Merry Christmas!

My apologies for not posting lately. No excuses. Just needed a break. Our cold spell has passed and we're back to normal moderate weather.

We went out to a Christmas Eve service at a church where nobody knew us and it was enjoyable. I've been in charge of Christmas Eve services every year for the past 30 or so years, so it was a nice break.

Tomorrow we'll have a family gathering here with a gift exchange and a ham dinner. It should be fun and I'm looking forward to it. Our youngest granddaughter won't be with us but here's a picture of her with her dad at Thanksgiving.

...and that's Ladybug trying not to get her picture taken in the middle!
I wish all of you a wonderful and joyful Christmas!

An Early Winter

Wow, has this been an early winter to beat all!  In an average winter we get night time temperatures down into the upper 20s to lower 30s F. And we might even get a dusting of snow. There have been winters where we didn't even get a serious hard frost. Not this year. So far we've broken four night time records for low temperatures and it looks like we'll do so for the next couple of nights at least. We even got a little snow to go with it today. This is way out of the ordinary.

No pictures right now. I've been too busy keeping warm...

Cintia knitzei flowers

I've posted these before but I couldn't pass up posting the flowers the plants are producing now.

Our granddaughter was with us for this past week and the house seems empty without her here (She lives in California). We took two trips to Powell's (the huge book store in Portland) and she found a book she really wanted.

More later. Enjoy your plants.

Lithops optica var. rubra

Hi everyone. Sorry I haven't been posting much lately; it's been a little hectic. These are some seedlings of Lithops optica 'Rubra' that are beginning to  look really nice.
Our granddaughter from California will be visiting over Thanksgiving and I'm giving a talk on growing succulents to a Garden Club tomorrow. In addition to that, of course, we decided to open the nursery for orders until December 6 and we've been fairly swamped.
Finally, our weather is finally turning cold with our first hard freeze expected this week. Now any money we earn from the nursery sales goes "slurp" to the heating oil man.

Echeveria setosa var oteroi

Ah yes, at this time of year...wow! Not commonly available, these are outstanding little plants.

Mammillaria elongata 'Rufocrocea'

Mammillaria elongata is a pretty common plant, not very exciting for the experienced collector. However, this variation on the theme is quite interesting. The stems proliferate along the stem and quite regularly send off variegated and/or monstrose growth.
For those who follow our nursery, it should be noted that we are again accepting orders, but only through December 6. After that we'll be closed for the holidays.

Enjoy your plants!

Fockea edulis

This is one of a couple of nice old specimens of Fockea edulis, an African caudiciform plant, that we have. We've really come to like these plants over the years.

Graptoveria 'Opalina'

Gorgeous, fat-leaved plants. We've had these for a few years but haven't really spend a lot of time propagating. We should, I suppose, but with the greenhouses full as they are...?