Japanese Maples?

Beautiful Neil. Charley sends you nuzzles and hopes you are feeling much better....

Freezing cold and wet here and the wind is gale force!
Ugh!
Love.
Neil.

I like wind, but not in combination with freezing and wet! Keep your head down, Neil.

Sunny and will be about 60 today. Last two mornings close to freezing, unusual for us this early in the season, but not bad.

Blooming this week.

Dear Debra, it is a miracle! This morning the wind and rain has gone, the sun is out and it is a warm 53 F. This beats being at 33F in a force 10 gale, with driving rain. What a lovely day!
Absolutely perfect for the mother in law to get her broomstick polished for the witches annual fly around on Halloween!
Love.
Neil.

I could here the high wind all night, but just a little bit of rain this morning. More rain is coming. The wind brought down a lot of leaves which is helpful in keepeing the trees in place.

Neil, our ferns have been turning brown.

Hugs to you Lucy. Be safe....................

A dear friend lives in northern New Jersey and has promised faithfully to stay in her home (a minor miracle in itself.) Lucy, watch out for that accumulated rain!

Blooming today
Coral Drift Rose and Mexican Heather

Blooming today:

Yellow Gazania and Thai Basil

Wonderful pictures Debra, thank you! I hope you are all OK, warm and well after that storm which looked terrible! Sarah's company has an office in New York, and as it is a law firm she works for she got a very irate partner from New York asking her to get someone to reboot the Blackberry server (Computer), in a Hurricane! They had closed the office for safety reasons, but she still insisted that someone should go through the Hurricane and deluge of water to reboot the computer so she could use her Blackberry mobile phone, which is a work phone and not a private one.
After ringing back lots of times and getting more irate and downright rude to my wife, she was told in no uncertain words that they could not reboot the computer in the basement as it was under six feet of water.
So this New york lady has reported them for not doing their job, whatever next!
Love to all.
Neil.

Neil, people can be unreasonable when their minds are about as porous as granite. And, I guess to be fair, when they have been and are extraordinarily frightened by what they can't control. Saw a report today that some are getting angry because the electricity has not been restored to their area and THEY WANT IT RIGHT THIS VERY #$%&^ MINUTE!!...sigh...it is distressing that they do not realize the men and women working to restore that power LIVE THERE, TOO! That they also have been affected. And they are diligently and even heroically trying to get EVERYONE back to as normal as things can be at this juncture...sigh

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On a brighter note, take a close look at this photo. Two Gerbera stalks, each one with a two-headed bloom. Never seen anything like it.


This cyclamen is amazing to me. Planted two years ago in another area. Struggled a bit, so moved it here last Fall. Did well through Winter, came up very lush through Spring, fried to crispy-crunchy brown this Summer, now is putting out tender little leaves like nothing ever happened. I just *love* green growing things...

Planted 'Fiery Clump' a red multiflowered tulip this afternoon. Only 5 bulbs. John (under protest) did the dozen 'Katharin Hodgkin' reticulata species. They are in a difficult place to reach in the garden. We have had one brave one of those appearing the last 2 springs. Not as hardy as the regular reticulatas as it is a species mix. Cleared a lot of leaves to plant the tulips, weed grasses in the way, but I would guess that they make it through. They were baiugh locally & was surprised to see the Katharins. Only reticulatas which they had.

Dear Debra, my mother is a Cyclamen freak and has many of them! The one that grows outside here is [i]Cyclamen hederifolium.[i] This wonderful cyclamen grows quite happily here and is a strange plant as that too browns and goes missing then comes up and flowers when it decides, sometimes without leaves at all. The massive bed of them is a sight to behold underneath my mothers massive paperbark maple. We have red white and as they have crossed pink ones!. They also spread everywhere.
Hope you are well.
Love.
Neil.

Just some photos from the garden yesterday!

Neil.

Neil, those photos are beautiful. I love Fall color. This Bradford Pear is on my route home from work. One of the few commonly planted trees in this area that gives us a little color, too.

Dear Debra, you pear is lovely! I did put a post on here about Cyclamen for you, it is above the pictures!

Neil.

It is Remembrance day tomorrow as the 11 Th hour, on the 11 Th day of the 11 Th month is when the first world war was finally over. Our Queen and members of the Royal family lay a wreath at the cenotaph in London and our whole Nation has two minutes silence. Everything stops from the buses to the trains to the radio stations.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Thank you for helping us remember....

Thanks, Neil.

It is beautiful...