Oh Lorraine, I found some great people on the Trash to Treasure forum... and that's where I got the instructions (they are great) this was made with broken blue bottles that a really nice DGer sent me via Priority mail (she broke 17 blue bottles and they were HEAVY)... Also the Hypertufa and Concrete forums gave me Alot of ideas.
You should check that forum out, lots of ideas for just pennies.. I copy them..lol. they are great.
Becky, the birdbath wasn't for them, but they liked it so much that there it went..lol. Now I need to make two, one for me and my daughter.
Why don't we do some "mixed seed trades"
Gourd, I didn't even know they had that kind of forum, I never get past the garden stuff. I'll pay them a visit.
Where we live there are a lot of "junk" stores, they call them antiques, but there're junk shops, however, with lots of cool things.
I need to go there and look for some unusual things to use as pots, etc. I do have an old rusted wheelbarrow I think I'll put lots of petunias in and maybe Caladiums in the middle. Sound Ok?
What I want is a chamber pot!!! Course if I told my grandkids what it had been used for they'd decide to do that too, and there I'd be with my poop filled pot!!
Got some of our seeds already. Got yours Nature, I love trying to guess what the stuff is. Soon as they all get here I'll get them out.
Sometimes we'll have to start a trade with certain plants, you know, like coneflwers or something. If anyone here has an idea, why don't you think about it. I've never done that before, so it's probably a bad idea. I just love trades where you get lots of stuff!!! greedy greedy greedy.
I think it's cheaper to do a trade with several people than just 1. However, everyone has been so nice to me, I'll send my one or two little packets and he're come an envelope full of neat things cause they feel sorry for me and my poor little seed collection.
Hey everyone, Gloriag has joined our motley crew, so glad to have you Gloria. These people are all nuts, so if you just pretend you're in an psych ward
Ok, I noticed no one else has put a before picture. Don't let me hang out there by myself with my ugly before. Let's have them!!!
Unless you're going to do what I usually do, wait till 5 minutes before planting and then find a place!!!
ooooh! I want in! can I get in on the trade? I just started a whole bunch of trays and have some left over, I can mix them all up and send em to you!
I know exactly where I'll put mine........you're gonna laugh (or maybe cry and feel sorry for me!) when you see my before pix....! LOL
Let me go find it and I'll post it with a 'short' story!
I fit right in -in psych wards! LOL!
See that blue tarp covered mountain in the center? My Wonderful husband placed it there last spring, it was supposed to be moved to our front yard, but never made it that far....
This is now my view when I look out the window! It is about 4 feet tall and ugly and the blue tarp (weed barrier) is falling apart . He cant move it now until summer, so I was going to throw a packet of mixed wildflower seeds on it-Just so I didnt have to look at it all season! LOL! This would be a great spot for my surprise bed! LOL! or maybe I'll just put them in the flower bed in front of my window to block the view!
Well, I obviously have LOTS of work to do to get my garden ready ! Lol, so does my before pix beat all?
I cant wait until the yard is done and I have AFTER pix to show!
I tried to paste the pix from my gardening blog, doesnt look like it worked very well. If you want you can see all my before pix on my gardening blog here at DG.
Oceanjl, got you down!! It's going to be fun, no telling what will come up!!! Please send your seeds in a medium or larger bag. Maybe a sandwich bag?
Guys,Hopefully, we'll have enough seed to send out a lot., That way you might even have enough to save for trades.
If you sent a small packet of seeds, that's fine, I'm still going to see everyone gets a lot back.'
Please try to get it to me before the 1st, before the 5th for sure. I want to get them back to you before March 15. Sending them back won't be so bad, don't have to worry about who gets what!!!
Everyone gets the same thing. This is too easy, ya'll got to make it hard, so I feel like I'm doing a hard job and act like a marter.
Lorraine, you should get some from me today... I don't know what is taking them so long, we are neighbors..lol.
A.
I was thinking about New Mexico the other day. I've been through there a few times and the northern part, I guess, where you would go if you left Colorado and went back to Texas.
We'd have to stop and just ohh and ahhh over the landscape. I kept expecting Indians to come off those hills and scalp us.
Anyway, yours should be here soon, That Presidents day off got everything behind. I will let you know when they get here
OOOH, I am from Northern NM... it is beautiful there, but colder than this area where I am now, some zones are 5/6 there, the ground freezes where I was raised. But the wild flowers take your breath away. I wish that I knew to collect seed in those years..lol.
My Grandfather had apple orchards and traded big sacks of apples and some kind of white rocks to the Indians in one pueblo, they have the neatest dances and festivals, and the food is great. Now it is all commericalized so everyone is out to make money and not affordable to regular folks anymore. It used to be something you did every year, I was only 4 years old or so, but remember like it was yesterday. I MISS those days too.
Nothing fancy, just plain old good decent people.
Are the seeds there yet? lol. Just kidding. lol
Waiting at the door, watching all night for the mail!!!
Well, you ought to go back up there and get all those seeds. I thought we'd do anything for seeds! Get a group together, call it a "nature trip"
Then if any one tries to stop you, you can blink your eyes and say, we're just on a nature walk looking at the flowers.
Here, if they come along and catch you picking wildflowers, you will get a ticket. Probably if you were from out of state then you could say, "oh I didn't know"
ABut you know, this is Texas , don't want to get shot for gathering seeds. I wish you could see the highways and interstates when all the blue bonnets are blooming.
What grows wild there. Everytime I talk to anyone about pretty places to go, that's the top , even more than HWY 101 in Ca. I love it too
LOL Lorraine, I have been driving on the freeway this week and noticed these beautiful pink flowering trees on the side of the highway. I have been trying to figure out what they are. I want one! I think they are some kind of flowering cherry or plum trees? but with no fruits? anyhow, I was driving home from work yesterday thinking........maybe I can sneak out here in the middle of the night, pull over on the side of the road and dig up one of these little trees and sneak off with it in the middle of the night :) .......
well, it was a thought, not anything I would do.....but I want one of those trees! LOL!:)
No, I was thinking about all the wild flowers that grew on my Grandfather's land and my relatives in the mountains, they own that land. Is it still against the law to pick seeds from your own land? wow, I didn't know that.. I also have 10 acres closer to ABQ, I think I would get a little mad (a lot mad) if anyone said anything to me.
This coming year, I should have alot of seed too to gather.. I'm anxious too, and this wind has me inside, otherwise I would be out there... I'll take photos of the area I plan on putting those seeds when the wind dies down.
A.
One,
It could be a crepe myrtle, those can really be gorgeous.
Or a Redbud tree! Another pretty one when in bloom! :-)
Good. I thought you were talking about highways and stuff. No, I don't think they have a seed police to come in your land, but that may be comin" lol
We just joke around here when we plant them in the yard. My son in law is a deputy sheriff, so we all beg him not to arrest us. He just shakes his head.....( stupid women)
Ok, where's the picture you're looking at. Are you "seeing" things or am I not seeing things.
OK all you chickens, We need before pictures. Don't be scared, look at mine!!!
You know what would be neat. To have some native flowers or wildflowers from all the states or part of them. But you'd need 10 acres for that!!
Nope, wouldn't work. Well, maybe if we just had the state flower.
I did send Texas flowers to a girl in the Netherlands cause they don't have blue bonnets. She's going to send me some tulip bulbs from there later. So, I'll have some little dutch tulips
I know, I've lost my mind. Haven't had my second cup of coffee, my daughter and her husband are gone to "the boats", The 3 little darlins' are at their other grandmother's. So I'm just giddy !!!
Tried to add a new name to the list and get a message saying I've used all my edits and can't edit till tomorrow. I didn't know you could edit too much.
Got some seeds yesterday with poppies, baby breath and i don't know what all.
Gourd, I checked that one out, but the ones here are all sticks with tiny pink blooms all up and down the sticks. I've been watchng them to see what happens next.... I dont want something that blooms for 2 weeks and then gets purple leaves or something wierd. The county planted these all along the freeway, so I know they have to be low water and no fruits dropping.....just wish I knew the exact name.... I would have taken a picture, but stopping on our freeways would be taking my life in my hands! LOL! We have lots of road rage here :)
It doesnt look like any of the flowering plums or flowering cherry trees in the plant files on DG, and I havent seen any in the nurseries here -thought I would seeing as they are all in bloom right now-would be a big selling time, but maybe its not good to plant them when they are blooming? well, I'll keep watching them and searching :)
I'm wondering if they are not oleander, they plant alot of that along on the freeways, there is also a neat one that I love, it is Echium, that comes in red, purple, white and pink... I had those in CA... god I miss my plants.. I'll bet they bloomed this year for the new folks that bought our house.
I need to get some CA poppies going and some of the Matilja Poppy, I wonder if they would make it here, I've got to get plants for those, I have never been able to germinate the seeds for that..
I just started some CA poppies that the water district gave my son at school. after I put them in the trays, I noticed that they were from 3 years ago (no wonder they were giving them to the kids!) none have sprouted yet...may have wasted some good soil! :(
They arent oleander. We have lots of that here. These are small trees, with dark branches, but tiny tiny pink flowers right on the branches, no leaves on the trees yet, just covered in these tiny pink blooms. Maybe I will try and get a photo.... The bottom half of the tree is just a trunk, no flowers on the trunk. all th branches grow straight upwards, not sideways.... each tree is maybe 10 feet tall ? maybe a little bigger, but only about 5 feet wide?
In CA all the Lowes and HDs have those 3 x 4 baggies full of poppies, lupines in bulk.. I wish they had them here like that.
Your mystery tree sure sounds a lot like a cultivar of Redbud:
http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/adv_search.php?searcher%5Bcommon%5D=Redbud&searcher%5Bfamily%5D=&searcher%5Bgenus%5D=&searcher%5Bspecies%5D=&searcher%5Bcultivar%5D=&searcher%5Bhybridizer%5D=&search_prefs%5Bblank_cultivar%5D=&search_prefs%5Bsort_by%5D=rating&images_prefs=both&Search=Search
Becky, I think your right! it looks alot like this one: http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/78938/
Now I know where to begin my search! thanks!
Lorraine and all - Here is the garden bed area that I am thinking of doing the toss and sow method using the seeds I receive in this swap. The vines will stay and there are some dormant plants in these beds, but it certainly needs to be filled in with lots of flowering plants! Cottage gardening is my style, so it doesn't matter too much what grows there as long as a particular plant doesn't take over and dominate the beds.
Lorraine, I can send poppys in my mix (CA poppies) do you want me to add other ca typle wildflowers too? I am mailing my envelope today. :)
Oce, you send whatever you like!!! If you want to throw poppies in there great, if not , it's fine.!!! I realized I had left over columbine, so I threw that in
Becky, that is perfect. Can't you just see it full of flowers. If you have too many of one kind, they can go somewhere else or in file 13
Lorraine, i want in! I just want a small number of seeds since I am probably going to have to do a container garden, but I have a TON to send you!
I definitely want to see everyone's before and after pictures.
I am going to send my package out on Wednesday (I am "laid up" from surgery right nnow). Yay!
Is everyone pretty mych sending flower seeds? I don't know if I will have room for big plants. This is such a great idea.
PS - Lorraine, you have a D-Mail from me :)
Lorraine,
I Just sent you my BE :) full of surprises! :)
Anjl
Thanks, I can't wait for alll this stuff to grow out. I can't recognize a seed so I won't know till they come up. Don't you like to send stuff you know people are going to be surprised about? And excited!!
I'm so excited, I think I might mix up my own seeds and throw them in a bed just to see what happens! lol. I mixed up my bulbs last year -on accident- and it took me a while til I figured out which ones were planted where! I cant remember which bulbs were planted in the back yard, so now I just have towait for them to bloom :)
I did that last year. Didn't do a bed, but planted seeds in the old wheelbarrow. I intended to just do it to start the seeds, then move them, but it looked so pretty I left it.
I even did one with certain colors. You know, blue and pink or yellow and orange. So that's a good idea, you go girl!!!
Can I still get in, I have some holly hocks, new mexico sunflowers and some other's that a lady gave me with no name and I'll have to look at my other seeds to see what I have. Susan
Lorraine - That's a neat idea about your wheelbarrow! I bet it did look lovely! I think I need to go to some garage sales locally and find some cheap garden props and art to add to my garden. Has anyone found some interesting items that they have used in their garden? Maybe we should start a thread on another forum for ideas! :-)
Lorraine - Are you going to do a cut-off date here for people to sign-up? It might be a good idea. It may take a week or longer for last minute folks to get their seeds to you! I hope that it doesn't run too much after March 15th before I receive my seeds. I say that because I already have plants sprouting and growing.
Our heat index the past couple days has been in the 90's. Any hotter and my newly sprouted seedling are gonna fry! Here it is February and it feels like summer. Forget even having a Spring! I guess we never had a winter at all this year! It must be Global Warming!!! I wonder if Florida will be considered the "tropics" in a few more years! I am NOT looking forward to summer this year if it is already this hot. (ugh!) I like cooler weather (60's and 70's). Makes gardening outside more comfortable! We have the humidity here too which makes it feel even warmer. So for me and anyone else in Florida, the time for sowing our seeds is now.
Here is one of my seed beds currently. I think I may have tossed too many seeds in it. I have no idea what most of the plants are. It shall all be a surprise in another month or so! :-)
nineties! I am jealous! I just want the rain and wind to stop long enough so I can get my beds ready for all these seeds!
becky, have you ever tried putting up the sun screens over your new seedlings? I've heard it can be done, I just have never tried it. Its supposed to keep them from getting fried....
Where is everyones 'before' pictures?
Here's a list of members whose seeds I have gotten:
Beckygardner
Weedseed
I will post your name as I get them, that way you won't worry about them.
If I should have gotten yours by now, please let me know.
oneanji - What are sun screens? I've never heard of that. Is there a weblink to explain what it is? I sure do need something to protect my babies. It's just too hot already!
I'll send you a d-mail-dont want to hi-jack Lorraines thread :)