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A Season of Change

May 12, 2021 by Deidre

While all seasons bring great change, the transition from winter to spring is always the most marked to me. The world awakens, transforming from its bleakest state to its most beautiful in only a short period of time.

This spring has certainly been one of quick and substantial change for me personally as well. We are expecting our first child and are in the process of selling our home while still looking for another in this wild and crazy unpredictable market. Though life is full of stressors right now, it is also filled with blessings almost daily and I find myself feeling thankful more than anything else.

Though it feels more like summer now than spring here most days, since we are technically still in the season until June 21st, I thought I would take a moment to share some of the seasonally appropriate updates in my world before springtime runs out and we slog our way into a hot and humid southern summer.

I decided to refresh my homemade vine wreath form for spring. I cleaned and conditioned it before storing it for the holidays last year, so only new decorations were needed. I usually update it once per year and favor neutral themes that will transition between seasons well, though with a focus on spring and summer since I typically use this wreath during only those months. For this update I wanted a wild and overgrown, but minimal look that would highlight the gorgeous vines.

I love how it turned out! I think it’s my favorite version yet.

Moving on outdoors, I’ve never really trimmed my boxwood plants. They grow slowly and I like them to have a natural, fluffy look anyway. Finally though, they had grown too large and I had to give them a cut. As I was doing this and throwing the trimmings on the ground, I thought, “Hey, surely I can preserve these and make my own boxwood wreath!”

Well friends, that would have been a fun tutorial to share. I followed some advice online and things seemed to be going okay maybe…? I had these two buckets sitting in the shade on my back patio, the trimmings soaking up the preservation solution, but all I was doing in the end was making mosquito soup. You’d think they wouldn’t breed in a preservation solution?! Alas, this one was a FAIL. If I ever have the opportunity to do this again, I will place them in a garage or something.

Now for the opposite of failure – success! We lived in this house for years before I knew these bushes were azaleas. They never bloomed! I’m only mediocre at best when it comes to plant identification. I was always jealous that everyone else in the subdivision had azaleas but me because I love them. Then one year, one tiny flower popped out and that was basically it. But that was enough! I then knew I had azaleas and obviously they weren’t getting something they needed. Long story short, it took a couple of years, but this is the first time I’ve had a fully blooming bush! Just in time for us to move and leave them behind. I’m so thankful my house gave me this last sweet parting gift though. And all it took was Miracle-Gro azalea fertilizer + time and patience.

I have three in-ground plants which I added last year: a Japanese magnolia tree, a flower bed of day lilies, and a few irises I added late in the year to the day lily bed.

My day lilies did well last year and I’m happy to say they emerged beautifully this year and are now very thick and lush. In fact, I think I may have to remove the irises or they may choke them out. The irises were a late edition and this is my first time to see them bloom. The Japanese magnolia had a pretty rough year in 2020 though. An in-ground plant’s first year is always the hardest as it seeks to establish its root system, but some sort of blight hit late in the year that I couldn’t figure out and all the leaves turned crispy and fell off. I worried about it coming back this year, but it put out a couple of lovely pink blooms and now has full greenery again.

I added a few new potted plants including this gorgeous bougainvillea which also bloomed, but unfortunately a storm beat a lot of the pretty pink off of it. I also got a couple of potted hydrangeas which I’m finding very challenging to care for. Potted, they are VERY thirsty all the time. I hope to plant them at our new home, whenever we find one!

Though I have more, I’ll save my sharing to just include this one last plant, my indoor variegated rubber tree.

This is my favorite plant that I own! It is so low maintenance, but big, full, and beautiful. It is really flourishing right now and putting out a lot of new leaves. Every single leaf is so unique, I always look forward to what a new unfurl will reveal.

I’m not much of a green thumb – for every success, there are two failures. Right now though everything is beautiful and thriving, so I’ll take the momentary win! I hope your own gardens, both indoor and out, are also flourishing. And if they’re not, don’t be discouraged! Plants are a learning process.