Family And Flowers...

You all know how I feel about family. We always have such fun and special times when we get together. We laugh, cry, tease and have been known to tell off on each other but always with love.

Left to right... Mary Catherine, the oldest daughter of my oldest brother... my sweet niece that I spent lots of summers with when she was little even before her sibs started coming along. Sometime I'll post up some photos of those times. Nancy Lu is the youngest and only daughter of my sis who passed away when she was 23. Nancy Lu was just shy of 2 years old. She was the first granddaughter after her mom and dad had had two ornery boys. She is also a Leap Year birthday girl. Then there's yours truly, leaning on my sweet Nancy Lu as I have often done in my life. My sis sent me this photo in a note and I just had to share it with you all. It was taken at Nancy Lu's home in Bethany, OK, Labor Day weekend. Mary Catherine and her youngest son (bless her heart she has four boys) drove my big brother up from Ft. Worth for a visit. My sister and one of her boys (she also, bless her heart, has four boys) also drove up from Weatherford, TX, for a visit. My middle brother, Walter, and my cousin Carol drove in from Meeker to join with us and have a mini family reunion for the day. Anyway I love the picture and wanted to share a bit of the fun with you all.


In my life, here in Oklahoma, fall and mums go together. My Carol's birthday is in September and I would imagine there hasn't been a birthday for the last 20 + years that she has not gotten at least one mum and usually several. For her 70th birthday last year she requested no gifts from friends that came to share that milestone. When they persisted her sister and I said just bring her a mum. They did just that. This one is one I brought home for her this year. There is a grasshopper hanging around on the right hand post of the flower pot.


This is one of the 70th birthday mums that we managed to keep alive through the heat of the summer.

What a payback for our efforts to keep it alive. It is a beautiful, clear yellow and has been full of blooms. Carol always has me trim off buds until the 4th of July and then one time after that she has me just pick off the buds, not cut them. Then we let 'em rip. I don't know where she got her info on doing the mums that way but it has sure worked all these years.


This is another of the birthday mums we managed to keep alive. This red isn't as densely packed as the yellow but it has really been strutting it's stuff and putting on a show for us.

We lost a couple of the other mums and several shrubs as well as our tomato and pepper plants but we are thankful for the ones we managed to keep with us until the heat wave finally broke and we started getting more normal temperatures.





I want to show you something new that is new to us...

The seeds were gifted to me by the young man that does my hair. Besides giving the best haircut I've ever had, Dude loves to grow flowers as much as I do.

I think I've told you about the quote that I've carried with me for probably 40 years...

"Not By Bread Alone: After Hippocrates", by James Terry White (1907) that reads:

"If thou of fortune be bereft

And in thy store there be but left

Two loaves, sell one and with the dole

Buy hyacinths to feed thy soul."


Dude said these are called hyacinth vines or some people call them Hawaiian bean vines.

The blooms look a bit like sweet peas or even kinda similar to little orchids.

After the blooms the vine puts on a purple seed pod and since this vine won't winter over in our Oklahoma zone 5-6 so I'll be collecting the pods to be able to grow some more next year. I'll have a lot of them so if any of you want to try these out e-mail me with your address and I'll send you some seed.

I had 8 or 10 seeds that I basically just put at the northeast corner of the trailer thinking it's already June and I don't know if these will make or not... If I had known then what I know now I would have also put a trellis with them. They are climbers and have gone all over. It's been great. Even in the heat the vines flourished. They were in the same bed as the mums so they did get watered but I was totally astounded at how well and how fast they grew. They new leaves are light green with purple veining.


These are the purple seed pods and there are a bunch of them. I would be interested if some of you that live further north would be able to grow this vine as it seemed to sprout from the seeds quickly and grew fast as a weed and all over the place. I didn't mind that because I like the looks of a wilder garden but next year I'll put a trellis for them to climb. I have an idea for one I'd like to make myself that I think would show off this little beauty. I'll keep you posted on that little project.


Well I've sure been way longer winded with this post than I have been in a long time and you know what? It feels pretty good! Maybe the meds are getting me back to somewhat my old self.

Let's hope so... and let me know if you want to try out some of these hyacinth vine seeds.