Fall Blooms

Plumbago

Hibiscus

Mexican Petunia

Passion Flower

I'm still working on setting up my work space after the move, so I haven't had a chance to sew, stamp, paint, or otherwise put much of my creative energy to good use. I did, however, find some time today to take a few photos of what's currently blooming in my backyard, and I'm sharing them here with you for some color inspiration.

Today we also managed to plant some lettuce and broccoli, and are hoping that the mild fall and winter here will be kind to our cool-weather crops. We're planning some extreme container gardening for the spring, in the hopes of not only reducing our food bill, but eating better stuff as well.

I should have most of my supplies put away by tomorrow, and will soon have a few things to show you. I see moo cards and some projects with gel medium in my immediate future...

Purple and Orange - Inspire Me Thursday

The current challenge at Inspire Me Thursday is purple and orange. No orange here, but this is one of my favorite botanical photos, mainly because of the purple edges on the leaves (a little hard to see at this resolution). I think coneflowers are at their best in this stage of their development - so many interesting textures!

Summer's End

Sadly, summer is coming to an end here in South Alabama. Granted, we probably still have several weeks of high heat and humidity to deal with, but the air feels fresher the past couple of days. The nights are a little bit cooler too, and the water in the pool is almost too brisk for a comfortable swim. This subtle change of seasons should be a good thing, but my allergies are now in full swing and I'd like to take a backscratcher to my itching eyes. It's not just the hayfever, though. When it's time to cut back my coneflowers, I know that the year will soon be drawing to a close, and I wonder why I didn't accomplish more throughout the summer, when my energy levels should be high. At least this summer, I managed to get back on track with my art, and that's a very good thing. I may not complete something every day, but I do manage to work on something creative, even if it's just prepping a background or tearing interesting textures or phrases out of magazines.

Pictured above -- the last of the coneflowers, photographed and manipulated in Photoshop. Today's heavy rain has saved them from a brutal pruning, and tomorrow they'll probably look fresh again. I just may have to give them another couple of weeks after all.

Friday - Orange

Lots of flowers here, but hey, that's what I'm about sometimes!

Fruit of the Earth

We have coneflowers blooming! And we have figs!

This fig tree, which I got from Mama as a tiny 6-inch stick she had rooted in a pot, has moved around the Gulf Coast with me a couple of times. She gave it to me about 3 years ago, shortly before we moved from Mobile to Ocean Springs. Then at the end of 2005, when we relocated back to Alabama, I moved it again, this time in a bigger pot. It's still in the pot, but is very happy here on the patio in my fairly shady backyard. At some point I'll probably need to plant it in the ground, but for now it stays where it is.

I'm excited about the figs because they remind me so much of Granny and Grandpa. They usually had fig trees, and Granny would make jar after jar of preserves. Sometimes she would can whole figs in a very sweet syrup, and other times she would make a more jam-like concoction. But I will probably just eat my figs raw, if the birds don't get to them first!