Goodbye Peppermint Geraniums

For the last 6 years or so I have been a member of MSN groups. I just logged in after about a couple months of not visiting and I found my award winning group Peppermint Geraniums was gone. A lot of sweat and tears went into making it a website design site worth visiting. I guess I'll be working on transfering and fixing my backgrounds and other graphics on my other site Shiny Red Glass. I was using Peppermint Geraniums as a graphic storage for my other websites.
I don't have the heart to rebuild PG. I guess it's time to say goodbye to it. I'll miss the friends I've made. i still have another site there, Shiny Red Glass, which from the looks of things I'll need to revamp because most of the graphics were on Peppermint Geraniums.
One of my friends on MSN is an author now. either her forth or fifth romance novel is a best seller on Amazon. It seems like yesterday she had me proof part read part of her first book. At one time she was helping me write a romance of myself, and when I found how much time it took for her to finish the first book and the devotion she has to give her vocation, I realized I wasn't disciplined enough to do it full time. I wish her all the best, however I will never be able to write another romance story. Deborah is a lovely friend. I met her when I joined her award group DMAT Awards. I was even an assistant manager to the site for a while.

Beans and Gripes

I can't cook beans, every time I try to they turn out like rocks. I could soak them for two days and cook them for a months and still they would be rocks. Since the food has been short, I took out the last piece of beef and the pressure cooker my grandmother gave me. Beans were on the menu. Having never used a pressure cooker for fear of it exploding, I was leery of how it would work. The beans turned out OK, but I think whether they or the chili spices I used were bad. No mater how much doctoring I did the taste was still there, rotten masa flour. I made a huge batch of these beans and they were ruined by the taste, ugh! The family oohed and aahhhed about them, but none had seconds. The cats wouldn't even eat them. Needless to say, it was a disaster. I do know that the beans in the pressure cooker work though, so it could be chalked up as a learning experience.

Elise is still looking bad, one of the cuttings I was supposed to sell bit it, I don't know what's wrong with the plant, but I may have to unpot it again and cut the mush out. This time I'll leave the plants to dry a few days before repotting it. The heat is not helping any of the plants recover either.

My grandparents/landlords came to visit. I never know when they are landlords or grandparents, there is never a line drawn. They morph from one to the other at the blink of an eye. Anyway, they came by to tell us they had a car for us, but we have to wait for the paperwork before we got it. I don't know how to take this because they have never given anything without a string attached a mile long. There is a cost to it, we just have to wait and find out what, even if it were given for less than a dime, it will end up costing us a mint in troubles. I do love my grandparents, but they act like jackals all the time attacking the weaker family members at every turn, but they are who the Lord gave me as family, I should be happy I still have them. It's hard though.

They also said if we clean up hickville they'd bring a working washing machine. I come by it naturally, I was raised by pack rats of the worst kind. My grandparents came out of the depression and they never throw anything away. They always find a use for it. Our house and yard reflects being raised by them. Half of our yard is full of my uncle's junk, the other half ours. I admit we do need to clean up the yard, it does look like a bunch of yokels live here, which isn't too far from the truth.

I found a hole in the wall across from the old washing machine today, they are supposed to be bringing a new one, I can imagine the tongue lashing I'll get for that one. It was caused by part of the dryer. I know it will get better, but I don't know how worse it could get. I do know, I could be like my brother and living in a homeless shelter in Portland with his wife and son. I've been homeless before, I guess if I had to we could do it again. I pray that we find mercy soon, not that we deserve it, but it would be nice.

Custom Blogging

Not much in the line of plant stuff today, instead I've been goofing around with making my own templates for my blog. Since I don't like deleting anything I'm going to keep them and maybe somebody can use them. Who knows?

Here are a couple examples I've made in the last few days:



This was the first one I made, I've decided to try another layout, so the others followed.


I really like the transparent backgrounds with the scroll background, now I need to find the perfect one.


This is Epiphyllum "Melon Whip" I took these pictures a couple years ago. Look for this one, because I'm going to use it for a while and retire the orchid.

This is a template I made using some pictures I took of Carmel Barns in Carmel, CA.
Each of these have scroll tables, I really like the fixed background, it keeps the background in any resolution looking sharp.

The one I'm using right now is my Epiphyllum 'Padre.' It's a beauty when it blooms.
Enjoy

An update on my husband's job. I got a call just a few minutes ago and his forman said he's been called back to work and it will only be a day or so before the rest of the crew is called back. I have happy tears because we're starting to get a bit hungry in our wait. PTL The hardest part of trusting the Lord to provide is the wait. We just don't know how or when he'll provide, but not doubt that he will. Hopefully we'll be having a smoother ride for a few months.

Anniversary Surprise...

Or maybe curse? I love my husband very much, but I wish he'd get a little more creative when it comes to plant gifts. I'd drool over any orchid he'd give me, or an other kind of epiphyte, for that matter. I've even be happy with a Sansieveria or peace lily, however it seems every time he gives me a plant it's a Kalanchoe blossifeldia. It's a pretty (cheap) plant when it's in the florist's foil and sitting on the shelf at the grocery store, it even looks that way for a few months afterward, but then it goes downhill. It gets leggy, then ugly, and will never bloom again, unless you can give it all it wants. It's not a good houseplant for beginners. Yes, it does stay alive with lots of neglect, better with than without, but it will never be the pretty compact plant it started out to be.

That said, I was surprised that he bought it last night. He'd went out street witnessing with his friend and brought it home. It was a bit wilted, but it's perked up since being watered. The bottom leaves are a bit beat up from the car ride and the foil, they'll fall off eventually. I like how the flowers seem to change as they age, they are different colors, yellows, pinks, and creamy white. It's a nice plant. I'm proud of him.

While photographing for one of the gardening forums I belong to today, I took this picture. I was trying to get a close up of the spines. This is the "ghost" variegated corncob Euphorbia. I've had it for a while and I think it is one of the most stunning of my plants. I really like the way the picture came out. The large picture is a little gritty, but that happens when you turn off the flash. I'm not going to complain, this is my third Sony Mavica camera with floppy drive. The first DH ran over, the second died, and this one I bought from a lady for $50. It's an older model than the other two, but it works. I'd like to get one that has the CD reader, but maybe floppies are a bit safer in my house. With three children, I've always got scratched, cracked disks.

I got my orchid pots yesterday, just in time to repot again into more uniform pots, the cats have decided to play in my plants, so maybe the tray with insert will help protect them from knock over.

More on Pots

I have been waiting the last few days for my new orchid pots. I realized I needed some flats to put the pots in. I know Charley's Greenhouse Supply has them, but I didn't want to pay $2 each for something I know I can get at the nursery for free if I sweet talked them. However with no car, I' stuck with online buying. I looked up web flats and couldn't find them, I looked up web flats with little luck. I really needed them, so I went on a search for them. I found them, but I had to buy a case of 50-100 of them, I only need about 10 or so. I finally found them for 87 cents each sold as 1020 web flats. With shipping it comes out to about $1.25 each flat. I also found inserts for the flats, which hold the flats even better and tape plant labels. I'm happy with my findings, I hope they come soon so I can get my cuttings started. For the winter I'm going to get some seedling flats without holes to go in my shelves to protect the floor when I move them all inside.
My Epiphyllum "Elise" is not doing too well. She doesn't like the heat. I had her in a self watering pot and she was doing fine until about 6 weeks ago, then she started yellowing up the stem. I realized she was starting to mush. I re potted her into a two gallon pot, but all the new growth is slowly softening. I'm afraid I might lose her. I am waiting for payment for some cuttings I should of her on eBay. This was two weeks ago. I hope I get payment soon because the cuttings aren't looking too well. My King of Siam looked the same as Eilse a few weeks ago, but has bounced back since re-potting I'm hoping the same will happen to Elise. She's such a good bloomer and repeats her blooming throughout the year. I gave her some B1 root stimulator, hoping she'll recover any root loss from being in the self watering pot trying to escape. Somebody on the epiforums mentioned rooting her plants in Vegemite, we figured it was the B1 in it that was so beneficial. I am experimenting with B1 vitamins in my fertilizer, I bought a bottle of B1 vitamins just to add to my fertilizer. It can't hurt, since B1 is used to help root development. I heard the prenatal vitamins and aspirin helps plants develop also, aspirin did seem to help, but I'm not sure of the multivitamin.
Yesterday was my anniversary. I got a box of chocolate covered mint oreos. Wow, yippee, excellent! Can you feel the sarcasm? I bought a copy of The Holy War by Paul Bunyan and a thermos set for my husband. The boys made dinner, tuna helper and rice, yum, at least they attempted to make something nice. Tonight it's hamburger helper. I'm sick of box mixes, but they're as cheap as we can get. I guess it's going to be another rough year. We still have no car and he's been laid off for two more weeks. Tomorrow is the anniversary of the Highway 41 fire when we lost our house. Maybe that's why I've been so soppy lately. I pray that I will get out of this funk and learn whatever lesson I'm supposed to so we can move on.

Time to Repot

I have been using the last two weeks to upgrade my pots. I had many of my epiphyllums in the self watering hanging pots shown in my hoya post. I found that the soil was too moist for my epies. I was told I needed more perlite in my mix. My mix already consists of 1/3 perlite as it is. I use 1/3 potting soil, 1/3 perlite, and the rest a mix of clay cat litter and vermiculite. I also mix in the used coffee grounds from my husbands excessive coffee habit. I am now mixing it again half an half my mix with perlite. It's more white than anything else, but hopefully my plants won't rot. Another trick I learned is layer perlite in the bottom of the self watering pot then pot in the normal airy potting soil. Since perlite comes in 3.5 cf bags for $14 at OSH it's fairly cheap, but I do tend to go through it a lot.
I have since re potted all of my large plants in black gallon nursery pots. I don't think they can handle being re potted again, but this leaves about 10 empty self watering pots. I now have the problem of what to do with my cuttings. I have recycled some 4 in round pots, but they don't really fit in the flats very well. I was using plastic cups with burned holes in the bottoms, but even these were too moist and was causing rot. I was introduced to these pots when I bought some plants from Pacific Epies. I really like them, they are heavy and have lots of holes in the bottom, they come in clear and green. I bought the green ones only because I'm cheap, but I would really like to have the clear ones so I can watch the roots grow. They are made for orchids, but I'll use them for epies. I couldn't afford 1000 of them and less is not as economical. I found a lot of 100 on ebay. I bought them. With shipping and tax it comes out to about 23 cents a pot. This is better than the lot of 1000. I hope they come soon, so I can re pot my cuttings again. I also have some more epi cuttings waiting to be potted up.
There are many kinds of pots, clay, plastic, plaster, ceramic, and come in all sorts of sizes. My favorite to say is the "Long Tom," it's about 1 1/3 the height of the diameter, it's made for plants that need a lot of root room. Then there are bulb pans, which are about 1/3 the height of a regular height, for shallow roots and cactus and succulents. It can also be used as a training pot for bonsai. Standard clay pots are as high as they are wide. azalea pots are about half height, they make 3/4 height.
Now you get into orchid pots, they come in standard, 1/2 height and long toms. They come with slits in the side for root development. I have been making some orchid pots by drilling holes in the side of standard clay pots, it works well. Another favorite kind of pot is a strawberry planter, it's an urn looking thing with holes in the side to plant strawberries or herbs or even succulents.
One thing to keep in mind while planting is holes in the bottom of the pot, soil will go through them. I have found a cheap way to keep the soil confined for the first few watering's, coffee filters. Yes coffee filters, just place on over the holes in the pot and put your soil over it. You can also use a layer of newspaper, this takes a bit longer to break down though, but newspaper makes excellent compost also. why not use it to line your pots?
For more interesting information on pots and types of pots, I found this exhibit. It's quite interesting to see all this antique pottery. From cache pots to chamber pots, (not really) you'll find them on this website.

Hoya Hoe-Down

This posting is going to be a computation of my Hoyas. They are easy plants to grow if you can get the watering down right, some require more water than others.

This is one of my newest hoyas, it has a lot of potential and hopefully some beautiful blooms coming. I bought this as 5 4 in pots and stuck them in an old 8 in pot I had. I hope it fills out soon. It seems to be a slow grower, but I'm hopeful nonetheless. Hoya carnosa compacta is her name and slow growth is her game. I bought her at Hometown Nursery in Paso Robles.
Hoya shepherdii, my first ever Hoya to bloom, I bought it from Grow Nursery in Cambria as Hoya longifolia. You can tell the difference between the two by the bloom color. Longifolia has pure white blooms shepherdii has a red corona. This is a free blooming variety, which has been in bloom since about 4 months since buying it. I think this is one of my favorites so far.

I sold some plants on Ebay, this week, some epiphyllums and one of them was a cutting of what I bought as Hoya australis. I also got this plant at Grow Nursery in Cambria, I really need to get him a book on Hoyas, he uses an out of date book to ID his plants. I was told it is not an australis as I'd already suspected, but H. verticillata. It is a beautiful plant which is finally giving me new shoots. I see penduncles on all the plants in the pot, so maybe it won't be too long before I get blooms. I love the feel of it's leaves. They are ridged slightly. I hope the person who gets it is as happy with their little rooted plant as I am with my big plant.

This is my oldest Hoya I've had it for a year now. It is a shame to my growing capabilities. It was a rescue from Hometown Nursery. It had mealies and wasn't doing too well. I took it home, killed the mealies and almost killed it again this winter when it was hit by frost. I did lose some hoyas, but this one survived. It was all the Lord's doing, I would have killed it otherwise. It's not bloomed, and was recently under potted to a in pot. Hoya carnosa "Krimson Queen" is her name, aka Hoya carnosa variegata. I got a couple more hoyas from HTN. You'll meet them later.

The next on the list is Hoya kerrii. This is the slowest grower I have. It's put out all of two leaves in the year since I've had it. You can see in the picture it has splashed leaves on one stem and green on the other. I was wondering if I had two different varieties, but never got a response yet. I got this plant at Miner's Hardware in Morro Bay. They are the only hardware store I've seen with Hoyas. They tend to be hard to come by. I had a huge hanging basket of kerriis this winter, but the whole basket died in the frost. This plant I had inside. I just re potted it so it can grow on a trellis. I'm afraid I'll be old and grayer before I see it bloom though.
This is a NOID carnosa I rescued at Oceano Nursery, it also took the frost really bad. When I bought it it was a chocolate brown color from the sun. It was really beautiful. I've since grown it in less light and it's greened out a lot. I potted the green stems from my carnosa Krimson Princess in the same pot as this one, since this is a NOID I hope I can get two different colored blooms. It finally looks like a plant with the two foot stems in the pot. I was surprised to see new growth, so maybe it's recovered enough to bloom sometime next year.

Hoya carnosa "Krimson Princess" is also easy, but it keeps wanting to revert to green. I took out all the green stems and put them in with a NOID carnosa I have. I have had this plant for a few months now and with this heat it's really taking off. I feed my Hoyas Eleanor's VF-11 with each watering. I've cut back on the watering because I've found with the SW pots they really don't dry out all that much. I hope to see this one bloom within the next year or so. i cut it back a bit to compensate for the loss of the green stems, I hope this makes the pot fuller eventually. With as quickly as it's losing it's variegation I need to do something quick.

This is my newest Hoya, Hoya pubicalyx "Red Buttons." I got this one at Grow Nursery also. I have been eyeing this plant for a long time before I finally bought it. You can see where it was grown in darker conditions by the stretched stems. I'm hoping these stop elongating and new stems cover the elongated areas. I know this one is correctly ID'd because it had two tags, one hidden which said "Red Buttons" the other said Hoya species. This one is supposed to have chocolate brown maroon blooms, I can't wait. I haven' seen any penduncles, but that doesn't mean they're not there.

Well there you have it kids, my happy Hoyas. They like it outside. I'll have a mess when it's time to bring them in. This year I won't be leaving any of them outside to get frost damage. I lost two hoyas and a lot of cuttings last year, I hope to not repeat that experience again this year. I hope soon I'll have blooms on some other Hoyas, but for now the shepherdii will have to do.

Monday was my son's 15th birthday, it was fun, even though my husband was laid off and no transportation in sight, we managed to have cake and presents. He and his brother went camping in Yosemite with my mom and brother and will be back on Friday. I hope he has a good time, Monday is my anniversary, it will be 13 years. It is also the anniversary of the Highway 41 fire next week, where we lost everything to arson. People have adjusted their lives to the loss, I'm not sure 13 years is enough time to cope though. Without the Lord, I couldn't do it.