porch plants

Hi everyone! 

We are having a glorious week of weather after several days of dark skies and heavy rain last week. 

There are three porches on the home we are renting in Beaufort. We have a set of front porches and a little side entry porch from the driveway and garage.  

The front of the house has northern exposure so there is filtered light through the woods on each side of the house morning and late afternoon. We are using the classics...ferns and palms. 

Easy to find at good prices, the nurseries are full of them. They sell out quickly but new shipments arrive weekly.

 I added pansies to the base of the palms to add fullness.

We also have a bird's nest anthurium/anthurium hookeri placed in the middle of the porch so it does not receive too much light.

We have been enjoying the lower porch in the evenings with cocktails and mornings with our tea but the afternoon sun is starting to interfere as it lowers at this time of year. If this was our permanent home, we would hang outdoor drapes at the end of the porch to block the harsh afternoon sun.

The morning light is so pretty....

The upstairs porch has a delicate frilly palm.  I need to start learning the palm varieties. We are using the common ones I found at Lowe's. The top porch is our privacy porch with a full sized sofa, good breezes and nice views.

The side entry porch has a fiddle leaf fig that was difficult to find. I was looking for several months and had to finally order one. They are so popular that they sell out as soon as they arrive. 

We have a small one because the space is tight. I still have not found them at Home Depot where some other bloggers have. I just planted herbs in the tiered planter as I did on in our last home.

We thought these oleanders next to the chimney were goners after the polar vortex came to South Carolina but after painstakingly pulling all the dead foliage off, they are coming back. The landscaping on the house is simple, balanced and attractive. 

The back yard does not have a porch. A screened in porch would be perfect there because it faces the pond.

The pond has turtles that rest on the bank and take surprisingly big leaps into the water when we get close. Also wood ducks are usually here. Geese visit and spend most of their time honking at us if we are out in the yard.. The lawn is not in great shape but as renters, we are not really wanting to spend much on the lawn. I did buy weed spray and a neighbor boy is cutting the grass for us.

So what about your porches? Have you potted your porch plants this spring or are you making plans for when the weather allows? Sticking with the classic palms and ferns makes it easy.

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy

spring sightings

Things that Inspire photo

I hope everyone had a nice Easter. I thought this was such a beautiful idea. Each year on Easter Sunday, an Atlanta church erects a wood cross, wraps it with oasis and wire mesh and the congregation then fills it with flowers. Read more about it here.

After several days of dark skies and heavy rain, the sun shined on Easter Sunday afternoon. We got on the bikes and explored our soon-to-be neighborhood.  

Everything has turned very green! 

We happened upon some mating dances being performed by a group of wood storks. You can barely see them in the distance at the end of the pond. This is a different pond than the one I showed last week. This one has huge water lilies.

Two males were strutting around with their wings fully extended while the females just stood nonchalantly looking the other way.

This swing is in the lawn across from our lot.  It faces the marshes of the Broad River. 

We decided an Easter treat was in order so we stopped at Bruster's, our local ice cream stand, and were excited to see a bed of several striking Bottlebrush plants (Callistemon). Perfect compliment to Bruster's awnings.

What are your favorite spring sightings these days?

Melanie, of The French Cottage, won the giveaway bag. Thanks for entering to all those that left comments.

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy

bringing foliage in

The home we are renting does not have gardens, just nice basic landscaping. There are a few late blooming azaleas which have not opened yet and some oleanders that were frost damaged and are coming back that will hopefully give us summer color. 

So to add life to the inside of the house, I have been cutting foliage from the yard. 

I only brought 2 vases here, the rest are in storage. For some reason, a few wicker flasks were packed with husbands shoes

 

so I have been using them instead. The St Germain elderflower liquor is so good, we are going to try making different cocktails with it. The prettiest bottle.

Chocolate bowl is getting low, need to get some easter chocolates.

This carafe belongs to a set of glasses but I needed something tall to support the palmetto fronds.

We have been visiting nurseries, excited to see the different flowering plants that can be grown in the South but without a yard of our own,  have to be patient until the house is built.

When you need a little freshness in your rooms,

do you just clip a little sprig here and there too?

One more thing...

many azaleas are starting to fade so here are a few I captured the other day, the pinks are near our lot and the multicolored were in a churchyard next to the grocery....

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy

white azaleas

The beautiful cemetery next to the parish church of St Helena in downtown Beaufort is worth a visit, especially in April when the white azaleas planted at all four gated entrances are in bloom. We came upon them the other day on a bike ride. 

Enjoy.....

I want to thank

 those who have expressed condolences

to me about losing our dog Andy. It is so nice to know that there are other dog lovers  who understand. I centered my days around long walks with him as our kids grew older and more independent and am feeling lost without him. My husband feels the same way. After several extremely sad days last week,  I decided I needed to force a change and that is why I am blogging more and making some other changes in our new life here as well. I am thankful that it is spring, we are enjoying the rebirth of nature.

Don't forget to enter the Les Toiles du Soleil bag giveaway,  just go here and comment, drawing will be Friday,  April 18.

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy

our future neighborhood and Andy

Hi everyone! 

This is a long post for me...warning.

I remembered my camera when we were in our new neighborhood last night. The light conditions were not favorable but here are a few shots of our street and lot.

Fresh ferns had popped up since we visited the other day. Wish there was a way to save them but they will undoubtedly be crushed when construction starts. The lot is long and narrow. The house on the left was just finished. They chose yellow siding, at least it is a happy color. We will go with a cream most probably.

 All the trees are flagged for the survey. We will lose all the oaks in the center and try to keep those on the perimeter. 

This is the view towards the marsh from the lot. The limbs on the left are oaks that will remain and obscure part of the view which is fine with us. They will provide shade in the hot summer and differentiate our lot from the others that do not have trees on their frontage like ours does. So our front garden will have more shade, we prefer that for the double porches.

View towards the neighbors. The clump of oaks to the right of husband will remain.

Our lot is between the two houses here.

Husband checking out the view which we love! The lawn is protected park space but rarely do you see it being used except at sunset. There are swings to relax and enjoy. Most residents stroll over or ride bikes and the older residents tend to bring their cocktail or wine and arrive on golf carts, departing the moment the sun sets. So the street is very quiet. We feel blessed that we will be able to see the sun set from the house.

This view says South Carolina!

Looking down the street in the other direction. Park on the left.

 This farmhouse styled home is just down the street. It sits on a small pond on a beautiful lot.

Looking back towards our end of the street. You can see the beautiful garage apartment with a screened porch in the rear of the house.

Across the small pond is the large neighborhood pond. There were two people fishing yesterday. One fellow was fly fishing and an older lady had parked her bike and was fishing all by herself which I thought was awesome.

Wish the sky was blue, these shots would have been prettier.

The fly fisherman is on the left, you can barely see his blue shirt.

We will love walking and biking our neighborhood.

We happened upon a Red Buckeye or Aesculus Pavia in a naturalized area next to the pond. The stems are pink.

Moving away from the pond towards the rest of the neighborhood. You can see that husband is alone... 

We lost our sweetheart Andy last weekend. He deteriorated very quickly. Appearing normal on Wednesday, he slowed down a bit on Thursday but Friday morning, he suddenly could not walk and did not respond to strong pain relief. He could not lie on his side, the lump increased in size as the day went on and he stayed in one position most of the day. Friday night he stayed in a frog position all night and every time I checked on him, he was awake. The pain relievers should have allowed him to sleep but had no effect. 

Taken two weeks ago.

Our soft lovely boy was not going to suffer, he went to heaven on Saturday. We never saw him ill until the last two days of his life! A blessing he went so quickly but a shock to us. He seemed to be so happy and had not lost his appetite or his handsome body, except the stupid hump between his shoulders that haunted us. Needless to say, we feel very lonely without him. Trying to figure out how to live without him right now. I know we will adjust but right now it feels very sudden even though of course we knew what was coming. Losing a pet never gets easier, no matter how many you have said goodbye to.

This photo of Andy was taken in our last house two summers ago after a bath and trim.  A typical stance, he is watching me cook but checking out the black squirrels that were always under our bird feeders. We also had chipmunks that lived around our patio and scampered around us as we sat outside. They would run right by him but he accepted them as he did all the frogs on the edge of the pond. Squirrels were another matter though and he was always chasing them up the maple trees. He only caught one once and it was not pretty.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that is all for now. 

Having more free time now that I no longer have children at home, no longer have to care for a  big house and yard or have a big dog to take long walks with everyday, I am going to start blogging more often. I will share some gift ideas as my go-to last minute gift drawer has depleted and need to find  some nice things to replenish  it with. May even do my first giveaway with some local goods from the Low Country. So come back soon!

Thanks for visiting!

Cindy