Brave Souls, Autumn in San Diego County

Little 'Ballerina' fuchsia lifting her arm to wave at me as I pass by. 

Even though the temperatures dropped down to the low 40's, I still have flowers on many of my plants. These are both on the South wall of my home and they get a bit of warm sunshine during the day.  This fuchsia grows next to the Iochroma cyaneum seen below, which provides just enough shade for it.

Iochroma cyaneum is a flowering shrub or small tree from tropical South America in the family of Brugmansia.  It has lovely trumpet shaped flowers that the hummingbird and bees enjoy and visit often.  I am happy to see this blooming now with so many of the flowers in my Hummingbird and Butterfly garden spent.  I am training this to be a small tree which will provide a canopy for some of my shade loving plants, like my  madarense geraniums.

This is a repeat blooming Iris, the name escapes me at the moment.

I have 5 Christmas Cactus coming into bloom now, you can barely see the red flowers on the plant below this one.  The white/pink you see here is in full bloom.

A few brave buds and blossoms on one of the two Plumeria plants I have.  This one is 3 years old and I grew it from a cutting.  I did have it in a clay pot but decided in June of this year to plant it directly in the ground.  It is near a sprinkler head, see it at the base of the flower, this provides it with water 3 times a week when needed.  It bloomed most of the summer and is still trying its best to continue.  It is in a somewhat protected area of this Southwest spot, with both a large rosemary and lavender bush nearby to shield it from too much of the hot Southern California sunshine.  

We rarely get below 40 degrees in our zone so I am keeping my fingers crossed that it will do well through the winter.  My other Plumeria is called Golden Rainbow, which I also grew from a cutting in June of 2012.  It flowered once so far and is planted close to this ginger plant shown below. You can see it just peaking over the top of the ginger, at the top right side of the photo.

 Here is my Galangal Thai Ginger plant I purchased in June 2012 from City Farmers Nursery in San Diego.  You may have seen a piece of the rhizome in your bowl of panang curry at your favorite THAI RESTAURANT.  I will need to wait until next year before I begin to cut the rhizomes for my cooking adventures as the plant needs some time to spread.  I am so excited to see it doing so well in this location just off the South side of our patio.

Our loquat tree that we planted a couple of years ago is flourishing.  I am surprised at how many buds are on this small tree. Last year we were able to pick for the first time, and with this many blossoms already on it May of 2014 looks very promising!

I can't leave without showing you a few photos of the pretty fallen leaves from our two Sweet Gum (liquidambar styraciflua) trees. The heavy rains last week and some hefty Northwestern winds left the trees almost bare.

A beautiful carpet just in time for our outdoor Thanksgiving day dinner, providing the sun is shining, rain is in the forecast but I will keep my fingers crossed that we can dine alfresco!

Changing Time

The cloud looked in at the window,

and said to the day, "Be dark!"

And the roguish rain tapped hard on the pane,

to stifle the song of the lark.

The wind sprang up in the tree tops

and shrieked with a voice of death, 

but the rough-voiced breeze, that shook the trees,

was touched with a violet's breath. 

-Paul Laurence Dunbar