Saturday, August 16, 2008

What we do for fun...

I have mentioned before that my husband has a green thumb...green arm...green left side of his body. He loves growing tropical plants and my house often looks like a indoor jungle during the winter. (because we do not live in the tropics! No matter how much we pretend that it's true.)

Anyhow, one of his dreams has been to enter a couple of his plants in the state fair. We finally bit the bullet and filled out the paperwork a couple of months ago. He entered two categories (blooming and non-blooming) with no real idea which plants he might actually take. Because you can't actually predict what might be blooming two months in advance. And you can't predict how much damage japanese beetles and random factors of life might do to your foliage. And honestly, over the past week, you might have thought we were planning a small scale invasion of a hostile territory with all the discussion, plotting, and planning that has gone on in choosing just the right plant. (oh, and now would be a good time to mention that NOTHING was blooming! Everything had just finished blooming or was just about to bloom.) Finally, Wednesday night, (the night before said plants must be taken to the fairgrounds) a decision was made. And remade. And discussed. And fretted over.

Thursday morning, he and his dad transported the "babies" down to the fair. And Thursday afternoon, he was the proud "papa" of two prize winning "babies."


This is a ginger. I forget what kind. I know I should remember. But I don't. Josh could tell you if you really want to know. See the lovely blue ribbon? This ginger rocks!

This is a three year old plumeria that he started from seed. I am so glad that it finally cooperated and decided to bloom. (I think it's a blue ribbon plumeria but we are happy with second place.)

Here is the bloom up close. Because you can't really tell much about the bloom on the other picture.


And in case you didn't see it before...the blue ribbon!

Congratulations, Josh! (and as you might expect, he's already talking about what he's going to enter next year. It may be a long twelve months.)




3 comments:

Abba's Girl said...

Congrautlations.

We are fortunate down here, we can leave Plumeria outdoors about 355 days a year.

Is he already planning what to take next year?

Annette

Angela Baylis said...

This is just SO SO cool! I wish I had a green thumb! Congratulations to Josh! I'm SO impressed!
Love,
Angie xoxo

Anonymous said...

Oh I love fragrant and beautiful ginger and plumeria. And a guy that likes to garden, well that's pretty cool! We have a variety of verigated leaf ginger that we got in Hawaii, and it is blooming right now. Tell Josh congratulations and maybe all those plants inside last winter was worth it! Love, A