Tree Dahlia (Dahlia imperialis)


variegated Tibouchina


brugmansia

Red Climbing rose, looks plastic


Oxalis-peduncularis


peach Abutilon


these picts were all taken today 12/9/2017
plus there are several Fuchsia's in bloom

Nice show Dick!

thank you Carol
when i lived in Fountain Valley i use to have Orchids blooming at this time of year in the back yard

Beautiful, Dick...and I can say no thank you on the Tree Dahlia...had a feeling it would be pink...lol..I was hoping white....I'm funny about pink, the two camellias that were here are hard for me to take, but I will leave them for now because taking them out would leave such a blank...

I have very little going on ...first camellia and the Pineapple Sage...that's about it...

Sherry
i also have a white and it has NEVER bloomed for me
i should cut it up and give it to you

Never? Never flowered? That is odd, isn't it?

I'd not seen a variegated tibouchina before either...another plant that I love and yet would not look right here either...I tend to go for the odd plants rather than the pretty...and I'm really big on whites.

I just got seeds sent to me last week from Nan Ondra at Hayefield...are you doing any seed sowing? If so, I have seeds of Ceratotheca triloba 'Alba' to share....and Clematis versicolor, Stipa pseudoichu, Molinia arundinacea, Digitalis ferruginea, Cephalanthus occidentalis, Veronicastrum virginicum, Mirabilis longiflora, and Chasmanthium latifolium...LMK...

Yeah, Dick...I have orchids growing in my yard too, but due to a cool, cloudy summer, not much is blooming. Nothing got enough sun this year until we got a heat wave. Then they all got fried because they couldn't acclimate. Been a bad year down south.

Sherry
i quit doing seed 10 years ago when i got sick and have never got back into sowing seed. and i have a gallon bucket of different seed that is now 10 years old. some of it was rare seed.
you do know the Digitalis takes 2 years to bloom from seed ? i have plants coming this spring of
Digitalis laevigata and Digitalis lanata and they will seed next year, do you want me to save the seed ?
if you want to try the white Dahlia i will cut some cuttings for you ? i do NOT know why it has never bloomed, got both it and the pink at the same time.

Carol
Sorry to hear you had a bad year in Orange County, all but one of my grand children still live there.

wcgypsy said:Never? Never flowered? That is odd, isn't it?

I'd not seen a variegated tibouchina before either...another plant that I love and yet would not look right here either...I tend to go for the odd plants rather than the pretty...and I'm really big on whites.

I just got seeds sent to me last week from Nan Ondra at Hayefield...are you doing any seed sowing? If so, I have seeds of Ceratotheca triloba 'Alba' to share....and Clematis versicolor, Stipa pseudoichu, Molinia arundinacea, Digitalis ferruginea, Cephalanthus occidentalis, Veronicastrum virginicum, Mirabilis longiflora, and Chasmanthium latifolium...LMK...

I love seeds....cannot resist seeds..lol..

I have white Foxglove and Digitalis thapsus...I don't seem to remember them taking two years, but I've lost track of time, it seems...yes, please save some foxglove seed.

Okay, I must be getting ding-y with age...somehow (?) my echium seedlings this year did not get labeled....and I had started E. vulgare...and apparently some other echiums also...so, I gave my some e. vulgare seedlings to my neighbor, karen, who's a sort of, but not addicted, gardener...she likes things short and neat and tidy...everything in its proper place. Well, her echiums really, really took off doing much better than mine. I have this strange spot right at the front corner of the porch.....I planted a hydrangea there...and the kinda charming little wild rose that had been close there came back after I dug it out...well, I decided that it deserved to live...kinda odd with that hydrangea, but we'll deal with that later, in that same area, I had set out 3 E. vulgare, then one of the Verbascums popped up there...well, I will let it set more seed, then pull it out...then Bex gave me a couple of Miscanthus Morning Light and I decided I wanted one on each side of the porch...............so...all together in this one tight little spot I now have a rose, a hydrangea, a will-be-large Miscanthus, a very tall Verbascum nigra...and one echium that made it through last Winter...lol....and last week I finally woke up and looked at the E. vulgare that is now really taking off and looked at it again and realized it is not vulgare, but pininana, which will get quite tall. I have been wanting to get this one going...but not there, nor in the the several spots where I have it planted also.....

Now, fortunately Karen had planted hers at the corner of her front porch railing, which is a good spot for a plant that is going to reach SIZE and not look out of place...but I did have to let her know that it's not what she was expecting and will get BIG, so I will not feel bad if she pulls it out later, or even now....and it is so healthy...sigh...

Dick, do you have your echiums in an especially good draining spot...or mounded?

in the ground
and i prune them every year

My PInguicula carnivore is enjoying the chilly overnights this December:

Dick...this first one, by the front porch, is one plant...all of the foliage looked like that until we finally warmed up, then the one branch took off...



These others were planted at the same time.....











tarev, we've been getting frost here...though supposedly not that cold yet, my yard says it is...

sherry
your first image looks like two different leaves
and you're saying it is only a sgl plant with one branch showing big leaves ?
Wow
can you take a close up of the 2 branches ?
i wonder if the big leaves are normal and the small ones are dying

Karen's (neighbor across the street) has the large leaves also. The large leaves on mine started out like the others and (and the others pictured) then got large. The smaller leaves are not dying, they're now elongating and I'm suspecting are going to bloom....

Terev your carnivore is very pretty, didn't know they got that nice

tarev said:My PInguicula carnivore is enjoying the chilly overnights this December:

Thanks Dick! It is behaving nicely this time, I am quite happy it is enduring the dry cold weather nicely.

Oh...I have camellias starting....






I suppose that I need to look UP more often, rather than always looking down...but looking DOWN, I find such neat things. There is a shrub at the library and it has turned out to be baccharis, a name that I was familiar with, but have never grown...and I decided to go back come Spring and take a couple of cuttings...then 3 days ago, out along the drive where I've planted Swamp Honey Myrtle, I noticed something...poor thing has been mowed down repeatedly, but it's baccharis...lol..thought to move it, but OTOH, I'll leave it where it is and make sure it does not get mowed again...the neatest things pop up here....

What a fun thread. Love seeing everyone's flowers.

I just have a balcony here in San Jose, CA, and so far I have just a bougainvillea that I bought last spring. It's blooming and doing great. I took this photo yesterday.




I also pilfered some aptenea cuttings and shoved them in a pot about a week ago to see if I could get them to root (never have grown any type of succulent before) and they're blooming LOL. I think that's a really good sign. People use them as ground covers to replace lawns here. I'll take a photo of my blooming little cuttings tomorrow.

This summer I hope to add a lot of company to my bougainvillea on the balcony. Didn't have time this summer, just moved here in May.