Portulaca

I have never liked Portulaca flowers, seen them in the neighbourhood yards, garden centers... They look soooo... "wormly". So I don't know what possessed me to buy a tray of 24 plants during lunch hour that day, the Cantonese speaking flower lady was so friendly.

Don't like them, don't know how to take care or where to plant them - so I put them in 4 different locations, hoping they will tell me which spot works better. You may call it trial and error or natural selection. Surprisingly, all 4 spots are doing just fine.

This will be a place for me to record my garden flowers, what they called, how the seedling, grown plant, flower and seeds look like.

1 month after planting	Close up - White Portulaca
Portulaca Fresh Seed Pot	Dried Seed Pot
Collecting Portulaca Seeds	Portulaca Seed Size

A month after planting, I've already collected a handful of seeds - what to do with them...?

Mmmm... Blue Berries...

Mom often shoves a piece of some sort of fruit to my mouth and says: EAT! You should eat fruits. I don't see you eat any fruits.

It's not that I don't like them... just not the ones you get in Canada. I grew up in a country where no one buys week-old fruits. Stores/fruit stands sell whatever is in season, picked when ripe, freshly from the tree probably the same day.

With a small blueberry bush and a couple of strawberry vines, we get to have that kind of freshness every couple of days during the summer - if the dog didn't get to it first.

Soooooo Hoooooot

It's gotta be the hottest day of the year. 32 deg C in Aurora - I can't imagine what it feels like in Toronto downtown with the number of cars and A/C units emitting hot air into the atmosphere.

While grocery shopping, we decided that eating a big breakfast, light lunch and decent dinner is something we should *try* to do... ... again. And that's why hubby bought a pack of bacon when I picked up a pack of Canadian bacon (eyes rolling). The idea is to cook them in advance so he can nuke it at work for a BLT bagel. A BLT bagel I believe costs about $6 in that lovely CLS cafeteria nowadays. Good idea, eating health (healthier than chips or muffin) AND saving money. Not so good idea because I have to cook. Heated kitchen and a house full of bacon smell... yeah, that's something I want in a hot day like this.

Well, no worries, I'll just cook outside in the yard with our camping gears. Here is the bacon sizzling and old-pup guarding it. He is barking at me because I distracted his bacon watch...