starting to think there was no hope for me growing my own flowers, worrying that my flowers would bloom too early or too late. Now I feel much more confident.

I can't wait to show the results!

Holy Tomatoes!

Hizzah! I finally have tomatoes! Out of all my 21 tomato plants, I was beginning to worry that I would not get any fruit from any of them.

When I planted my initial 6 plants, they shot up in size and looked great for about 2 weeks, which inspired me to purchase 15 more plants. Suddenly my leaves on the first set started to look droopy all the time and the bottom leaves of the plants were turning yellow and brown and curling up. For weeks I thought they were on their last legs and they started infecting the newer plants as well. I thought all was lost until last week when I went out to re-tie my grape tomato plant and noticed a bunch of small green balls emerging from the branches!


Just a few days later, I noticed all of my cherry tomato plants had fruits as well. I guess that smaller fruits take less preparation time it needs.

I'm greatly looking forward to harvesting these little lovelies. Tomatoes are my favorite vegetable and I intend to eat my fill.

Les Tete-a-Tetes

Yay! I got my daffodil bulbs in the mail yesterday! I ordered them about a month ago from Gurney's and they just now came in. I ordered two different types: Tete-a-Tetes (which are yellow with a golden yellow center) and Minnows (which are white with a yellow center).

Hopefully they do well (I've never done bulbs before now and I'm deathly afraid they will rot with all the Florida humidity).

Stay tuned for results!

Meet Peeps

This is Peeps McGee, he is a fixture in our garden (he sits between the eggplant and the ichiban - mainly to stop the name calling). Justin and I were shopping in Lowe's a few weeks after we started the garden and as soon as we saw him, we knew he's be the perfect garden guard. Though the bright and unyielding Florida sun has bleached him somewhat in his short span of office in the garden, there he still sits, never abandoning his post.

If only one could find such reliable help in other occupations :)

The Search for Dittany

This little herb was quite a difficult find for this Floridian. I searched high and low, every google search result, and every local nursery. Justin and I stopped by Rockledge Gardens about a month or so ago and I'm pretty sure that the woman who helped me thought I was some type of witch. Oddly enough, the first site I found through google that would sell dittany plants was a Wicca supply website.

I did eventually find a website for a nursery in Delaware that happened to sell dittany. This is the site.

http://site.mawebcenters.com/accentsforhomeandgarden_1/cart.html

I was actually able to find not only dittany of crete for sale, but also costmary which I couldn't find anywhere else for sale.

Anyway, so in all my research that brought me to want dittany in my garden, I learned quite a bit about the herb. For example, did you know that it is also called the burning bush because the plant is so woolly that it will catch fire like tinder? Kind of neat huh?

We'll see how it all ends up. I've never gotten live plants in the mail before.

So... The First Installment...

So, the title of my blog wraps things up fairly well, I think. I got into gardening completely on accident.

It all started when I decided to get married. I fell in love with Ranunculus flowers from all the bridal magazines, but the magazines also tell you that - from a florist - they are not cheap. So, I got the idea of growing some of my own to save some money, and still have a plant to get more flowers afterward. Thus began the search for more information. I found a site that sold bulbs of all different colors. After that initial search, I decided to wait a while since I wouldn't have to plant them for a bit longer.

The main inclination to gardens came on full throttle when I visited The Cloisters in New York City. It was the last thing we did before we caught our plane back to Florida on July 17, 2008, and I have to say it was my favorite place in the city. The architecture, the art, the gardens, the view. Everything was so picturesque. The gardens are designed in medieval styles, with historical formations and ancient plants. All the plants are also sectioned off by their purpose: kitchen, medicine, fragrance, and magic. I loved these gardens, and that caused me to look up information on these medieval plants.

Ok, so that was a long explaination of how I came to love herbs, both common and strange. When I started showing an interest in growing herbs, my mother decided I should grow a vegetable garden too. Now I have been bitten by the gardening bug and can't get enough of it. A modest sized garden that I started in my backyard went from having 1 fig tree, 9 black eyed peas, 9 okra, 1 ichiban, 2 eggplant, 9 corn, 6 tomato, and 4 pepper plants has now more than doubled its size. Today, I have 1 fig tree, 21 tomatoes, 16 okra, 2 eggplant, 1 ichiban, 9 black eyed peas, 2 giant pumpkins, 3 straberries, 2 sweet potatoes and 7 corn plants. That's without the herbs.

In my herb patch I have 2 pineapple sage, spicy globe basil, parsley, lemon verbena, bee balm, lemon balm, cilantro, chives, cinnamon basil, and common sage. This patch will also grow within the next couple of days to include costmary and dittany (which I had to special order from Delaware) and lamb's ear and feverfew.

I tell you, I have an addiction.

I also have many plants I have sprouted from seeds that are just waiting to be big enough for the ground, as well as 4 dendrobium orchids and 1 phalaenopsis orchid, 2 mandevilla vines on trellises, 1 confederate star jasmine vine on a trellis, and 1 rosemary plant that I have turned into a topiary (as well as all of the clippings that have now rooted to make new plants).

I'm telling you, I dove in head first to gardening and now it has become a passion. I'm looking at it as a sink or swim situation and I plan on swimming, but we shall see how it goes. Hopefully, I end up helping someone out with my accounds, but if not at least I have my garden to console me :)



P.S. I did finally order my Ranunculus bulbs, which I have yet to plant, but I will report the results when I do.