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Saturday, November 9, 2013

Discoveries, gardening, flower drying, and embroidery!

I was walking around the neighborhood tonight I found this amazing vine growing on my cousins fence. You get the idea of the size of these "fruits" hanging on the chain link.  They are so pretty!



They open up when ripe and these beautiful red beans are inside! Just gorgeous!!!!!
I have no idea what it is. Any ideas??

Look at these sprays of a Bougainville down the street from me! The white to light pink coloration is spectacular!


And the last thing I wanted to show you is my first set of 2 dried Mum flowers that I kept in my mini flower press for three weeks.

I peeled the blotting paper off and a few of the delicate petals fell off. I will Mod Podge them to some handmade paper to send out my next handwritten letter.

My gardening 5 year old granddaughter picked so many flowers to dry on our walk tonight, that I had to use the blotting paper and stick them all into the middle pages of a big thick book! I have some small weed flowers to put into my small press. It will be fun to see them all in 3 weeks!!!!!

And a few pics from the tire garden!

And the little coaster I made with embroidery on felt, then attached to cork underneath. I have the matching cup cozy to finish. This was a gift from my son and his wife. It's so cute!
So these are some things I've been doing, and I hope to show you my butternut squash crop that I started from seeds, from a squash we ate from the grocery store!  This was fun! It has been raining, today and then it got dark before I could take a photo of the seedlings!!!

See you again soon!
Xoxo-Julie


11 comments:

Cindy said...

I googled your orange fruits. It's either a Balsam Pear or a Balsam Orange, and it's native to either Africa or India. I'm too tired to research more. It's a cousin of gourds and pumpkins, in any case.

I hope you have better luck with your butternut squash than I did. I had a seed sprout in my compost last spring, also from a supermarket squash, so I nurtured it and the vine grew all over the place and made lots of flowers, but ultimately, I ended up with only one puny squash.

Julie said...

Thanks, Cindy! I'm excited to do more research too! I just couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this thing on the fence. The actual vine is shabby, but these little gourds are so sweet. Not sure I would want it in my yard as it looks like a weedy kind of thing!

One time I tried to grow pumpkins here and they did the same thing your butternut vines did. I had tons of them and then gorgeous large yello blossoms everywhere, then everything fizzled, and we never got one pumpkin! It seemed like I had planted them later in the season, tho, and it was heat that killed them here. My hope is that I got these going early enough! Only time will tell. If I get flowers, that will be fun! Hehe. I never really expect much here! When the heat hits again, it will all be over!
Xoxo-Julie

Claude said...

Balsam pear is one of the invasive weed in your area. It's definitely not recommended to grow there bird spread the seed around and it's causing quite a problem in some of the wild parts of Florida but the fruit in the seeds are interesting. like the coaster. Pottery cool.

Lisa at Greenbow said...

I have no idea about the vine you found. Definitely a southern plant. I love the embroidery you do. This redbird is great.

Dandelion and Daisy said...

Very sure you would not find that gourd growing in Oregon! Very pretty tho. I like your flower press. I should make one instead of having flowers falling out of random book that I've stuck them in to dry! Like the coaster, want to see the cup cozy when you are done.

Amber said...

Your coaster is adorable! And I think I need a flower press! Very cool.

Teri said...

Love that fruit even if it is invasive. So different.
All those pretty flowers and that adorable coaster. You have been busy.
Your flower press looks like fun.

tich said...

I really like your coaster design. It is so pretty. I also like the cinder-block succulent area. It has given me ideas for next year, even though I am not much of a gardener.

shirley said...

Love the colour of the fruit on the vine. I wonder if it is edible. Pity it is such an invasive pest...much like our lantana here.

The coaster is very clever.

I like your bouganvillea is the white/pink called "popcorn"

JennyPennyPoppy said...

Certainly is a very colourful looking fruit, seeds and all! Your dried flowers certainly came out very nicely indeed. No flowers blooming here now as we head into the cold and snowy winter months. I'll enjoy seeing all of yours though and your wonderful succulents too. Always love those pictures. Your coaster looks terrific. Such a nice design and a great colour.

My Little Family: said...

It looks like the dragon fruit in the grocery store too.