Day 91 - My Sad Looking Coffee Plant

Do you ever have those plants where you wished it would just either 1) Kick the bucket or 2) Thrive? Well...I do. I bought this coffee plant more than 2 years ago and I am still trying to figure it out til this day. I see new life on top but it's not exactly thriving but it's also not exactly dying. And I continue to water it every week, holding onto hope that one day it can reach for the light and thrive.

Day 89 - Beware! Killer Dachshunds!

Metea got this for me when she attended the Gilroy garlic festival some time ago. How sweet is she to be thinking about me?!

I haven't had a chance to initiate my vegetable garden but it's in the works and when I do have that garden, this sign shall go there. :D

Day 82 - What's So Special?

Yeah I know....there's nothing special about this picture. Other than the fact that the lime is from my BACKYARD!!

Day 80 - Life Starting Again

It's only been two months and this tree is showing life again. Amazing! Original post found here.

Day 79 - Apple Tree

Oh yes, you better believe it, I have an apple tree. What do I do with the apples? Well....nothing really. The husband and I tried a few apples from this tree and they were terrible. (Probably due to lack of fertilizer and care). Nowadays, I will feed some apple slices to my dogs.

Day 51 - Orange Tree

My mom dropped by yesterday bearing gifts of food and an orange tree! :) How wonderful is she?! There are flower buds on the tree but I am not sure if they will full bloom to an actual orange. It's o.k. though...we have all the time and are looking forward to freshly squeezed orange juice next Spring or Summer! :)

Oh and the little guy you see in the picture is Snickers. I think he was looking for some tree bark.

Day 44 - Succulent Update

I figured it's time to update the progress on my succulents. The original post can be found here. Wow..I just looked at the date of my original post, July 16, 2008. Pretty much a year. Well....I am sad to report back there has been some casualties. I originally started out with six catus plants. I am now down to three. :**(

Day 31 - My Lime Tree

I have a pathetic looking lime tree in the backyard. I've had the tree for almost 3 years now. It's always at the butt of my in-laws' joke. I think it's at the butt of my parents too. They like to give me grief about the way I take care of my lime tree because....sheepishly admitting...I don't.

About a month ago, I saw the tree spout a fruit. Yes, one lime! I was soo excited as I told the husband about it. He just sniggered at me and thought I was crazy. He quickly reminded me that one lime was pretty pathetic for a tree we've had for several years. I giggled while explaining to him that I didn't care if it was only one fruit...at least my plant survived and is bearing fruits this year.

As I was feeding my dogs today, I decided to look around our backyard and trotted over to my lime tree. I'll be darn, I see at least seven little green balls spouting out. How cool is that! :D

Anyhoo - I am on the look-out for an orange tree so my parents will probably pick one up for me in the next few months. Gotta love the parents for stuff like this although my mom thinks I am crazy because she got rid of hers and now I want one. You see....my parents like to plant the exotic fruits like dragon fruit and logan. Lime, lemon and orange trees are boring to them, however, I am a bit boring and tend to like more of what are considered "American" fruits.

Day 29 - Bare Yet Full of History

We have this huge tree in our backyard. At one point, I thought of getting rid of it but I've realized this tree has history. Right now it's completely bare to the bones as we've stripped it of its leaves. Don't worry, by autumn, we'll see new life on those branches.

I don't know the history of this tree, actually, I don't even know what kind of a tree this is, but it whispers to me that it belongs to this house and a part of the land...

Compost

I ordered a compost bin today. What's a compost bin? Shame on you if you don't know what a compost bin is!! J/K A compost bin is a container that will decompose organic materials and turn those materials to soil AKA dirt for those who do not know what soil is. What type of materials? Well, leaves, eggshells, ground coffee, orange and banana peels, etc. There is a whole list of items that you can put in a compost bin. There are also other materials to avoid tossing into the compost as those materials can produce foul odors or attract rodents. The latter part would really be scary for me. Of course, the odor would cause an uproar with my neighbors as well.

Now I know some people will ask why not just buy the soil from Home Depot or Lowes. Simple. Why pay for something that you can get free AND you are also helping the environment by recycling your waste.

Anyway, I've been talking about composting for about a year now. Sad. I take action slowly. Had I bought the compost bin like I originally wanted to instead of waiting for a deal or getting it from the city, I would have had my dirt by now! Go figures. Now I have to practically wait until the end of this year to get my dirt. Oh well. I guess it is o.k. since I have all the time in the world. It's not like my garden is going to get up and leave me. Hm..well, actually, it will probably just wither away due to my lack of commitment.

So, sit back and watch me in the next few months as I pursuit my new endeavor. Wish me luck. In this case, soil! :P

Inspired

I am inspired!

I have a new goal for 2009! It will be working on our backyard! I was looking at whiteonricecouple's blog and their garden is just perfect!! Now I just need to pull all the information together. This will definitely be continued work in progress.

Gardenia & Planting

Ha! They say I have a brown thumb and laugh at my feeble attempts at gardening. Well, I stick my tongue out at those who laugh at me. :P

My plants on our front porch are alive! So eat that! :P I walked out to the porch this evening to water my plants and there was the scent of gardenia! My face immediately lit up when I saw my gardenia shrub had produced buds and one flower! I am just super giddy to see all the plants surviving.
Aside from the gardenia plant I have on our porch, my oncidium orchid is alive! It's been more than a year and the plant has finally produced flowers again! My plumeria plant is also alive and is producing plumeria buds!

Please excuse the tacky wooden stick that is holding up my plumeria tree. I haven't had a chance to figure out where to plant this tree.

And here is a picture of my Schlumbergera Harmony also known as the Christmas catus or is it the Thanksgiving catus? Either way, it's one of those plants. I guess we should just call it the holiday catus. I purchased this plant last Christmas and it did not arrive until after the holidays!

Anyhow, I originally had this plant in the house but because the cave (oops that's what I called the husband's room), so I guess I mean our living room did not have enough light, I moved it out to the porch. Looks like that was a good choice because my plant is starting to grow new leaves.

So to conclude this post - I am a happy gardener and I laugh at all those who did not have faith in my "green thumb" capabilities. P

One Republic & Planting

The husband and I as well as ECA & his gf went to the One Republic concert at the OC Fairgrounds over the weekend. It's been awhile since we have been to a concert so it was nice to go again.


Here's the gigantic sausage dog that the husband was enjoying. It just screams calorie-overload to me!
The first band to play called themselves Carolina Liar. I've never heard of them until now. The husband thought that perhaps the singer was coming down with a cold or getting over a cold because he sounded hoarse = terrible.

The next band to sing was Phantom Planet. For those who don't know who they are, remember that TV show, The OC? Remember the theme song, "California, California, da-da-da-da-da...," well Phantom Planet wrote and sang that song.

Then it was One Republic, a local band I might add! Two of the five guys are from OC and another two are from LA!

Stop and Stare (this is the best I can do so don't complain).

Unfortunately, I did not get to take any pictures of them when they sang "Apologize," as my camera ran out of battery. Boo! :( After the concert, the four of us attempted to walk around the fair but it was getting late and the fair was close to closing. The good news was that we were able to pick up funnel cake! Yum! Yum!

I finally got a chance to pot my succulents this weekend. I've had these babies for several months but I've been so lazy. Aren't they cute?