The BIC Plant and Gardening Thread

[sister13]

Hello BIC friends and fellow gardeners! Whether you have a container on your balcony, some indoor plants, a whole garden, or even if you just happen to visit a botanical garden or see a lovely space or plant in your neighborhood you want to share, this is the place! Please share pics, tips, plans and tricks about all things gardening!  

For many years I had a container balcony garden with mostly flowers and herbs (when travel allowed), and I am now embarking on my first backyard landscaping and gardening journey. 

I am often taking inspiration from the natural world around me and have recently had some spring inspiration for the Makeup Challenge of the Week and have loved chatting about gardening in our other threads, so I thought a new thread would be nice. 

It’s always so interesting to me to see plants and gardens from different regions and countries, so I hope you’ll join the conversation!  

PS: if you create a makeup look based on some plant or garden inspiration, please feel free to post your look or flat-lay here, too! 

Here are a few pics of my spring bulbs to start and I’ll share more soon (kindly ignore the weeds)! 

 

 

My old balcony (from the outside) - I’ll try to find an internal pic too:

[Samtian]

@sister13 Those are pretty! I love poppies. 

[sister13]

Thanks, me too! So floaty! @Samtian 

[Saradestin]

Wow! Those poppies look gorgeous @sister13 ! And the spearmint is so big! I love gradiolus. Those have beautiful colors! 

[sister13]

Thanks, I have some other mini size mints but this looked great! @Saradestin 

[Titian06]

What a wonderful variety of goodies, @sister13 ! 💖💖💖

[sister13]

Thanks! @Titian06 

[Samtian]

I'm so jealous of people that can garden! My life dream is to have a beautiful wild overgrown cottage core garden. Sigh lol. Where I live, is out in desert farmland. Our house was built in 1958 or 1953, and before that it was a bar. Our house is the only house in our area that doesn't grow grass. Like I get a few random thick patches (probably not even grass anway) but it's mostly 20 different varieties of weeds. I wish I was joking. 

We do have a wild rose bush. I've tried to let the starts grow but mom or my brother always destroyed them. Guess who is doing yard work this year 🙂 I'm going to let all hundred of them (jk probably like 10) starts run wild as they please. I don't care if they take over the yard. The bloom lasts one week if lucky. In June. I wish they were pink. 

Last month my power company started this project to help reduce power costs (though it takes 20 years to see $6 difference) but they gave away free trees. I chose a Chinkapin Oak. Planted it April 28th, and it's already starting to get leaves, which makes me happy. I've never planted a tree before. We do have one tree in the back that during the winter or something, it looked like it lost a branch and got stuck sticking up. Turns out it like had a little baby and that thing is growing! Anyway as I was saying, the power company let you have 2 trees but I didn't know that. Next year I can get another. It took a lot planting the one tree so I'm glad I only got one. The car ride home was fun because that thing took up my whole Mitsubishi Outlander. It kept hitting us in the face on the drive. Here is a picture after I planted it. It's name is Chick Pea. 

I've tried to grow a Lilac Bush someone gave me a start of and my brother ran it over with the lawn mower, like 6 years ago, I'm still butt hurt about it. Down in Utah they have a Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point and here are some of the tulips when I went too many years back.

[sister13]

Oh wow! Thanks for sharing your plant and tree stories! That rose bush is a stunner! Pink would be nice but yellow is great too, it’s so prolific! Sorry your brother ran over your lilac! And congrats on Chick Pea, I’ve been looking at trees and even the tiny ones are expensive so that’s great you got a free one! Those programs are great! 

Lovely tulips! I’m hoping to get to Boulder this weekend but may have missed the peak blooms, thy always do a lovely job downtown with bulbs but I haven’t had a chance to go see them yet. @Samtian 

[Samtian]

@sister13 I hope you get to see them soon! We have a lot of schools that start growing trees and sell them at the end of the year for like $35-$40, beyond that I'm not really sure how much trees cost. I started thinking about the rose bush and it was here when we moved in back in '98. It's crazy to me how long that it's been!

[Saradestin]

Woooow!!!! Your yellow rose bush is spectacular!!! 😵😵😵😵😵💛💛💛💛💛💛💛 So gorgeous!!! I understand you struggling to plant the tree. If the soil is hard it is really a pain. I remember me trying to dig a hole in California wine country to plant a bush and I had to use a ⛏️ , hitting as hard as I could, and I was barely making a dent on the ground. It took me the entire day and once done, I filled it with water to soften it and it took two days to start going down! Pure clay and stones. Here it is a breeze because it is pure sand so, unless I am digging by a palm tree, with their abundant roots, it is super quick. 
Those tulip flowers look so gorgeous!! 😍 It is my favorite flower. I went to the Keukenhof Tulip Gardens in the Netherlands and that was OUT OF THIS WORLD! 😵

[Samtian]

@Saradestin Haha oh I can imagine the California digging! I ended up flooding my area so I can shovel it out really quick. I want to see those gardens!

[Saradestin]

When I mean impressive, I mean IMPRESSIVE @Samtian !! They are also called the “Garden of Europe,” they cover an area of 32 hectares (79 acres). Each year during the Tulip Festival in the spring the garden witnesses the blooming of over 7 million flowers, including over 800 species of tulips. Some were as tall as my hip! 😵😵😵😵

[Samtian]

@Saradestin Holy moly that sounds like heaven. 

[Saradestin]

You would take amazing photos there @Samtian !! 😍

[Titian06]

Congratulations on your tree and baby tree, @Samtian ! 🥳🌳🌲💖  The yellow rose bush is pretty; better something than nothing. 🌹

[Samtian]

@Titian06 Thank you, and that is true!

[sister13]

Ugh, I just wrote a whole post and accidentally hit cancel and lost it! 😞

A few more bulb pics and I’ll write It out again later! We are in a New build, so kindly ignore the mud and weeds, landscaping is to come! 

These are called Golden Dawn. They are so cute but seem to fade fast, unless it’s bc of the crazy wind and rain we’ve been getting. Also dandelions. I think they are helping the erosion so I haven’t t pulled these yet! 

And a couple of paperwhites from my Mom’s yard - these are so special to me since my mom loved them so much. I’m hoping some more will bloom. I may need to put them somewhere else next fall. 

Oh, and the Gladiator Allium. I guess it’s normal that the leaves turn brown as the plant is blooming, which is unfortunate but online I saw some people plant them with other, mid-lower plants that leaf out before the allium to hide the brown. 

[JoSometimes]

Love the gladiator allium @sister13. It’s in the onion/garlic family, so it’s just trying to be like its cousins and develop some skin. Your property’s going to be so colourful once it’s all done!

[sister13]

Thanks! I am looking forward to that day, haha. I love flowers and nature! @JoSometimes 

[Saradestin]

How beautiful @sister13!!! And those allium!!! 😵😵😵💜💜💜

[sister13]

Thanks! They’re so neat! @Saradestin