This week had so many great moments, but it felt like it just kept getting worse and worse. I can’t wait to spend the next two days working on my garden. It’s one of the most peaceful places I can go. Even when it needs a lot of work. Maybe especially when it needs a lot of work. I’m behind the general suggested timeline for my zone, but I started some seeds this week. I have a few flowering plants I can start from seed in containers so I did that too. I even put my cactus kit together finally. I wonder if cactus seeds can survive four years and still create sustainable cacti. 

Labels: country life, gardening, orchids, singalong songs

Blood oranges and blooming orchids, what a weekend!

I have been fascinated with orchids since the end of high school.  Kings of Leon's Aha Shake Heartbreak album cover may have started it all.  My ex may have given me my first orchid, but I doubt I was able to keep it alive.  Somehow my mom inherited a lot of my gifted orchids, with a few leaves but no stems.

I went to visit an old friend in St. Augustine in the fall of 2017 and came back enthused to bring my collection of orchids to bloom again.  Last fall I bought a beautiful orchid on clearance row, which was strange because it clearly had several healthy buds close to blooming.  I was nervous to re-pot it, but wanted it to have the best of the best, so I bought a new pot, ideal potting materials, and it continued growing stems.  It started growing blooms at the end of January or beginning of February, and right after Valentine's Day it bloomed!

There's more though!  One of my older purple blooming orchids had leaves but no stems left when I returned to it.  It's grown a healthy stem and has small little purple blooms growing slowly. 

Also blood oranges are back in grocery stores and they are so sweet and delicious!

Labels: orchids

I can be pretty dumb.  When depression does find me, I close myself off.  I don't remember ever sitting any of my friends down and telling them what I was going through.  Did I ever tell you?  Sometimes I think it's those old friendships that visit Libby, to check in on what's new in my life, since I never call them up to talk about it.

I went to St. Augustine to visit my old friend in October.  I am so much more than just grateful that she invited me to visit her.  It wasn't like we picked up our friendship where we left off, because we don't have that anymore.  I got real weird and different and our friendship felt real damaged for years.  And still she invited me back.

We went to a concert like old times, except we walked there from her house.  We went for a walk on the beach one morning and collected trash and recycling to keep it from going back out into the ocean.  We went to explore the historical side of town and she gave me a guided tour.

I never expected myself to love living in the country so much. I didn't realize there was so much to discover about myself.  Meanwhile, living down in a sunny beach town, my old friend still has so much in common with this new me.  She has always been cooler than me though, so of course she's been at this longer than me.  I am grateful for all that she's shared with me - on composting, beekeeping, and how to keep an orchid alive and blooming.

I don't know if I can do that drive again by myself anytime soon, but if I am going to continue on this part of bettering myself and finding the good and the light and the ones I love, then I am going to try. Maybe we can make it a long weekend.

Side Note: I couldn't write this post about St. Augustine and not use an Avett Brothers song for the title, but if this post could have two unrelated songs, then it would also be Car by Built to Spill.

Labels: Avett Brothers, beekeeping, composting, depression, friendship, good will come, orchids, Red, St. Augustine, stay in the light