Dragon's Orchid Garden

We spend much of our time at home outside in the back yard.  Evenings are my favorite time.  Sunset at Jimi and Leon's is spectacular. From Garden At my house, the water view is our little koi pond.  At night, red, blue and purple flowers in the garden disappear.  White flowers glow softly in moonlight.  I've been adding more and more white flowers and choosing many which will scent the evening garden. Brugmansia, or Angel Trumpet not only have beautiful flowers but an intoxicating scent. From Garden Night blooming Jessamine isn't at all spectacular during the day, though it's a lovely shrub.  At night the tiny white flowers give off a powerful jasmine like scent.  Plant these at the periphery as they can be overpowering up close. From Garden Use white Vinca (periwinkle) for sunnier spots and impatiens for shade.  These annuals are perennials in Florida, self seeding.  They are super easy to root by cuttings. From ...

This bookmark pattern was the most challenging so far.  I've done 6 others.  One of the challenging parts was remembering that I'm knitting most of it in a reverse stockingnette stitch, so that purls are in the front and knit stitches are the wrong side.  This makes the rib stitches that make up the stem of the flower and the ribs in the leaves really stand out.  The back side looks nice, too.  Another challenging part of this pattern was learning the correct way to YO or yarn over between knit and purl stitches.  If you don't do it the correct way, your yarn holes will close up.  The finished pattern can be found on Ravelry for free. One more challenge was translating the chart from my pencil and graph paper to a table with knitting symbols in Pages.  By now, I'm getting almost as good at typing in knitting symbols as I am at typing letters!  I got lots of practice with this one. The pattern is adapted from one in the book, The Essentia...

Slightly cooler evenings have the autumn orchids blooming.  It's been incredibly dry, making it necessary to water.  The rain-barrel is nearly empty.  There are buds on several orchids that haven't bloomed in a couple of years, and even one on our brsdm. golden gamine 'white knight'.  Can't wait to see what that one looks like.  I should have pictures in a couple of weeks. Bulb. Doris Dukes is on her second set of blooms. From orchids lc. ( laeliocattleya ) mini purple maikal is very pretty right now.  That's the orchid pictured in my blog header. From orchids This yellow and magenta lc. is fragrant and stunning, but the tag faded, so I don't know what the name is!  I'll have to scout the rest of the tags and make new ones for the faded ones before I can't read them. From orchids Onc. Lambada 'Cutey' has small flowers that take FOREVER to open, but are well worth the wait.  From orchids Our double angel trumpet took a beating ...