Friday, January 25, 2013

The Beauty of Ice

 Mother Nature is being downright cruel here in middle Tennessee. One day the sun will shine, the temperature will rise and the plants will begin leafing out and sticking their heads towards the blue sky. The next day we wake up to a garden covered in ice...my poor plants. I'm sure they will be fine, but it's just cruel!!

From my windows everything looked so different covered in ice, so I decided to brave the elements and take some pictures. Crunch, crunch, crunch beneath my shoes, then slip, slip, slip....I had to be careful. 

Look what I found...a winter wonderland!

  Camellia

 Icicles hanging from the top of the pergola.

 One of our tiki torches. We won't be using this for a while!

 One of the Pin Oaks. The ice didn't bother Rascal at all.

 The bird houses look cold on the outside, but I bet they're cozy inside!

 The chairs look like they have tassels hanging on them.

 The Crossvine on it's arbor.

 Russian Sage...each stem is encapsulated in ice.

 Poor Mockingbirds..their apples are frozen.

 The Leyland Cypress branches are heavy with ice.

 I thought this was a great shot...can you find all four birds? Three Cardinals... a female on the fence at left and two males on the feeder, and an Eastern Towhee on the right fence.

 My daffodils are trying so hard to bloom!

Spiraea (Goldflame)...it reminds me of an ice sculpture.

 Japanese Privet

 Watch out little fairy or you'll slip right off that rock!

 The gate looks so pretty with it's "greenery" and icicles.

Gaura

I hope you enjoyed my winter wonderland. What's the weather like in your garden?

Words and photos property of Christy's Cottage Wildlife Garden.


29 comments:

  1. I really love how you blog Miss Christy! You are doing an AWESOME job! Just sayin...

    My garden is looking about like yours but now all the ice is gone-yippee! Now for a warm up.

    I bet if you cut those daffodils and bring them in they'll be fine and will bloom for ya! P.S. The PX still has daffys on sale-some really pretty double ones too. I bought a whole bunch and just planted them-you know you want to be planting:)

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  2. Hi Tina...Thanks so much! I needed to hear that. The ice here is melting, but there's still a lot of it! Tomorrow I think I'll stop by the PX and get some daffys. What do you think the cut-off is for planting them? And you're absolutely right....I DO want to be planting!!

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  3. I always go for it. As long as the bulbs are viable then I think you can plant. Just maybe no blooms the year of planting. Some of the bulbs are bad so be sure to check them with the squeeze test before buying! They have a fairly nice selection but they are going fast.

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  4. Winter wonderland here too, for about 24 hours!

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    1. I sure can't wait for spring! I have something very special planned for one of my new gardens!

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  5. It's beautiful Christy! Good job on the pic!

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  6. What beautiful scenes ice and all. Here not so great as the roads are all ice over and I have to drive to the Twin Cities tomorrow to catch a flight.... Yuk!

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    1. So glad you enjoyed the pictures. Be careful driving to the airport!

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  7. All that ice! Poor little daffodils! The pictures are beautiful - I really love all the icicles hanging from the pergola - but ice can be so destructive. I hope it doesn't hurt your plants in any way. I was very impressed when I read your "About Me" section. I can't wait to see pictures of your garden this spring and summer! You have done a lot in a little amount of time! I would love to follow your blog, but didn't see how to do that, or a way to email subscribe, either.

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    1. Thank you so much for your nice comments!! Starting a blog in winter has been a bit difficult because there's not much to show right now. But come spring and summer I'll have so much to show and I'm very excited. Just FYI...we're doing something very special in one of our new beds in spring and I can't wait to show everyone! I would love for you to follow my blog and I'll "google" to learn what I have to do so you can follow it. Thanks again!

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  8. Burrrr, your garden looks cold. As I type, the windows to the house are open for fresh air from our expected mid 70's today! I do like the way ice looks in the garden but fear for our beauties expecially those already blooming such as the daffys. But as we all know, plants are very tough and can handle a lot of punches Mother Nature tosses their way.... Love the header pic! Such an inviting spot to have a sit and enjoy all around!

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  9. Thanks so much Skeeter! I'm jealous of your weather! I finally figured out how to do the header picture after a lot of mistakes....I think it turned out nice!

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  10. Hi Christy, I just found your blog! The icicles look fascinating, but boy, they must be so hard on your plants. Hope you have as little damage as possible.
    By the way I am living and gardening in San Diego since five years now. I thought that might be interesting for you to know, since I read in your profile that lived there as well, before you moved to Tennessee.
    Christina

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    1. Hi Christina! Thank you so much for visiting my blog. Yes, I was born and raised in San Diego and had never lived anywhere else until we moved here in 2005. Quite a difference! Our entire yard in San Diego was 45x75 feet. I actually ran out of room for flowers. I am sure that will never happen here!! I had never even seen snow fall until we moved here. What part of San Diego do you live in? I look forward to following your blog and hope you follow mine! When spring comes I will have so much to show everyone!!

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  11. Wow-these photos are amazing! The ice looks like sculpture. We had a span of deep cold in the single digits here and it just warmed up again. It is unbelievable how ice can form into art! Thanks for sharing!

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    1. Thanks so much!! Even covered in ice the garden can still be beautiful!

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  12. Brrr, Christy! I expect to see something like that here in Nebraska, but not in Tennessee! I wonder how often that happens. All that ice sure made for some lovely photos, though. I hope it all melts, and your plants recover well. I like your chairs, including the one in the header photo, and your other structures. I did see all 4 birds. We have cardinals here, but not the other one.

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    1. We have ice fairly often in winter. Coming from California I had to get used to all this ice and snow!Glad you liked the pictures and the chairs. Believe it or not someone that came to the garden tour last year remembered us when she was going to get rid of the chair in the header photo and asked if we wanted it (and some other things I'll show sometime.) Of course we said YES!! Thanks for visiting!

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  13. By the way, I had to look up to see where Memphis is, as you say you are in the middle of the state. How was your weather today? I don't know how far the storms themselves traveled after the tornado or tornadoes.

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  14. It's always nice when folks give us cool things like that chair!

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  15. I like how the ice makes a garden glisten. It is not so good for the plants and trees, but makes winter a wonderland. You have great images of the ice. Our area too has been having the vastly fluctuating temperatures from 5° to 64° in a week. I missed the cold stuff though!

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    1. Thank you so much!!!! These fluctuating temps can't be good for our plants. However I'm very lucky that my plants are healthy so they have a pretty good chance of coming through OK....I hope! On the positive side, my plants that need some winter chill should be very happy!

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  16. Ice is pretty on everything...except maybe roads.

    We haven't had enough moisture here for ice. But, we have had the cold. Actually, yoyo weather here. 80s one day, 40s and 50s the next....ugh

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    1. Yes, we've had yoyo weather too! The plants don't know what to "think". When I went out to take these pictures I didn't realize how much ice was on our patio. I got about halfway to the grass and thought "what have I gotten myself into!!!", it was so slippery. I thought I'd be safe on the gravel path but that was slippery too! I finally made it to the grass and was OK. Thanks so much for visiting!

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  17. Mother Nature provides all manner of beauties for us - and an out of the garden. No ice here after nseasonal 50 degree temps, but brilliant sun on the veil on snow covering the ground.

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    1. Hi there and thank you for visiting my blog! Yes, I agree, Mother Nature does provide all manner of beauty!

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  18. I missed this post earlier. Ice sure can be pretty.

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  19. Ice is beautiful isnt it? But looks so darn cold to me! No ice or snow in our neck of the woods but we are never out of the woods until March 1....

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