My Winter Garden ~ Big Red Blooms Bravely

 

Hello everyone! Welcome on the sunny early February afternoon.

This weekend I started my winter bulb garden. Later than usual, because I had bought this beautiful pre-planted garden during post holidays sales, with a Christmas gift card. [it was this or groceries.]

I ordered the planted bucket along with this year's paperwhites and a new amaryllis from a new source, https://bloomingbulb.com/.

The order came quickly, all the bulbs planted in the pretty blue tin bucket. I changed out the ugly grey straw covering the soil, used green sheet moss and my homemade Mushrooms.

The paperwhites boomed so fast and so beautiful. They came and went quickly though, maybe ten days from unboxing to shriveled and brown.

But the white amaryllis is just hunkering on: I look at these bulb gardens and think, No way will those flowers all bloom at once--and my skepticism is correct.

It's okay though, I don't mind waiting.

*******************

So time to Start the other bulbs. This year I had no plan beyond trying to grow some of the bulbs in potting soil instead of water and pebbles. 

I had my old amaryllises and new bulbs from Blooming Bulbs, a pink ''amie'' [my short term for Amaryllis] and a dozen paperwhites, on sale. The paper white bulbs are  "Nazareth"---ordered this year hoping for less intrusive scent than Ziva. All were stored in a closed box, against the cold outer wall. [nope, scent is ick, dogwalker friend was sniffing and looking for a possible hidden Mo accident, LOL. But not THAT bad. Really.]

Imagine when I reached under the Swedish bride's bench where I store my bulbs, cold and dark spot--and look who popped out through the box flaps!

Big Red, aged at least 8 years old now, desperate to start its 2025 journey. No light, no water, tipped over sideways. I was dumbstruck, and actually felt pretty sad, like I am a bad amaryllis mom. 

 

She was set in the sidewalk scavenged tall glass vase and quickly righted and watered.

As of this writing, buds begin to open! What a joy.

The other bulbs had sprouted too:

This is the pink ''stout and chubby'' pink  amie from South Africa. It was poking right on out of the bag. "Rhapsody Sonata'', I think it's called.

Planted up and doing well.

She is a lovely soft medium pink, so now called Pinky, of course.

Even Little Blue, who is a very small bulb and not getting bigger [year 3], has never bloomed, was at least showing green edges.

I had said to myself, if it doesn't bloom this  year--and how likely is it really to be blue, c'mon!---I'd discard it. But recent reading about amies says they vary in size and age, and while the pink amie from Blooming Bulbs says it is a small size, it's quite large, bigger than a baseball. Both it and Big Red also have baby bulbs this year, to be replanted separately when they all go outdoors in June.

Anyway, Blue may get a grew more years. You can see it is so small it fits in a recycled hyacinth vase. I'll feed it extra this summer!

I also researched paperwhites, looks like they really cannot be reused, they will not rebloom. My dad grew an entire carpet of the supermarket Tete a Tete tiny yellow daffs recycled each year under the Cape Cod kitchen window, much to the joy of my mom. The Tete a Tete daffs naturalized and covered maybe 15 square feet of woodland edge. I'm trying some from last year in my big meadow pot. we'll see.

Anyway back to this year's paperwhites. Most went into the tall glass vase with the spiked insert that holds to tall leggy stems upright.

There were so many BIG bulbs that I also used a sidewalk found planter, a Dutch crocus bowl, filled with the extras, plus moss. I need to make more fairy toadstools. [airdried clay]

I really wanted to do my paperwhites in my blue and white transferware tureen, a la ''seen on IG" HERE 

Instagram screenshots, below

But the floppy stems issue once the staged pics are taken? Hmmm.? Nope. I hope maybe to find hyacinths or grape hyacinths instead at TJ's or the grocery store later near Easter.

IG screen shot, above

So much fun and anticipation, for not much expense. Springtime joy in winter. Every morning I rush to see how much everything has grown!

Again I recc Blooming Bulbs for great prices, on  sale now, and fast service, quality bulbs. You may also fid paperwhites on Amazon and other bulb sellers if you too want the fun of seeing something grow and bloom in darkest winter. Have fun!

edit: I'm adding a link to Martha Stewart's blog post where she does a step by step how to for amaryllis: How Martha's Gardener Does it

Two other small projects in the spirit of while I was at it:

Repotted my mini snake plant, a Valentine gift from last year. It too has baby offshoots and needs to be repotted but this will do for now.

And I had the glue out to attach strings to my mini pumpkins before they get moldy; hang to dry. Out of season stylistically but I love their bright colors.

*****************************

Mo walk!---in his Valentine snood.

He is so happy and invigorated on cold still days. He took me off at good pace, almost as far as the secret beach path. My hip and back pain was not too bad and seemed to get better as we trotted briskly along. I'm sure he misses our long active hikes, though he too is not as young as he once was.  But I wimped out and turned us home; taking the beach path adds twice the distance of even a long walk. I was very chilled despite snowpants and many layers. 

Fence peeking through a gap in a seawall, frozen high tide storm water and sand, driftwood branch.

I hope to sew some Hearts tonight, and maybe a Valentine doll dress for my little friend's dolly. Then back to BB1, ugh. Heavy gale wind blowing, house is sooo cold.

Have a good week!♥️♥️♥️♥️

love

lizzy

gone to the beach....