Dreams of summer past......fiery lily after the rain.
(Click pictures to enlarge)"Orange is red brought nearer to humanity by yellow."~ Wassily Kandinsky
Yes, I know it is Sunday and I missed the photo hunt by a long shot. Still, I had these already in the works and thought they were beautiful and frankly, I was just too "brain" tired to focus on a different thought. Orange has always been a warm and inviting color in my book. I had an orange room... not quite this bright, but almost... when I was in college. It was the first time in all the years that someone actually asked me what color I wanted my room painted. Typically, the parsonage walls were painted very pale.... pale blue, pale beige, pale pink. In fact, most of the time, my room was SO pale of a pink that you had to hold a bright white paint chip sample next to the wall to even tell that it was pink at all. I was in college and would only spend two summers in the house before getting married, but for those two summers I had a bright and vivid orange room. It was wonderful!
I have outgrown the bright orange for walls, still I like the more muted tones that remind me of a Tuscan sunset. And I still love the orange of fall leaves, mixed with those of red and gold, as well as the flaming oranges bursting forth in the spring and early summer lilies.
Thoughts of Autumn present.... just in time for Halloween. 
Fall mums are everywhere. We have those in dark magenta, deep cranberry red and these golden tangerine shades. Each year my mom loves these flowers on the porch or step and after they fade, most people simply toss them out. The first year I let them go too long and they looked completely dead. Still I planted the roots and the sticky stubs and waited. The green leaves started poking up through the sticks and to my amazement, it survived and thrived and ended up a much larger plant than the original. So the second year I did the same and last year as well. This spring I followed the recommendation to dig them up and "root prune". In this process the root ball is cut and reduced by at least half, then re-planted. I also snipped off the early buds... before July... to try and thicken up the plants. It worked! And I even took the biggest section of the trimmed off root ball and planted it in the back yard. Now I have dark magenta purple mums in full bloom there as well.
So, what color should I choose this year.... more red, pale yellow, gold or more orange?
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Saturday Photo Hunt (on Sunday) ~ "orange"
A birthday bouquet from her loving son..
(Click pictures to enlarge)"A flower's appeal is in its contradictions--so delicate in form yet strong in fragrance, so small in size yet big in beauty, so short in life yet long on effect." --Adabella Radici
Mom's birthday was Tuesday and we took her out to eat grilled scallops and shrimp at one of our favorite restaurants. When we returned, these gorgeous flowers were sitting at the door.... a beautiful bouquet from her son. Roses, lily, daisy, carnation, Queen Anne's lace, a large mum and alstroemeria; shades of peachy orange, lilac, gold, burgundy, white and deep purple bring a feeling of fall into the house. She is so thrilled!
Wednesday, it was a visit to the botanical gardens. The roses are still blooming and will be hitting another high point in October. Mom had not seen the butterfly garden there. She always thought we had so many butterflies, especially this summer, but compared to the botanical garden we have none. Hundreds of "flutterbyes" flitting everywhere. Inside the house even more. One poor tulip poplar was host to many eastern tiger swallowtail caterpillars and looked like it was quite ready for a break. Today, the 20th, is the start of the monarch migration to Mexico.
Anyway, this was the birthday week for MOM.... Happy 82nd and many more!
PS to my brother: You did a really good job on the flowers, Stephen!
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The Crooked Man's House, Norfolk Botanical Garden
(Click pictures to enlarge)Don't Let The Rain Come Down
"There was a crooked man and he had a crooked smile
Had a crooked sixpence and he walked a crooked mile
Had a crooked cat and he had a crooked mouse
They all lived together in a crooked little house
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
My roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
Oh yes, my roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
Well, this crooked little man and his crooked little smile
Took a crooked sixpence and he walked a crooked mile
Bought some crooked nails and a crooked little bat
Tried to fix his roof with a rat-a-tat-tat
Now this crooked little man and his crooked cat and mouse
They all live together in a crooked little house
Has a crooked door with a crooked little latch
Has a crooked roof with a crooked little patch
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
Uh-huh, oh no, don't let the rain come down
My roof's got a hole in it and I might drown
Oh yes, my roof's got a hole in it and I might drown."
~ Written & Performed by The Serendipity Singers (1964)
Crooked windows, crooked man, crooked cat and mouse doors.
This is the second in a series of playhouses built for the children who visit the botanical gardens this summer. Each is based on a piece of children's literature or poetry. The first we visited was Jack's House. Now we are focusing on a crooked man... or his house that is. From a distance you see a tall purple pipe sticking up from the very crooked roof of this house. Then it moves and moves again and the sun glints off of a shiny surface up top. What could it be? A periscope disguised as a stove pipe!
The house is crooked, the windows odd shapes and the front doors.... bright orange with the shadow... or silhouette of the crooked man. The siding is made wood shingles of different sizes and colors; cream, purple, bright green and ORANGE! On closer inspection, kids were hovering around the periscope... it really worked! And look there.... little doors in the wall cut especially for the crooked cat and the crooked mouse!
Up periscope!!!
As with all the playhouses, this one will be auctioned off at the end of the summer and a lucky boy or girl will have this in his/her backyard. It is bright and colorful and perfectly fitting for the Saturday PhotoHunt ..... "orange".
Oh! Yes! This poem always reminds me of the song written and first performed in 1964 by a group of folk singers, The Serendipity Singers. I believe Trini Lopez also performed it later as well.
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Coneflower "Tiki Torch". A view from our flower bed. “If we were to imagine an orange on the blue side or green on the red side or violet on the yellow side, it would give us the same impression as a north wind coming from the southwest.” ~ Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein
I have a section of the flower beds dedicated to coneflowers.... red, yellow, white and shades in between. This bright orange variety is called 'Tiki Torch' and it is lovely.... the butterflies and bees love it too. I have much to learn about how to deadhead them and when to leave the cones for the birds to eat the seeds. All in all, for a first year, the flowers have turned out pretty good. Many are still going strong and a few have just begun to bloom. I have a few that won't make it for next year and some plants (mainly the mint) that I will dig up and put in pots before planting in the ground. I might just put the mint in a huge pot on the deck next year..... it REALLY gets out of hand and tries to take over everything. With our clay soil and trying to figure out drainage from the beds, it has been an experiment....a large experiment and as most garden beds go... a continuing work in progress.
In the spring, we wanted plants that would attract birds and butterflies and these have done both... some a little too well. That fennel and parsley and dill have attracted an almost non-stop deposit of black swallowtail eggs with associated caterpillars. As of today we have helped 24 swallowtails through the process and sent them on their way. The birds have also been happy... both with the feeders and with the insects it attracts. Our hummingbirds now spend as much time at the lantana, salvia and other flowers, as they do at the feeders. So, while a gardener's work is never done... I can at least call this year a success.... and will start looking ahead to the next years plan.
This is my 'orange' look for Carmi's theme... I am late posting again! I am going to blame it on the heat.... yes, that's my story and I am sticking with it!!
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