Hope In The Garden

When we moved into our beach house last summer I found that the previous homeowners left behind a number of orchids.  A couple were still in their pots in a shady spot behind the guest cottage; some were tucked into the nooks and crannies of a nearby sawn-off palm tree trunk.  To my great disappointment, the landscapers removed the tree trunk before I could salvage the orchids, and the others were trampled or discarded in the cleanup.  You can imagine my surprise when I spotted this little beauty popping out from behind the fishtail palm the other day!  It gave me great hope and joy at a time in my life when my ability to have any kind of faith is wearing thin.

Christmas pot finally receives a plant.

I promised my readers a picture of my pretty deck pot.  I bought it last December from Sun Harbour Nursery because it was big and blue and I loved the mosaic design.  We finally got around to dumping in some soil and I found a plant that's supposed to be no-maintenance.  It's a philodendron called Hope.

Basil (foreground) and a penta for the butterflies.

Pretty spring container garden.

Little roma tomatoes doing well.

Something killed my serrano pepper plant but I replaced it with another and this one seems much stronger.  I added rosemary to one of the pots.  My cilantro is still going strong, as are the basil and tomato plants.  And to wrap things up, the following pictures are of some local Indian River oranges we bought the other day.  My friend Tomasso took me to the old Harvey's Groves store on U.S. 1 in Rockledge the other day and I was so impressed and entertained by the dinner-plate sized hibiscus they had growing there that I had to bring Beaver back so he could take some pictures.  He took lots and lots of photos without realizing his memory card was still in the card reader back at home.  Luckily I took this one with my iPhone.

A giant Harvey's Grove hibiscus blossom.

#2 oranges are $11.95 for a sack full.

Indian River Valencias perfect for fresh-squeezed juice.