Spring is my Thing!

Finally, it feels like Spring. So I headed over to Green Acres, my absolute favorite nursery, with a budget and a mission: fill the three pots on the patio with this year’s annuals. I then proceeded to spend twice my budget getting some perennials for two of my beds, a houseplant for the patio and tomato plants for the garden in addition to the flowers for the three pots.

Baby steps on the budgeting. Baby steps!

First, I pop in my Between 3ANC wireless ear buds by Status Audio, put on my political podcasts and cleaned out two flower beds. They hadn’t been touched through the winter, so they definitely needed some love.

Neglected bed.

I typically use bright cheerful warm colors like orange and yellow and red. But with the state of the world today, I was feeling less giddy than usual so chose a more subdued palette of purples, deep reds, and blues.

For the flower beds, after cleaning and weeding, I added the dark red (almost turning black/purple at its edges) Dianthus AMERICAN PIE® Cherry Pie, an evergreen perennial with silvery blue-green leaves. They almost always have a flower in bloom. Great for edging or rock gardens and reminds me that bleeding heart liberals are beautiful in contrast to the bed of cold dead Republicans, I mean rocks.

The house plant is Calathea lancifolia, commonly known as the rattlesnake plant, a popular houseplant known for its distinctive, long, wavy leaves with dark markings resembling a rattlesnake's skin but reminding me of how Mitch McConnell’s greatest adversary was our first black President. It's also part of the prayer plant family, known for its leaves that fold up at night like my soul on November 4th 2024.

And finally for the flower pots, I combined:

• Purple Zantedeschia, a Calla lily hybrid, sets the mood (and it’s a somber one, America). Calla lilies are hardy both inside and outside the home. Its flowers can persist for up to 12 weeks and mature into richer colors as it ages.

• Dianthus hybrida, commonly known as "pinks" or "garden pinks," as in screams of “you pink commies” hurled my way at protests are a group of hybrid dianthus plants known for their fragrant, long-blooming, and colorful flowers.

• And finally, the ubiquitous Lithodora, a genus of flowering plants in the Boraginaceae family, known for its low-growing, evergreen habit and beautiful blue or white flowers, thriving in well-drained, acidic soil (like American politics) in full sun or partial shade. 

Final pot with calla Lillie’s, Dianthus, and Lithodora.

Overall, a beautiful day that I’m so grateful for. And a reminder that growth in all things comes with patience, love, understanding and attention. For the red states, that’s called empathy, something Jesus exhibited in abundance and you exhibit so little of.

Grow my precious. Grow.