It was lovely!
Lilies are opening up. This is the view from where I sit in the morning with my coffee.
The gazanias are loving the sun, too! This is a two year old plant, and is truly enormous. Grown from seed, and is just stunning.
Gazania close up shots. The little white specks make me think of bird feathers.
Hope you have had some sunshine, too!
I still have roses.
The leaves on the blueberry bushes are just stunning.
Best of all, I have new gazania. Really tall gazania! These grew from seed this year, and I popped them into a pot with gladiolus. That might give you some idea of how tall they are! All of my others are less than a foot tall – these are heading toward three!
Unfortunately there hasn’t been enough sunshine for the blooms to open fully. Shame as they are just gorgeous.
Yesterday there was a bit more sun and this one tried to soak it in. Blurry as it was also windy as heck yesterday!
For Ark. Yes, they overwintered!
They only open when the sun comes out – which hasn’t happened much in the last week. And my new seeds failed, too – so I hope these stick around for another year.
Take two
Well! I still have flowers. The pics below are just the ones from out back of the house. I meant to get pics from out front when the light hit there, but by then it was raining again.
The lilies are all gone, and the tigridia too of course. I’m still waiting on the tiggies to open their seed pods so I can collect this year’s bounty! The yellow iris already ‘popped,’ so if you want seed for those, let me know.
It’s been very wet – the whole country is flooded (we are okay) – but warm. We’ve had morning frost once, afternoon snow once; and last Saturday, I awoke to an unexpected snowfall:
It was funny to me that I opened the blinds and said, out loud, ‘Where the hell did that come from?’
An hour or so later I heard hubby get up, open the blinds upstairs, and say: ‘Where the hell did that come from?’ Ah, we do think alike on occasion!
So, back to the flowers. I still have a weather-worn white rose:
The new chocolate orange rudbeckia (from seed this year) is happy enough, if bedraggled and twisty.
The other, older rudbeckia are smaller this year. But still I like them.
Yes, there are stray dog hairs attached to most of my flowers. The back garden is also her toilet, so … unavoidable!
This is one of my cyclamen, which are meant to bloom in the winter. I kept this one inside all last year, but it got cyclamen mites so out it went, and away from the rest which are out front. I did tone down the pink in this, it was blindingly vivid.
I always forget what this is. I have two now…. 
I’ve saved the best for last – there are gazania still in bloom!
As the gazania are new to me this year, I’ve been wondering the whole time if they can over winter in our super-wet, windy, but not terribly cold climate. So far so good!
I have a new flower-favourite (until my tigridia start to bloom)!
Please meet my very first Gazania – Gazania rigens. The sub-species I have is unknown as the seed packet we bought didn’t bother to specify. Lazy sods.
They are also known as the Treasure Flower, or African Daisy. I definitely consider them a treasure.
I started these from seed way back in April, and this is the first one to open. There are nine other blooms waiting to show their lovely faces, if the sun will just come out to play.
first gazania Ireland from seed
The same bloom has been shut tight ever since, which has annoyed me to no end. Not only because it is evidence the weather has been shite, but because I really wanted to see it again before the bloom withered.
(iPhone pic) Today, there was enough warmth for the new wan to have another look at the sky. I’m in love! These flowers are brushstroke of glowing paint in my soggy, windy world. I hope the rest of the buds have a chance to see the sky, too.
heretherebespiders 