Same here, we never get quite as cold as the predictions say. I have a protected micro-climate with a solar-heated pool in the mix and this year the ground is still a lot warmer than usual .

Still, all my orchids are indoors or covered with frost cloth except a few that like it cold and dry for dormancy in winter. Luckily we have a couple of rooms with south-facing windows so they can get some light even in the house. They'll likely be indoors until Thursday, get a good soak from the warm rain on Friday then come indoors again.

Out in the yard, I have one big frost cloth tent on a roller made of PVC. It's been deployed the last couple of nights, and is still out with the sun shining through it today. I went out and started to fold it up, but it was bright and warm in there and I felt sorry for the plants (as well as lazy me) if I pulled that off and let them cool down 20deg. suddenly. So they are in a little frost cloth greenhouse for today. I have tomatoes, basil and peppers in Earth Boxes still bearing fruit from being planted in September. Also all the tropical divas that were going strong well into December with that warm, warm weather we had, I have tucked into the big tent and maybe they will keep going if the weather doesn't stay cold for too long this month.

Large containers of water (my various watering cans, buckets and my 2gal. sprayers) are sitting out in the sun to warm up, and I use them as "heat sinks" to keep the frost cloth tent warm at night.

Im picking my lemons today. Its been cool enough to sweeten them up. Dont want to take a chance on them. Tops of angel trumpets got burnt last night. I agree with Ann, tonight Im going to take a few more things in.

It's cold now. 27 degrees. frost on the back deck

I moved all my plants to protection in November when we should have had colder weather. Not complaining that we didn't get it, but there's no way I could move them in and out and back in knowing we would eventually get a freeze.

My orchids are certainly enjoying living in my garden tub again. 3-4 of them are blooming. Even one I bought from Hawaii last year, not expecting a bloom for 2 years. Yea!

Heat pump is being brought in and installed tomorrow. He'll have me with some real heat and come on Friday to seal up air leaks in my floor vents and tweak everything else it needs. BBRRRRRRRRRRR

The temps in here are nice for sleeping with blankets, dogs and cats, but I can't stay in bed all the time.

The nice thing about cold fronts (yes there is one) the days have no humidity and the sky is always clear and blue.

Alright that's it. My temp read is on my computer. Jeremy just texted me his thermometer reading out side his house. He lives 2 miles from me: 22 degrees

Darn it - I thought the forecast was for 39 last night, but it's only 34 here right now. I don't know if it got a degree or two cooler during the night. I didn't cover anything, although all my orchids were already inside. I guess it's survival of the fittest at my house. Hope I didn't lose anything

Glad you will have heat Molly!! The days are beautiful, with the humidity and blue sky situation you mentioned. Nice.
My angel trumpet, full of buds, is still standing tall on the patio under the screen, I hope it holds. Everything else I brought in or covered. It appears my thermometer is stuck on 42, guess a stop at home depot is in order.
What did get hit, was all the azeala flowers that were blooming at the wrong time of the year. Luckily they still have lots of buds. The camellias are late and tiny, dont know whats with that. Heat I guess.

Pam,

None of my azaleas were fooled into thinking it was spring, but the camellias finally got a chance to bloom before the frost got to them.

My angel trumpets are having to survive in the ground. They freeze back every winter, but I mulch heavily and they come back on new growth in the spring.

Yep, I need to get a new outside thermometer too. All the ones I had bit the dust long ago.

Going into town today, maybe I'll get one.

Molly

According to our personal weather station we bottomed out @ 29. It can be a little hard to tell though as the sun hits the wall the sensor hangs on pretty early so we never count on what the temp. says once that sun hits the sensor. Undoubtably it has an effect even before hitting the sensor by just hitting the wall below it. That's when I just have to go by whatever Wunderground says the temp. is. All I know is it was one heck of a hard frost/freeze. It was COLD out there this morning! Everything heavily coated with frost. It wasn't hard to imagine we were looking at snow, it was so white.

Molly, so glad to hear you get the heat pump today. Sort of like us though only opposite. We got our A/C back working about 12 hrs. before a cold front & A/C wasn't needed - the heat strip had been working for heat. You get heat the day before the warm up. Life is like that isn't it? Ah well, it all equals out in the end. There will be more cold to come & you'll be nice & toasty for those fronts. Looks like you were colder than us this morning. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

I love, love, love these gorgeous blue sky, sunshine days though! We were just out on the front porch after eating lunch & it was purrrrrrrfect! Got my Vitamin D by rolling up the legs of my fleece pants & pushing up the sleeves of my sweatshirt & kicking off my slippers.

At my house it's survival of the fittest. The only things I have that get brought in are the 2 moth orchids and any rooting cuttings. Usually I don't even have cuttings to bring in this time of year but this was some cuttings sent to me so I couldn't choose the timing on them. I'm finding out that butterfly bushes don't go dormant here -- at least they've stayed evergreen so far & the poor things are in pots which makes the cold harder on them. GOOD!
El Nino has screwed with everything it seems. Some to the good. I have naturalized daffodils that came up very early this year. No buds yet but they are not far from budding. So the blooms will be early this year. A couple days ago I was walking out & around & saw a whole lot of my "wildflowers" growing. The rudbeckias, gaillardias, coreopsis had come out of dormancy & getting some good size on them. I will have to go see how they fared with this freeze. I hope it doesn't rock them back on their heels. The poor dogwoods never made any seeds this year & still have leaves on them yet are forming sizable buds already. Some of the crepe myrtles still have leaves albeit not a full compliment. Many of the pecans began budding out 2 months ago. Flip a coin! What will happen next? My dh is betting this will be one of those freaky years where we actually get snow.

According to our weather station, it's currently 62º here; the sensor is in the shade, inside the screened porch on the east side of the house right next to the water so it stays a little warmer out there. It is truly a beautiful, sunny day here with not even a breeze; a perfect day to be outdoors! I'm not sure how cold it actually got here overnight; local news reports said we were supposed to drop to 35º but I really don't think it got anywhere near that. I didn't cover any of my plants and they all look okay with the exception of one Aglaonema on the screened porch whose foliage looks a tad cold damaged.

My angel trumpet is not happy this afternoon, bummer. Well, it will be back if it took to much of a hit. I hope its just mad, going out right now to give it some water.

I'm not sure I did any good, putting some of my angel trumpets in the big tent. The ones that were too big, and got left out look just fine, too. All still have buds and flowers going.

I have a few little blueberry bushes in a raised bed (an experiment to see if I can keep the soil acid enough for them) and they have not dropped any leaves at all yet. A couple of them have flowers . . . we'll see what happens with that!

Good deal Elaine!

SNOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We've been having snow flurries since pre-dawn! No, nothing big but it's honest to goodness snow. Photos later......

My daughter called and said the same thing was going on at her house. She lives in the northern part of the county close to Alachua.

Yep, we were watching the news early this morning and they were saying it was snowing in North Florida! It's cold and windy here in Daytona, currently 44º but with this wind it's feeling much colder. It's supposed to drop to 31º here on the coast tonight with frost expected. I did have my hubby get up in the attic and get the bins down that hold all my old blankets and covers because I'm definitely going to cover some things tonight.

You go for it, Lin! I'm sure you'll be happy you did cover your favorites.

The snow stopped here around 11:30 - 12:00. That was quite a while for it to be snowing though! Quite the talk of the town. Everyone at the grocery store was talking about it.



Maybe it will do it again later as the temps. drop again. Sigh, I wish it had been heavier.

flaflwrgrl said:The snow stopped here around 11:30 - 12:00. That was quite a while for it to be snowing though! Sigh, I wish it had been heavier.

LOL, I say if we gotta have snow in Florida ... we should at least get enough to last a little while!

I just want to say "please, no more snow in Florida" ! Ann's picture of a few little snow flakes is plenty for me.