A look in to my horticultural side........

 

Hi there,

Well, thought that as this is my personal blog, I should start to share some personal things about myself as well as my creative and crafting life!

So, let me introduce you to "Eric" my Monstera (swiss cheese plant/tree!).  He lives in my orangery here at home and stands at almost 8 feet tall.  The second photograph shows you that he has reached maturity and is about to flower (there are actually two flowers forming, the other one is just to the left of that big one but much smaller at the moment). It is very rare to have a swiss cheese plant flower indoors so he is very much enjoying life.  The flowers do bare fruit which takes about 12-14 months to ripen and tastes a little bit like a pineapple crossed with a banana ......not sure that I'll be eating it!!!!! Look at all those aerial roots that he is putting out, when these grow down to the pot, I poke them back in to the pot to suck up further nutrients from the soil.

As well as an orchid collector, I am also a collector of African Violets too (named varieties) so here are a couple of my very young plants flowering for the first time - here we have "Ian Fun" and "The Shining Bell" - both are small plants but are a delight to have around the house.  You will notice the plastic pot underneath that top photograph, this is because I use a wicking system for watering my AV's so that is the reservoir pot!

Hope you enjoyed a little trip down personal alley today, I think it's nice to share my other interests as I have sooooo many!

Thanks for stopping by,

Leanne xxx