Flowers make the yard go round

    Thank you for all the wonderful comments on yesterday's post. My intention was to encourage current quilters and remind other quilters about the power of the quilt so they can engage in this activity. Many are discouraged and feel like there is nothing meaningful one person can do. Creating and giving enlarges you and makes a difference to  others.

     I have a very small lot. I would love more land. I try to make the best use of it and this year I bought some standing planters (thank you Cathy for encouragement) so I could have lettuce, tomatoes, peppers and some green onions. I really love flowers and use a lot of pots and planters.  I forgot to take pictures of the deck plants, got to go do it! Forgot the tomato planter also. My husband is building a pergola, so when the roof goes on, I will show it to you. So, this is a snippet of my dinky yard.

Bought four of these from Tractor Supply, my new fave store!

Flowers and Fabric, oh my!

      Two things I just love, fabric and flowers, have made an appearance around here lately. Two friends sent me fabric to help with making comfort quilts. Julie sent me some large pieces to help with backing and a whole load of 2 1/2" strips- some colors and a lot of low volume (yum) ones. I am trying to determine what quilts to make with them, paging through my collection of printed out ideas. Of course, then I had to rearrange two massive folders of printed out/purchased patterns. I arranged the strips by color and style for the photo. I usually put strips in a drawer by color.

     Also, I had a box of gorgeous fabrics from Gwen, who has supplied me over the years with big backing pieces in addition. I arranged the piles by type of fabrics (batik, florals, novel, kids) to figure out how to store these away. Lots of wonderful batik pieces to help augment the batik collections.

     One of my orchids is blooming. Every year for 5 years, it has sent out a shoot of blooms. They last so long and I am so happy to have some color around on these gray days.

     And, some of the Christmas cactus have shot out some wonderful blooms!

Last blooms standing

      Well, Oct. 31st, I saw snow. On Halloween. Fortunately, I took photos before of the remnants of my garden because it still had lovely flowers. I can't take apart the garden or boxes if there are still blooms on the plants, so I will be prying them out once the weather turns ugly probably. We just have too many months without flowers, so I hang on to them for all its worth.

Beauty Break

      I got a break in the action when my painting teacher invited us to the once a year paint in her garden. I had not painted in a while, so I welcomed the opportunity to photo, sketch and flex the painting brushes. Although her garden is not huge, it is very eclectic and creative. Enjoy some of the plantings! Besides the garden, Jody sets up little still lifes as focal points.

     And some of her demonstration painting.

Roses are glorious flowers

      I admit, I was always afraid of growing roses. However, with some advice and help, I am robustly planting them. I stick to shrub roses. I have a tiny yard, but there is always room for another rose. I love the David Austin roses and I have also been buying some from Heirloom roses- own root roses, not grafted. They have big sales and they have great how to videos. I do have to do titanic battles with Japanese beetles at times, althought right now, they are absent. I have had to fence them in because the insane rabbits ate canes last year.

Hot Cocoa- given to me by a friend who did not have enough sun. This rose has the most beautiful shiny dark green foliage and such a beautiful color flower

      This is a new Heirloom rose I bought on sale- aptly named "Take it Easy". It is growing well so far. First planted.

Today