It's Beginning to Look (and smell) Alot Like Christmas!

Today's temps in the 50's lured me outside for the great Christmas greenery hunt of 2010.  We are blessed to live in Tennessee where an abundance of native evergreens grow and are free for the cutting.  Among todays bounty are as follows: 2 types of pine, cedar, magnolia, and holly tree.  Glen also found a native possumhaw just a short nature walk away.

This is my first year to have a lampost to decorate so I added some greenery to the exisiting red bow.  Red seems to be my theme this year.

I keep the red star hanging year round on my back porch.  I also seem to have a star theme going on.  Notice the star shaped lights in the basket.  Coincidence?  Yes...a happy one.  Can you guess what the colored globes are?  Yep, once they used to hang on a swanky 60's hanging light fixture I suppose.  I bought them at yard sales this summer just because they were cool colors/shapes.

Full view of the table.  I have decorated underneath too with my fresh greenery.  I love this table.  I got it 2 weeks ago at a late-season yard sale that my flower buddy Glenda was having....  Only $6, could it be true??  I think other people were afraid to risk it because there was a can of wood stain stuck to the top.  Glen rescued it without too much trouble.  Thank goodness for the durability of enamel tops.  I'll treasure this table forever, especially since it was Glenda's!

My arizona cypress needed a little haircut to look presentable enough to drape with red lights.  I have them lining my sidewalk too..keeping the red theme going.  About the arizona cypress...I've had it 3 years and have yet to see the uniform growth habit demonstrated on the tag.  It grows crazy-wild!  I will give it kudos to it's drought tolerance and beautiful blue/green needles...the other reasons I bought it. 

This little tree is artificial but I think it looks real enough in it's terra cotta pot.  I'll probably leave it out all winter so things don't look so empty on the porch.  It's another yard sale find I'm glad I bought (now).

POSSUMHAW HOLLY

Happily trekking away with my treasured berry branches!

Pixie says it's time to get busy...only 28 days till Christmas!!



Daylight "Savoring" Time

I STILL don't like this time change!  I just want to cry, kick and roll around in the leaves-- but my tantrum would not change the fact that it is dark by 4:45!  So I must stop feeling sorry for myself and get out there and enjoy the daylight I have (mostly on weekends). I am still putting a few things in the ground as time and weather permits.  I usually don't give up the fight until temps get in the 40s and below during the daytime.  I have been busily picking up bags of leaves on the curbsides and scattering them over my flowerbeds too. 

This is the first full year of growing for this camellia.  I can't remember if it's called Christmas Cheer or Yuletide?  This is the first bloom for this year.

I have been pleased with the acuba's ability to rebound.  I found 3 brutally uprooted and tossed in the trash heap last year and rescued them.  They have proven to be beautiful and tough and very tolerant of dry shade.  I think I'll keep them! 

I thought these persimmons made a pretty picture against the blue sky.  We have a couple of small trees that have been loaded down this year.  Last year there were hardly any.  I have actually eaten a few of them...tasty.

Oh to see the fresh green variegation of Italian Arum--a delight when so much is brown.

I plan to use these pretty rose hips in some winter arrangements soon.

That's about the size of things here in southern middle Tennessee for November.  I am not relishing the winter that lies ahead but God knows best.  He knows we gardeners would work our fool selves to death if He didn't run us inside for a few months each year!