Easter Bouquets, A New Treasury and the Etsy Front Page

Best wishes for a very Happy Easter to all my blogger friends!

Here's a fresh bouquet FOR YOU!

Thanks to the heat wave, my row of bright yellow, Dutch Master daffodils, planted for cutting some years ago, has all bloomed at the same time. Fresh bouquets will be delivered to one and all at the Easter celebration and dinner that I'm going to attend.

In fact, it all bloomed so darn fast that a day after I took these photos, winds and rain knocked many of them over. Oh well, I'm still blessed with the bounty to share!

{my} English Garden

It's no secret that I'm a complete and total gardening fool, a flower addict, a botany freak...so to learn that I was in this Etsy treasury today was a lovely treat! {my} English Garden was curated by Jen who has the Ety shop Jenaissance which features vintage inspired, and often botanical, creations including necklaces and earrings--Please visit her shop and take a closer look at this garden inspired treasury. She's got a really nice blog, too, which is here.


And finally, saving the best for last, for the first time that I am aware of, a treasury that included my work was used on the Front Page of Etsy. It was the white treasury that I showed here yesterday and I learned that it was up about 5 p.m. EST on Saturday for about one hour. I missed it!

What floored me was seeing over 30 new hearts added to my shop during that hour, whoa!! It did not lead to any sales, however, which was a fallacy I had held dear...that "all I had to do was get on the "Front Page" and I'd sell like crazy." Ummmm, I guess we can now dispel THAT delusion!!

Ahhhh, no big deal....you all have a very lovely Easter with friends and family...and Happy Spring!!

Easter (Cactus)

When I lived in Iowa, my ex and I had an old house on a small farm at the edge of a tiny little village. Everyone knew each other and we were the newcomers. But we made friends and among those friends were the elderly couple who had owned and lived in our house before us.

I learned about a month ago that Marie had just passed away and as a tribute to her, I must tell the story of where I got this beautiful plant and learned how to grow the beautiful Easter Cactus (Zygocactus), because she really had "the touch."

It was over 10 years ago that she asked me to repot a huge cactus for her that she had been growing for I don't know how long. It was a tough job because it was a large, heavy, hanging plant and this type of plant is quite brittle and bits break off very easily. I succeeded and kept a few of the broken bits, potting them up for myself. The past few years, this remnant of her big plant has finally gained the maturity it apparently needed to REALLY start to bloom.

The past few months, it bloomed for Christmas and now, it's blooming again for Easter--how lucky am I!? And the flowers really are just the brightest, sweetest pink....it always makes me smile.

But the secret, according to Marie, that I've been practicing now for some years, is to put these plants outdoors for a couple of months, during high summer, in a shaded place. I think the extra light helps "rev" them up to grow big and strong to really send out the flower buds. In nature, these are jungle plants that grow under the canopy of larger trees, so lots of direct sun is deadly for them...but bright light in bright shade is a good thing especially when coupled with regular water and fertilizer during this time as they build up their "reserves."

The rest of the year, they live in my house in an east facing window where they are exposed to nice, bright morning light but are also protected from strong, direct sun/ And where they do get some water about once a week.

So best wishes to all for a happy and blessed Easter...and Marie? Here's to your wonderful memory and I'm pleased and proud that a little piece of you lives on here in my life!!

See Wikipedia to learn more about the "Holiday Cactus", it's history and cultivation.