My Aunt's Plants

 This fine couple is my Aunt and Uncle.  They live in Vacaville, California, and we visited them this past summer.  The plants they have around their house are much different than the ones we have around our place.  Tame Dames #2 and #3 took pictures of the front yard plants for you to enjoy.  Come take a look...

These potted beauties add a fresh green to their front doorstep.

This is Jade.  It is a remarkable succulent. 

We have cacti where we live, so these pokey friends were not unfamiliar.

I'm not sure what plant this is, but it appears to have gone to seed and given up the ghost.

This is another fabulous succulent that is very easy to care for.  My aunt gave me a start of it.

Here's a close-up of the jade.  We also got to take home a start of this.

We don't ever see snails or slugs in our soil at home, so it was fun to find one here.

Below are a few of the flowers in bloom in July.

My uncle got this sign for his front yard from a golf course.  He thought it fit nicely with their on-going landscaping project.

 

Below you'll see the glory of a cactus in bloom. 

We took our starts home in a plastic sack that we kept in a shady box, and made sure that we never left it in our hot car.  We sorta forgot about them, and unfortunately didn't get around to planting them until a month later.  I was afraid we were too late, and the plants would be dead, but it appears not.  These succulents are very hardy and easy to care for.  That's my kind of plant!  They are happy now in their new pots on our windowsill.

I regret that there are no pictures of the backyard plants.  We saw lemon, lime, avocado, and orange trees.  There were pots, borders and boxes planted with veggies and flowers.  They have a fantastic mulch bin that I'm told that at one time got so hot, they found the newspaper in their was actually smoldering and sending up smoke.  There's a nice toilet planter too, which I probably shouldn't even pique your interest with since I have no picture to show you.  I'll just have to go back for a visit and take a picture.  Until then, a warm adieu from the land of Vacaville!

Planting Bulbs and First Snowflakes

Baby, it's cold outside!

Although we have not gotten our first snowstorm yet, it is cold enough that we have got our first snowflakes this morning.  

I was laying in bed, listening to the household waking up, when I heard my kids opening the blinds.  It was the announcement of, "It's snowing!" at 7:30 this morning that sparked my memory that we have some bulbs that need to get into the ground before winter hits. 

After breakfast, we bundled up and braved the freezing temperatures.

 I grabbed a shovel and dug into the ground, and my kids followed behind with the bulbs. 

After we covered the bulbs up with dirt, we decided to catch a snowflake. 

I wish my camera I had with me could have taken a better picture. The snowflakes are really beautifully formed and perfect for picture taking.

We were only out there for maybe 15 minutes, but it was enough time to get our noses running and freeze our faces, fingers, and toes.  Buckle up folks!  Here comes the cold!