Seven Years Ago, Today...

I started on the most rewarding journey of my life: My marriage.

The newly-married Karen and Bob share a kiss at their favorite Italian restaurant, May 2, 2003

Then, a couple of days later another journey began: A two-day road trip from New York to Illinois in a rickety U-Haul truck.

Our rented truck in the parking lot of a motel in Indiana. Don't let its looks fool you. That thing could go from zero to 60 in 30 minutes.

View of the packed truck. You can't see them, but there are about 80 plants packed in boxes in there.

Yes, I packed up eighty plants and brought them with me to my new life. Seven years later, I have 30-35 of them left. I was feeling kind of bad about that (45-50 is a lot of dead plants) until I realized how big and mature many of the survivors have become, and how much I've learned about plants and what they need (and what they will and will not put up with) since then. Here are some of the survivors:

Photograph of a plant grouping in my New York apartment, sometime before I moved. All of the Sansevierias, the Dracaeana fragrans and the Epipremnum on the pole are still with me. The Anthurium 'Arizona' lasted about a year before it went into a sudden decline. The Sansevieria trifasciata on the far right is very much bigger now.

Peperomia incana in a 10-inch pot. This was also a very small plant back then.

Crassula ovata

Zamioculcas zamiifolia. It was about a third of this size in 2003

The Dracaena reflexa 'Song of India,' that was featured in a recent post is also one of those that survived and thrived after the move.

I'm hoping that in the next seven years, I can greatly improve my track record in keeping my plants alive and thriving. I already think I am doing better, since the great majority of my plants are at least three years old at this point, with many of them in the 5 years or greater range.

And I'm hoping that in the next seven years, and beyond, I can make my husband half as happy as he has made me in the last seven years. Happy Anniversary, Sweetheart!

Odds and Ends and Updates

Well, now I know which of my unidentified Hibscus rosa-sinensis plants received the hard pruning described in my post of January 8. It was the yellow-flowered one. I know this because the red flowered one bloomed today!

NoId Hibiscus rosa-sinensis

Now, if I'm smart, I'll put a label in the plants so I'll know what's what from now on.

Foxy, my rather brutally pruned Asparagus meyersii, has put out another new "frond." I think I'll declare this experiment a success.

This new branch has a fairly loose growth habit, due to the fairly weak winter sunlight. I think that it is pretty, anyway.

I wrote on January 27 that I would post a picture of my Sansevieria gracilis/ballyii/whatever flowers when the buds opened. Well, some of them opened and closed and fell off before I remembered to take a picture, but here is the bloom stalk with at least some open flowers.

Sansevieria flowers

From that same post, I noted that my Sinningia speciosa was re-sprouting , and posted pictures of its tiny new leaves. Here they are today:

Sinningia speciosa (Florist Gloxinia) leaves, considerable larger than in the original post

Finally, yesterday, I said that I had decided not to post pictures of heart-shaped leaves for Valentine's Day. But I like these pictures of Peperomia incana, so I decided not to let them go to waste.

Heart-shaped Peperomia incana leaf, silhouetted against the snowy outdoors...

...and here, showing the fuzzy texture of the leaves.