Verna and Bob's Weblog

Verna

Happy Independence Day!

patriot-bouquet.jpg

Aside from a couple of minor chores, we relaxed and enjoyed the Independence Day Holiday today. We ate pulled-pork sandwiches and Cole slaw with a root beer float. It was an excellent dinner! We’ll be watching fireworks this evening from the courtyard, where we have a limited view of the Sunset Park fireworks exhibit five miles west of our place.

I took this picture of these patriotic flowers back in July of 2007 (sorry, no larger image available), which are shown here on throwback Thursday in honor of the Independence Day celebration.

May God Bless and keep our Freedom in America!

July 4, 2019 by Family Food and Dining Holidays

Red Bird of Paradise Flower

Red Bird Flower

Now that summer is here, my gorgeous Red Bird of Paradise Flowers are everywhere in the front courtyard. The shrubs are about mid-size to how large they will be at the end of summer in into the fall.

The flower in the photo is one of the larger ones currently in bloom out front. The shrub on which it lives is the largest of the three in the courtyard. Click on the image to enlarge.

June 23, 2019 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Butterfly and Red Bird Flowers

Butterfly and Red Bird Flowers

A beautiful butterfly came into the courtyard this morning and was busily browsing the flowers on our Red Bird of Paradise (a.k.a. Pride of Barbados) shrubs. All three of the courtyard Red Birds now have flowers, so the little guy had a good selection to browse.

More about these flowering shrubs from Wikipedia:

Caesalpinia pulcherrima is a species of flowering plant in the pea family.

It is a shrub growing to 3 m tall. In climates with few to no frosts, this plant will grow larger and is semievergreen. Grown in climates with light to moderate freezing, plant will die back to the ground depending on cold, but will rebound in mid- to late spring. This species is more sensitive to cold than others. The leaves are bipinnate, 20–40 cm long, bearing three to 10 pairs of pinnae, each with six to 10 pairs of leaflets 15–25 mm long and 10–15 mm broad. The flowers are borne in racemes up to 20 cm long, each flower with five yellow, orange, or red petals. The fruit is a pod 6–12 cm long.

Caesalpina pulcherrima is the national flower of the Caribbean island of Barbados, and is depicted on the upper left and right corners of the Queen Elizabeth II’s personal Barbadian flag. Claire Waight Keller included pride of Barbados to represent the country in Meghan Markle’s wedding veil, which included the distinctive flora of each Commonwealth country.

Click on the image to enlarge.

June 16, 2019 by Arizona Critters Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Cherry Red Again

After separating the Cherry Red Cactus from several pups, we wondered if any of the pups would get flowers. Well, wonder no more . . .

Cherry Red Pup with Open Flower
 
Open Flower Close-up

This is one of two of the pups that had open flowers today. Click on either image to enlarge.

June 3, 2019 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Argentine Giant Cactus Flowers – A Dozen!

One Dozen Argentine Giant Cactus Flowers

In keeping up with the opening of spring flowers, we cannot overlook this spectacular display of a dozen open flowers at the same time on our Argentine Giant cactus. This is after five other previous flowers this spring on this same cactus. This is, by far, the most activity we have seen since planting this cactus in front of the house almost eight years ago.

The cactus is also showing other activity in the form of “arms” or new branches growing around its base. In time, the new growth should become cacti in their own right, with their own flowers and perhaps their own new arms. This should be interesting over the next few seasons.

Click on the image to enlarge.

April 24, 2019 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

New Throwback Dining Room Set

Dining Room Set

After finally retiring the old dining room furniture to a local charitable organization, Bob and I assembled the new table last week. Today, we ate our Easter Sunday Dinner using the new furniture.

The photo does not clearly show the snow white color of the table top but it does render the candy-apple red faux Naugahyde™ chair color and the shiny chrome on both table and chairs. The whole dining room set effect takes us back to the 1950’s Diner era with its appearance.

We think it’s charming. Click on the image to enlarge.

April 21, 2019 by Arizona Food and Dining Something Shiny

Avalon 1998

Categories

Archives