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gardens & polka dots

gardens & polka dots

Monthly Archives: May 2012

An Orchid Affair

24 Thursday May 2012

Posted by gardensandpolkadots in Gardens

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Tags

Crucifix Orchids, Epidendrum sp., garden design, horticulture, Orchids, Serendipity, Serendipity Garden Designs

Orchids have always appeared a little illusive to me. Tricky and unpredictable would be the best way to describe how I felt about them. They just seemed like a plant that other people grew and not me.I grew up in a small country town and I remember hearing about the Orchid Society and the Annual Orchid show. I remember one day driving past the hall where the Orchid Show was taking place and I looked in and it was a mass of colour and what appeared to be very excited people – chattering about their prized orchids. I just couldn’t imagine standing around talking about ‘orchids’ all day. Now I find myself in a completely new space, where each morning I look out of my kitchen window to will my little orchid cuttings on to success and abundant flowering – I’m sure this works!

My own fascination with orchids started when I visited my childhood home a few years ago. I discovered, or finally opened my eyes to the strategically placed orchids in the garden, on and around trees and on the veranda and deck. There in all their glory were Rock Orchids (Dendrobium speciosum –I’ll talk about these another time), the most beautiful pots of Crucifix Orchids (Epidendrum spp.) and I’m sure that other species were hidden there to! The Crucifix Orchids were flowering prolifically in orange, red and purple. The pots that the orchids are planted in have been placed in terracotta coloured pots and they look perfect on the north facing veranda. These beautiful plants kept on flowering over the years until recently when I was ‘home’ and discovered only one flower left. Nothing to worry about, they just needed re-potting and a little prune.

The Crucifix Orchids on the veranda. When they were flowering they were so beautiful, but even like this they look wonderful with their green leathery leaves.

So I got to work pruning. The re-potting will have to wait for another visit (hopefully not too far away!). As I mentioned, most of the old canes had finished flowering, but it was at the stage where they were starting to reshoot (up the length of the cane new leaves were starting to grow). I discovered this after I had cut some out, but it didn’t matter because the canes still needed to be removed to make the plant look tidy and to reduce the amount of energy that the plant was putting into these old canes. I want the plant to now put energy into healthy growth of the remaining canes and into producing beautiful, abundant flowers.

Without intending to I had collected for myself a number of cuttings, some were the canes with leaves, others were new growth with aerial root (roots that survive without being in the soil). I decided then that I would try my hand at propagating them to produce beautiful plants with fabulous flowers in my own garden.

An arrangment of orchid cuttings, surely at least one will take. I’m hopeful.

So, I set to work. First I purchased some orchid potting mix. Orchid potting mix is course and allows water to drain freely through and out the bottom of the pot. It also provides the orchid with the correct trace elements or minerals for healthy, strong growth.

As long as it says Orchid Mix on the bag you can be assured it is good for all orchids- course, free draining and contains the correct balance of trace elements.

You can see all of the goodness that makes this mix ideal for growing orchids.

Next I tidied up the cuttings a little then planted them. Because I am new to this I decided to experiment with the cuttings, using all the different ones I had to see which one will take best. I used old pots because they were small and wouldn’t take up too much room and as I found out once finished, they fit perfectly on my kitchen and office windowsill. So now I can look at, talk too and encourage them to become healthy, mature, beautiful looking plants through the day.

Old nursery pots are ideal for this use. Any size will do.

One of my little cuttings planted and ready to grow and blossum.

This gorgeous little cutting consists of a flower spike. I’m not sure how this one will go but I will encourage it on to good health and strength.

Four of my pots on the kitchen windowsill where I can will them to become healthy, mature beautiful looking plants.

Ideally I would have liked to propogated these orchids in warmer weather but as it turned out the opportunity presented itself to me now, in late autumn. So having said that I will be patient and nurturing to my new little plants and continue to encourage them.

If these cuttings don’t take I know where I can get more from and hopefully I wont have to bring them back to Sydney stuffed in my luggage on a plane.

If you have any nice orchid growing stories please share them here, we’d love to read about them.

Until next time.

Carmel

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Super Special Secret Soap

18 Friday May 2012

Posted by gardensandpolkadots in Polka Dots

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Tags

Fragrance, Gardens and Polka Dots, polka dots, Serendipity, Serendipity Garden Designs, Soap

I love discovering ‘Polka Dots’ during my day. I usually write them down so that they don’t just become part of my daily landscape but that they actually stand out. We all live in this busy world and the fabulous little details can often get stuck, wedged or swallowed up by the ‘other stuff’. Sometimes the ‘other stuff’ is important, sometimes it is far from it.

The other day I discovered a ‘Polka Dot’ that I share with a friend. I was fortunate to have a few hours with a very special friend of mine (actually I saw a few very special friends that day, lucky me!). But this particular friend and I somehow started talking about how we both love soaps (I love how one conversation can quickly and magically turn into a different conversation and you don’t even know how you got there). It wasn’t just about any old soap, it was about super special soap. You know, the soaps that smell divine and have delicious names that sound like fancy cocktails or deserts. The soaps that get wrapped in tissue paper at the counter and popped into a little paper bag. The soap that you keep and keep and keep, admiring it and occasionally picking it up to make sure it still smells like it did when you purchased it or when it was given to you. The soap that you can’t possibly use until just the right moment in time, then you carefully place it in the soap dish. Yes! That super special soap. If you don’t have any yourself then I am pretty sure you would know someone that does.

Even boys need super special soap…

Goats Milk Soap. One of the new additions to my ‘super special secret soap stash’

I remember when I was growing up there was always pretty soaps in the bathroom and it smelt so wonderful, fresh and florally. It felt homely and inviting. Now in my own home I love to have nice soaps and I love to give pretty soaps to my friends. When my Bridesmaids visited me in Sydney a few months before my wedding, I put out their towels then placed a pretty little soap on each of their towels. The soaps were a different name and fragrance especially chosen for each of them. I love to do unexpected things like this!

Recently I gave a friend a cute little soap for her birthday it was wrapped in blue and white stripped paper and had a little jewel on the front. It even smelt cute. And even more recently I bought myself some delicious soap, one was goats milk soap and the other, Pear and Ginger. Wow! The Pear and Ginger is beautiful (and sounds like a tropical cocktail!).

Pear and Ginger soap. This soap smells divine. I wish you could smell it too.

One of my favourite ‘can’t go past’ soaps is goats milk soap. It is great for your skin, especially in winter when the weather is drying. It is so creamy, delicious and nourishing and has such a wonderful soft scent. Fortunately for me, Dave understands the requirement of me having super special soaps and has contributed to the supply on occasion. A few years ago he gave me a wonderfully named soap for my birthday called ‘Oaty Goatie Goodness’. I was looking at it and smelling it recently (yes, to make sure it still smelt oaty, goatie and goodnessy!) and I think it might be getting close to optimal use time.

Oaty Goatie Goodness. Winter will be the perfect time to use this lovely earthy soap.

So, my friend (let’s call her Kate), who I share this soap love with was telling me about a lovely soap she found in a store in Melbourne. It’s fragrance was ‘orange and cinnamon’ (yum, if that’s not a fabulous winter-time soap fragrance, I don’t know what is). That evening I received a message from Kate saying that she had located an ‘orange and cinnamon’ soap in her ‘secret soap stash’ which she would like to give to me. Oh how wonderful! The anticipation of waiting for the soap to arrive so that I could smell it was so exciting. And just so you know, I did give Kate an opt out with no hard feelings clause, just in case she changed her mind and found the soap too delicious to part with. She was grateful for the clause but fortunately for me she found no need to use it.

Orange and Cinnamon. Prehaps beautiful soaps will be like plant cuttings, shared and enjoyed amongst family and friends.

Now I have a growing ‘super special secret soap’ stash. Well, not all that secret, but believe me Dave would not know where to find many of them. I am looking forward to using some during winter and finding more beautiful soaps for myself and to share with my beautiful, kind friends.

What is your favourite soap frangrance from your ‘super special secret soap’ stash?

Until next time.

Carmel

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Tulip Bulb Planting Time

04 Friday May 2012

Posted by gardensandpolkadots in Gardens

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Tags

bulbs, flowers, garden design, Gardening, Hyacinth, landscape design, Planting, plants, Serendipity, Serendipity Garden Designs, Spring, Tulips

Stage two of growing flowers from bulbs is underway, I’m so excited and I’ve just added yet another reason to look forward to spring. If you haven’t read stage one, ‘It’s Bulb Planting Time’ click here and you can read all about when I planted my purple, papery Hyacinth bulbs. They are going very well by the way. I am keeping them moist and making sure that they get enough sunshine during the day. As the sun travels further north I have to make sure I move them so that they can get the maximum amount of sun available. I have managed to keep them close to a north facing wall so the heat from the wall is retained and radiates out even when the sun is going down.

I don’t know what colour this Hyacinth is going to be – pink, white or purple – but I am sure it will be magical and smell amazing.

You might remember that the Tulip bulbs I purchased required 4 to 6 weeks in the freezer. This tricks the bulb into thinking that it has spent a very chilly winter in the ground. When we plant them in Australia in Autumn the soil has usually retained some of the summer heat – depending on the year and your location, so you need them to chill before you plant them.

So, 5 to 6 weeks have past and my bulbs are ready for some potted love.

 

Chilly Tulip bulbs ready for potted love.

You can plant Tulips in a prepared garden bed or in a pot. I am planting mine in a pot, not just because my garden is predominantly filled with vegies (which would look quite magical with Tulips popping up) but also because I want to move the pot inside to the sunroom once it flowers. In addition to all these very good reasons, by planting in a pot I know exactly where they. At the end of the Tulip flowering season when the flowers have finished and the leaves have died down I can easily lift the bulbs (i.e. dig them up) wash them, dry them and store them over winter. Then next year at about the same time after 4 to 6 weeks in the freezer I will plant them all over again – it just keeps getting more exciting!

Yesterday in the gorgeous afternoon light and desperately needing some outdoor time I decided that my lovely little Tulip bulbs had spent sufficient time in my freezer and were ready for the next stage in their journey – some potted love! So out I went with my pot, soil, gloves, frozen Tulip bulbs and a will for the little things to produce the most wonderful display for our sunroom when they arrive. I don’t know what colours we will be blessed with but it really doesn’t matter, five flowering Tulip bulbs is all we need.

I have placed the bulbs deep in the composted soil with the pointy end facing up.

The most important thing about planting any bulb is that it is planted the right way up. You can see from the picture above that I have planted the bulbs with the pointy end facing up. This end is where all the fabulous green and flowered goodness will come from. If you plant them upside down you’ll be visiting the florist for your fresh Tulips.

Tulip bulbs require deep, moist, well-drained soil enriched with compost and leaving them to do their growing business in a nice sunny position. It also recommends (on this pack) that they be planted 10cm to 15cm apart. I have read just as many articles on planting bulbs that suggest mass planting them in pots and in the garden. If you are not sure, experiment. They are not expensive to purchase. You could plant some in the garden at different spacings or in pots with different numbers. If you do plant them in the garden remember where they are so that you can lift them and plant them again next autumn. By experimenting you can see what the bulbs respond to best and you can see what colours and spacing you prefer.

Let the magic begin. Oh, so excited for spring!

I am so excited about all the magical little bulbs I have planted over the past few months. I will care for them as best I can and encourage them to burst out of the soil in spring in wonderous colours and perfect health and look forward to displaying them in my home.

A vase full of beautiful pink Tulips.

Pink Tulips, I am so excited to see what colours mine will be.

I hope you too have enjoyed planting your bulbs, which ever you have decided to plant.

I can’t wait to hear your stories on your bulb flowering successes when they start showing their little green leaves to the heavens in spring. Good luck!

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