Hoya update

The good news is that all last year Hoya's are still alive and growing, some more than others,
only Hoya pauciflora and Hoya dolichospartus are very, very slow growers, almost no progress.
Hoya carnosa, Hoya carnosa tricolor, Hoya cv Joy (metallica), Hoya kentiana, Hoya loherii are flowering or have so, Hoya cummingiana is full with buds, so is Hoya crassicaulis, Hoya latifolia
& Hoya mathilde .
Hoya multiflora and Hoya imperialis made buds and failed about 3 times- that was during the
frost.

Hoya carnosa tricolor 

with the orchids I had from my parents

 

 

 

Hoya cummingiana

 

  

Hoya cv Joy

Hoya mathilda

The " bad " news is: the house is too small for more Hoya's at the moment, and so is my wallet,
the money I have left is spend on outside plants for the garden.
I want to end with pictures of the windows downstairs.

 

 

SUNSHINE

You're the most beautiful thing

That I ever saw in my  life.....

(Francis Dunnery lyrics)

 

 

 

It's months ago since I last wrote here, we had an awful long winter with more snow than I ever
wanted, besides that I wasn't well at all, but now the summer really started and I am most of the
time outside, confiscated a part of the area  that was a former parking lot and turn it in what has to
be one day one more flower border.
Last winter I had my own personal color therapy, I knitted a big sweater -that fits us all -and I rediscovered crotching, after about 25 years. I fabricate little curtains with lots of colors and the
house is a bit of a Pippi Longstocking one now, esp. because I gave my partner a couple of iron cats for his birthday ( because I liked them a lot myself:-) )

I also crotched 2 chair backs and seats with rope, for 2 old gardenchairs.

One of them is a couple of months outside now, holding well, except the color orange, that is
getting pale ( the other one is still inside- cats took it).

December 2012, or: "Who'll stop the rain?"

 

 

 

Long as I remember, the rain been coming down

Clouds of mistry porin, confusion on the ground

Good men through the ages

Trying to find the sun

And I wonder, still I wonder

Who'll stop the rain......

(C.C.R.)

 

We had a big, big lot of rain here in the South of the Netherlands, it's raining for weeks
now, most fields look terrible, it's all mud in our surrounding and the cats take about 
a cubic meter of mud a day with them on their feet and body, we could start our own 
potato field with their proceeds.

The picture above is an example of how our island looks nowadays, not (only) because 
of the rain, but this is a piece of former agricultural land that is 'given back to nature',
what in this part of the country means that there is a whole lot of water brought inside the dikes.
My grandfather, who worked on a pumping station till his retirement, had tears in his eyes when he saw this drowned piece of Schouwen-Duiveland for the first time.
It's called 'plan tureluur' or 'plan redshank' in English.
I didn't work on a pumping station so I don't have the same sentiments as my grandfather had, but I think it is a shame that there was only water brought in and no trees or bushes.
During the summer a group of  cows are grazing there, and they must be spezialised in 
"Ditch Jumping" if you'll ask me.

So after all the rain we had it and as the pictures showed it realy doesn't take much to make the Kingdom of Mud here.
I didn't make much pictures lately, but here is one, a leaf that was fallen on the muddy 
road in front of the house.

And this is the view I have most every day when I wake up,

Verrrrrrrrrry boring!!!!
I want SNOW!! Lots and lots of snow, and sun!
Last time we had December snow was in 2010, and I want to post a bunch of pictures I made then,
and I want to wish everybody who takes a look here a very good christmas and the best wishes for
the year to come!

Brouwershaven

Den Osse, the house owned by the water board where my grandparents lived when my grandfather worked at the pumpstation nearby. My grandparents died 10 years ago, and the house hadn't had a regular habitant since, that is about 35 years.
 It's a big shame, I think.

Den Osse Harbour;

Next  pictures I took on the island below us, Walcheren.

And the next pictures I took around the house and the road here.

Our Indian Runner Ducks