Spring Blooms

 Flowers, flowers...everywhere.  In spite of our most welcomed rains today, spring is all around us.  I've finished all of my little tulip blocks and am now assembling them into the larger blocks to create my Tulip Time quilt.  This is a Bonnie Hunter quilt pattern.  I may not have it finished for this spring, but I'm really liking the secondary pattern that the green stems and leaves are creating.

The outdoor flowers are even more prolific.  The roses are coming into full bloom.  I always love the first flush of flowers.  

The clivias have also shown their blooms this week. 

My Dragon Dreams came together and is ready for gifting.  I loved making this pattern. 

The hummingbird nest in the plant on my mom's front porch is supporting it's second set of babies this spring.  Since escrow closes this week on her home, I won't be able to get updated pictures as they grow.  It has been so much fun to watch these little ones grow and fly off over the years.  I hope the new owners will keep the plant and enjoy them as much as we have.  

As March comes to a close, I can say that it has been a good month for my block count.  With the additional tulip blocks and now making them into bigger blocks, I have added an additional 22 blocks this month.  This gives me a total of 93 for the month of March.  I'll be linking them up with the 350 Block Challenge.  

Flowers and Birds

It's such a great time of the year for walks around the gardens.  The rains this year have made such a difference for all of the plants.  Everything just seems to be bigger and better with water from the skies rather than a faucet.

As promised, I grabbed the camera and headed down the road to my BIL's home.  His little hobby of cross pollinating clivia has become a bit of an obsession for him.  He currently has over 6000 plants!!!!  I thought it was about 3500, but I guess I underestimated.  They are growing everywhere in his yard and then he has a HUGE shade cloth covered area for a double level of others. 

Most of us are familiar with the orange ones.  I have a number of those that once belonged to my father, who loved his gardens.  Just look at the wonderful colors and different shaped blooms that we enjoyed.

This is what greets us at the front door.

Some of the petals appear to be shaped more like a lily. 

GREEN.....now we're talkin'!

Practically red!  It looks like Christmas.

This was such a prolific bloomer.

Around the pool area.

Loved the hint of peach on the petals of these.

More around the pool.

The classic orange.

This is the shaded area.  Clivia for as far as you can see and this is only the top level of them.  There is another whole level below these that is just as full.

I couldn't leave without him "forcing" me to load a few in my car!  I wish I had more shady areas in my yard as I could have helped him unload a lot more.  I may have to make a shad cloth area so I can bring all of the ones I loved home with me.  It was the perfect time of the year to go see them in bloom. 

Meanwhile, my own garden is in bloom as well.  I was able to pick the first bouquet of roses - always a welcomed day.

The citrus is in bloom throughout the area and the smell is absolutely intoxicating - especially in the early morning and evening hours.

As well, the jasmine vine and cymbidium orchids are each vying for their own moment to shine.

We had a couple of new visitors to the yard this week.  I was drawn outside by the rat-a-tat-tat I was hearing.  Look what I discovered in the palm trees.

I am assuming they are a pair. 

Next post will be back to stitching...........

Bristlecones and More

DH and I took a little road trip this week and visited a spot that we have wanted to visit for many years.  Each time we drive north to the Sierra mountains we always pass a sign for a turnoff to the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest.  This time we decided to make it our destination location. 


The Bristlecone Pines are the oldest single living organisms known.  The forest, located in the White-Inyo mountain range, is at an elevation of nearly 10,000 feet so it is springtime there at this time.  The wildflowers were just blooming and were wonderful to see.


The oldest of the Bristlecone pines is called Methuselah and is nearly 5000 years old.  It is located along one of the hiking paths, but they do not point it out to avoid vandalism to it.  Shortly after a Nat*ional Geo*graphic article came out about it in the late 1950s, someone broke a branch from it.




Gorgeous stumps everywhere.

Snow capped Sierras peeking through behind a high meadow.

The needles were really quite "bristly" feeling.

Springtime flowers.

After visiting the forest we continued eastward into Nevada and spent the night.  We saw many abandoned gold and silver mining towns and noticed that there seems to be more activity around some of the mines which we assume is because of the increase in the cost of the metals.



Once a booming city.

Coming home we took the road through Death Valley.  The temperatures were surprisingly low for this time of the year with the high being only in the mid 90s.



Heading onto the floor of the valley.

Loved these gorgeous sand dunes.  I would have loved to have slid down them.

It’s always good to get home and sleep in your own bed again.  Guess I am a homebody at heart.  I always seem to become more aware of my gardens when we return.



The plumerias are starting to bloom.  This was a piece of one of my father's plants.

JUST starting to bloom.  The smell is heavenly.

A late blooming Clivia.

An even later blooming iris.

The bougainvilleas that froze this winter have made a wonderful return.

I had a couple of nice packages waiting for me when we got home too.  The first was a whole bag of I Spy blocks from Michelle.  The little ones just love the I Spy quilts and it is so nice to have a great collection of them for making up quick quilts.  Thank you, Michelle.

I also had a whole bag of goodies from Leona that I won from her fabulous giveaway.  It was loaded with fabulous items for quilting and I know that I can use all of these.  Thank you, Leona.

Lastly, I received my mug rug from Leona’s Mug Rug 2 Swap.  I just love it.  I love the bright colors, the design as well as the wonderful fabrics and quilting.  Unfortunately, my partner did not include a blog link  to share.   I would really love to follow her work.



The picture does not do this one justice.

My sewing machine has been humming away since I have been home.  My daughter came over to make some burp cloths for her SIL so I made a few for a shower that I am attending in August.  She worked in pink fabric and I worked in blue.  Everyone seems to know the sex of the babies these days.  I always like surprises myself.

My next row of my PURPLE Rockin’ Robin is finished.  There were plenty of HSTs in this row!!!!!



Lastly, here are my latest Civil War blocks.  I can’t believe that we are over halfway done with the year already.

The next few weeks are going to be pretty busy around here so I may not be around as much as normal.  I will continue to read blogs, but please forgive me if I don’t always comment.  I have a ton of canning to do – tomatoes, strawberries, peaches and apricots are all in right now.  Too bad it can’t be spread out throughout the year.