In addition to being less than an hour from the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, we are an easy drive to some other places that have impressive collections. The Virginia Museum of Fine Art in Richmond is worth an overnight visit, imo. The Taubman Museum in Roanoke has good stuff, too.
The university collections that we think are worth seeing (and are within an hour’s drive) are The Weatherspoon Art Museum at UNC-G, the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University and Gregg Museum of Art & Design at NC State University. The Gregg is the smallest. But, it has had some excellent exhibitions. The Weatherspoon inherited a lovely collection of work from the Cone sisters.
I promised myself not to buy any new clothes for a year unless something I need absolutely wore out. Like work jeans or underwear got down to having to do laundry more than twice a week.
It was meant to be a way to keep from refilling my cleaned out closets and drawers. I have learned that I like having new clothes more than I realized.
I crack on my mom being a sport shopper. But, I, too, like having something new for the season. And, Wednesday, I was shopping with a friend because SHE needs an outfit for a specific occasion, and I ended up with a new pair of leggings that were on sale and very cute.
I know that in the grand scheme of money spending, it’s not a big thing. But, I really am trying to shop from my closet. And I’m a little disappointed in me.
We’ve been shopping from our pantry, too. We have been disorganized with where things were stored and had a ridiculous amount of duplicates. It had gotten hard to put things away. Some of that was trying not to have to go to the store very often so we bought more than we really needed at the time, just in case and because we would need it eventually. Some of it was picking up deals that weren’t on the list when we did go. And some was over-purchasing via Costco.
We had 3 (!!!) open packages of frozen scallops. Bought on sale at the co-op and used sparingly because they are expensive. And allowed to be buried in the freezer by other stuff.
I had cut myself off from more plant purchases, too. That has mostly worked. But, there has been a little bit of seasonal, replacement planting. Like the tulips that are functionally annuals here.
“Shopping from the pantry” and “shopping from the closet” have become phrases that help us pause to consider if we really need a thing or if we are shopping for entertainment. It seems to be effective. I can find things in the refrigerator, again.
In the spring, I got 3 gerber daisies (an orange one, a yellow one and an orange and yellow one) and put them in a pot on my deck. Gerbers are perennial in zones 8-10 and I live in zone 7.
Their blooming was spotty and I never had a nice grouping of all the colors together after I’d had them for a couple of weeks. NOW, I have healthy greenery and no flowers. If I bring them inside, they will probably make it through the winter and may bloom erratically next year.
I can’t decide if I care about them. I like the pot, though, and may just prefer something else in it. Maybe the pink amaryllis that’s been toying with my affections all summer.
I got the amaryllis thinking it would at least make leaves this year. Three times I’ve lifted it up from where it was apparently doing nothing intending to throw it in the compost barrel and found healthy roots.
My life is so difficult.
A couple of months ago, I promised myself that I would not buy any more plants for a year. Instead, I intend to get everything already here in good shape. Of course, I decided that after I had made another large purchase. I have mostly stuck to that, though. I did replace a gardenia and an echinacea that was destroyed by the patio installation.
‘Cheyenne’ echinacea
I have a bag of 30 mixed tulip bulbs that will go in the front bed next week. It’s too warm here for tulips to do well after their first year in the ground. A few of the red ones I planted last year will come back. But, not many and definitely not all. I don’t ever get them out of the ground before the leaves die back too far to find them. So, tulips are kind of annuals for me.
The cuttings I took from a variegated hydrangea the Monday after Memorial Day did well through the summer and went in the ground the Monday after Labor Day. I’m hopeful about that. It’s very small and I don’t expect blooms for 2 or 3 years. But, I haven’t seen one anywhere available to purchase. So, it was this or nothing.
Wachesaw hydrangea
I’ve moved the cannas from around the well. They haven’t been thriving there. We had very few blooms this year. Now, they’re off the patio in front of the fence. I think that should work well. I enhanced the soil some and have been keeping them watered and mulched. I’ll know next summer. I’m expecting a jumble of colors because I couldn’t tell exactly there there different varieties started and stopped.
It’s going to finally start staying cool on Friday and the bat flower is going to have to come in over night. It won’t need to stay in until temps are going to stay below 50ºF every night. It doesn’t love the decreased humidity in our house. But, if I leave it out even one night of real cold, it will die. I put it in a pot made for me by a friend of my kid because we share the plant. Taylor Kennedy does lovely pottery.
When temps are ready to stay closer to 40ºF, I’ll bring the black elephant ear in.
I’ve been drying herbs all summer and the last batch is ready to be picked and added to my jars. And the stick I have used for a hanger can go into the laundry closet until next year.
dill, sage, basil, parsley and oregano
I have been sprinkling cypress vine seeds by the fence on the left side of the back yard. It’s been coming back very consistently since I planted it by the stoop several years ago and the hummingbirds love it. It reseeds itself; it’s not perennial. I gave seeds from it to a friend 2 years ago and she sent me a picture of it trying to eat her mail box.
My stoop todayHannah’s mailbox last year
The seed package held red, pink and white seeds. But, we rarely see white ones. Most are red. I think having it swarming all over the fence will be a nice way to keep the neighbor’s dogs from paying attention to what goes on in my yard. I will mail seeds to anyone that wants some. You’ve been warned about how they spread.
Swan Lake Iris Gardens in Sumter, SC has an Iris Festival every year on Memorial Day weekend and the local Master Gardeners group has a fundraising plant sale. Most of what they sell are irises. But, one of the MGs is a genius with carnivorous plants and donated several bog gardens to the cause. After some heavy quizzing (because I didn’t want to spend $40 on one to just kill it), I bought one.
New purchase
I chose this one because I liked the variety of colors in the sarracenias and it included a Venus Fly Trap. The one on the bottom left is a S. psittacina, also called a Parrot pitcher. The green pitcher plant is a S. oreophilia. The red and white one on the top left is probably a cross of S. leucophylla and S. rubra and I believe it is small because it is young, not because it will stay that way.
She told me to keep their feet wet (they are bog plants), leave them outside all year (they are native to our part of the world), don’t freak out when they die back in winter and don’t bother to feed them. Particularly, don’t fertilize them. They get nutrients from the insects they trap and, if you fertilize them, they don’t need those nutrients and don’t bother to make traps.
In case you didn’t know, the traps are not the flowers of carnivorous plants. They are modified leaves. On the right is a VFT blossom and on the left is a pitcher plant blossom.
Because the plant sale was a fundraiser, the Master Gardeners didn’t use fine pots for the plants they donated. (I don’t blame them. I wouldn’t have either.) But, that meant that the plastic pot my bog was in turned out to be brittle. So, I replaced with a ceramic pot I got from Lowe’s. It is made to survive freezing and is glazed inside as well as out. (Terracotta does bad things to carnivores.)
It does have some soil underneath with a healthy dose of perlite and vermiculite to keep it from compacting too much. And there is sphagnum moss on top to help keep it wet.
The colors got stronger after it moved to my patio where it gets sun all day long.
My husband says it’s his favorite of my plant projects and my kid calls it the Swamp of Eternal Gladness. I am absolutely delighted.
This was the “care card” she included with my purchase.
I am the Audience 