I hope this works! :)

Different angle...

Another shot...

From a distance...

Around the corner...

The water feature...

Well, it's the ole crew up to new tricks again!...I commend all of you on such beauty and thank you for shwoing us what you have..So nice and it's great to see you all around still!

Marquest????? GREAT to see you again:-)))

MIke

Oh yeah...

One more of the water feature. :)

purpleinopp , kis the one with the red flowers an Aphelandra?

Asleep......I am going to give you my Shirley Temple "OH MY GOODNESS" Your plants are gorgeous.

Hi Mike. Where have you been? What have you been doing?

Marquest, thanks! Feel free to put "already seen somewhere" pics, if you feel like it. Does anyone ever tire of looking at your yard/plants? No!

CB, looking at the pics I put, there's 3 red flowers, Canna, Pentas, Anthurium. Does that help?

Asleep, nice! The only thing wrong with your display is that I don't see any Callisia fragrans. You can be honest with me too, is there anything so glaringly obviously missing from my pics? I didn't know you had a water feature, it's cute! Is that Sagittaria (no idea if I remembered how to spell that right) in the strawberry pot? What else is going on in there? What do you do with that whole thing for winter? Have you ever seen Marquest's pond? Is that giant spider plant hanging? Would love to see the Monstera by itself whenever you might get a chance to take its' pic like that.

Mike, heythere! Hope all is going well up your way. If memory serves, your plants stay inside all year? Well, if so, feel free to add a pic of them looking out the window!

I didn't take more pics yet... lazy.

Beautiful plants, purp! How long does it take you to water them?

I've never been able to keep houseplants successfully, so when I read about putting plants outside for the summer, I was a bit skeptical. I figured, "what the heck?" and tried it. I have been pleasantly surprised by how well they have done.

My Peace Lily:
{{gwi:83266}}

This is the house plant I've had the longest. I got it in February. It is putting out spathes (is that the right word?) like crazy. At last count there were nine.

Tradescantia pallida 'Purpurea':
{{gwi:98115}}

I bought this at Wal-Mart as an annual with three little spikes in late May or early June (and paid $1.23!). I was surprised to see that it was a houseplant when I did some research, so this winter, in it goes. It has grown like mad and has blossomed for me!

Aeschinanthus radicans 'Rasta'
{{gwi:98116}}

This isn't a great picture of my lipstick plant, but it is growing faster than a weed. It has little sprouts of new growth everywhere. I got it for Mother's Day and, boy, did it look rough. I gave it a trim, repotted it, and played around until I figured out how much water it liked. It has blossomed under my care.

This isn't strictly a houseplant, but it is one of my favorites. I plan to try to overwinter it in the house:
{{gwi:98117}}

It's been so cool, I've had to bring them in a couple of nights when it dropped into the 40's.

So I have a question for those of you who take out everything in the summer. How do you keep your smaller pots from blowing around? I have two broms and a phal that I think would love to be outside, but I haven't tried because it's been windy and I don't want them blowing around the neighborhood.

Thanks Marquest! Kind of you to say so! :)

And thank you as well Purp! Not too sure anything is glaringly absent from what I see(so impressed with what I DO see that it's rather hard to imagine anything's missing!). And yes at the moment there be no callisia fragrans at the moment(sad,huh?) That IS sagittaria and you spelled it right. It and the iris were collected from the wild and although the sagittaria seems to be doing very well,the iris is on it's way out it would seem. Also here and there is lysimachia nummularia(creeping jenny)which I started in the dirt on the edge but it does like to crawl into the water,so who am I to stop it? Under the water I have cabomba and elodea which are also in the black containers that are behind the feature(those also have waterlilies in them along with salvinia). Regrettably come wintertime here in minnesota it's gonna turn into a massive block of ice,so I salvage what I can and watch as the rest gradually vanishes under snow. I would LOVE to see Marquest's pond! I'm a sucker for aquatic and marginal environments and just can't ever get enough. the spider in question must be the one by the bikes(I really wish they'd quit parking them there as they keep mangling my philo bip leaves...anyhoo...yes the spider in THAT location is hanging by an inverted tomato cage that I rigged into a pot holder kinda thing and it's doing the job for now. Will see what I can do about that monstera pic you wanted. I am proud of it after all it's been through. Had a sizable specimen years ago and lost it in a move but had a cutting in the terrarium so that little bit of insurance payed off. Just in case I have another cutting of it in the terrarium now as well...can't be too careful,right? :)

Okay Purp,..got a couple of shots of the monstera.

#1

And #2

Ashley, thanks! I've only had to water plants under the porch roof this summer. The rain is more than enough for the others, I've only used the hose to fill our dog's water dish. So it only takes about 30 minutes every 3-4 days for watering. That hanging basket your purple Tradescantia is in is my fav. kind, big & definitely plenty of holes in the bottom. Good for you for taking the saucer off of it! The green hanging pot, I always use a pruning thing to make a hole in the real bottom of those, the hole is up about 1/2 inch, which allows for a lot of standing water in those. You can do it while the plant is hanging if you think yours needs it too.

Part of the reason I combined some of the plants this summer is to get rid of smaller pots. Like you said, they can become airborne and plants don't like to fly. When I do have them to deal with, I try to put them against a bigger pot, sit then inside a bigger pot, use a heavier cache pot, put a rock in the pot, whatever works at the time with what I have. You can also tie things to posts or rails with fishing line.

Asleep, thanks! Cute Monstera! Much easier to see now. How long have you had it? I always like other people's water gardens, but have never had an urge to have my own. That Lysimachia stuff is pretty! I could use some of that for the hanging pots, the holes. How fat does the 'main' stem get?

Here's some plants that aren't on the front porch...

{{gwi:98118}}

I keep taking cuttings from this stuff, should have taken a pic before I gave everything another hair-cut. Toni, if you're looking, that's Lantana to the left.
{{gwi:98119}}

This is where I spend a lot of time feeding the mosquitoes.
{{gwi:98120}}

Misc baskets.
{{gwi:98121}}

This is on the front porch, but I like it so much, it gets a close-up.
{{gwi:98122}}

I dug up the Cannas that were here. While waiting to make sure I got them all, these plants are using the space. China doll (Radermachera sinica,) Eucalyptus poly-something, I think I was told the prickly thing is an Agave. The tall plants in the ground on the left are Datura.
{{gwi:98123}}

Pothos and Dracaenas in the shade of a giant Bradford pear weed already too big to kill when I moved here.
{{gwi:98124}}

Misc succulents.
{{gwi:98125}}

More succulents and sun lovers cooking in the sun (so baking pans are appropriate, right? They're less than $1, and almost sturdy enough, how could that go wrong?)
{{gwi:98126}}

Such wonderful setups :)

I love your yard Elkay, it seems very woodsy. Someday i'm gonna sit outside in the morning and drink tea in an area like that.lol
Here is the front porch of my plant display.
{{gwi:98127}}

Right side of the porch I couldn't get in shot.
{{gwi:98128}}

Plants hanging out around the pool. They don't seem to mind being close to it.
{{gwi:64924}}

Front porch revisited. Main section of plants. The pink pot......yeah...friend gave me that plant recently in it. Going to repot as soon as I can in something a lot less....pink.
{{gwi:98129}}

Mornin,gang!

Ashley,
...my 4 inch pots are mostly to the front and in front of those I have bricks. I've actually been told that the town I'm in gets more wind than chicago and there have been times when I've had to go searching for the ones that flew away! lol

Purp,
The monstera started out as a cutting that was given to me by a nice lady in nola after she saw me gawking at her windowbox...believe that was about 5 or 6 years ago. It was around 3 years ago that I had to start over from the cutting I'd kept separate,and what you see now is progress thus far. The stems on the creeping jenny are certainly small enough for a "holey moley" ..in fact I wondered if you were to cut a couple inches off of a drinking straw and then cut a slice down the length(this is important later),maybe you could set a cutting in the straw and then the straw,cutting and all into water of appropriate depth to root(like normal only with a straw). After it roots you could push it into a hole in the side of your pot and then open the slice and gently pull out the straw leaving the cutting behind in it's new home...hope that made sense! lol

Auron,
That pot IS pretty pink! lol
Maybe pop it in a basket with a tight enough weave to hide it. I actually think it's pretty...not just anybody can pull it off but a pothos could get away with wearin it's jammies to the grocery(okay now I'm just being silly! lol).

Here's a quick shot of one of my little xanadu. The other two are in terraria inside. :)

Thanks Asleep and Purp for the ideas. I'll have to try a couple of them next year and see what works for me. It's probably too late this year. If it doesn't get warmer, I may have to bring in some of the tropicals already. At least once a week it's been down below 55 at night. Some days aren't getting much over 60. Since they're next to the house, on a covered porch, and in the shelter of a maple, I'm not too worried, but when it dropped down to 47 (in July, grrrr), they came in for a couple of days.

Asleep, I absolutely love that monstera. That's a very cool-looking plant. Hmm. I might need one. Think I could get one in without DH killing me?

That hanging basket your purple Tradescantia is in is my fav. kind, big & definitely plenty of holes in the bottom. Good for you for taking the saucer off of it!

Lol. I had a bit of a discussion with my DH when I took off the saucer. He told me that I needed it so water didn't spill all over the place. I told him they were going out on the porch and the water wouldn't hurt anything. Then he said that his mom always used them and she had beautiful plants (and she did). I told him I was an over-waterer and didn't want to kill them. So then he told me they had to go back on before the plants could come inside. I smiled, nodded, and promptly threw away the saucers.

I also have two cast-iron plants that I got in a GW trade in the ground outside that I plan to bring inside before the frost.

Thank you Ashley..and getting killed by the husband is not an option! :)

More pics from the backyard.

This setcreasia has been moved from the front and is still adjusting a bit.

Here's a closer look at the creeping jenny for Purp who seemed to like it. :)

This is as of yet still a mystery ficus,but whatever it is I love it! The roots got that way from being kept in a terrarium while indoors.

Little sheffy here got the same treatment. :)

New leaf on my phil erubescens is making my day. :)

This is "Jeff" a commemorative plant I'd spoken of in another thread.

Neon pothos and syngonium.

And who doesn't like waterlilies? ;)

Oops!
Forgot to dote on my anthurium(aroids are a passion).

My phil brazil seems to enjoy the outdoors quite a bit,but then again most plants do. :)

Thanks for looking gang! :)

Yes, yes, yes, to all of these pics!

"I smiled, nodded, and promptly threw away the saucers." Maybe we are long-lost relations? Wow, this is good stuff.

Auron, I had that same wood-slat plant stand until it finally fell apart in the weather. Cool, and the plants on it! Especially the - is it an orchid? Wow - what a bloom. I love pics of irony, the cacti perched on the diving board are hilarious!! There's a thread in the conversation section of unfortunate adjacency, which would be enriched if this pic was added, IMHO.

Wish we were close enough to trade containers, I love the pink pot! I have some manly dark green, black ones, even some buckets with handles that used to have perfectly testerone-ish ingredients like drywall mud and some stuff used at the chicken ranch.

Asleep, little Scheffy - can you get that rock wedged into the roots more? Maybe get some of the smaller rocks lodged in some of the smaller crevices? If that kind of thing sounds cool to you. I love the roots on that and the Ficus in the pic above it. Architectural interest on a plant, IMO. I've killed plants before thinking that kind of thing should be buried more, but never by planting higher.

What is prettier than a new Philo leaf? Nothing unless it's not your plant and YOUR plant has a new leaf - then yours is prettier. Is the variegated foliage with Xanadu - ficus pumila? That Lysimachia is very pretty and that pic of the pond shows the under-water plants so clearly - how cool!

This discussion got so "long," the page turned purple. Interesting!

Cut this Cordyline (ti plant's) head off and it's responding by making 2, that's cool!

I'll probably hang onto it until someone comes by that wants it. It would be a shame to throw away, I've seen neutral color pots about that size go for quite a lot here....

Yes, it is an orchid. Odontocidium bittersweet 'toffee'. My most recent purchase. I'm dangerous with loose change and I like flowers too much....lol
{{gwi:98132}}

I looked at that thread. A good laugh :)

Asleep,
Love waterlilies! I hope yours will bloom for you :)
I really like your little tree's. Those roots are attractive.

WOW! All of your plants look awesome! I have a good amount of my collection outside for the summer too! I'll share mine tomorrow!

Oh Purp! ...that kind of thing DOES sound cool to me! In fact I've been meaning to find sheffy a better rock to root over but it hasn't jumped out at me yet. The roots on that ficus(and little sheffy's for that matter)are not the result of potting higher so much as aerial roots that found their way back down to the soil and thickened up to what you see now. All it takes is humidity and patience...I use terrariums because it's just as easy as putting them in and forgetting them.

Yep.
That's ficus pumilla alright,..both variegated and the regular green(to the left)as well.

Hard chop on that cordy there...makes me wonder...if you let the new points grow to the point that the main stem is at now and then cut 'em back every bit as hard and did that time after time...just how compact could you get it? =)

That odontocidium is an eyecatcher Auron,..really something else! =)

Here's another angle of the main group.

My God...You folks have the nicest yards. Beautiful, gorgeous plants.
I'm green w/envy. :)

Wish I could take all house plants outside without worrying about ants, earwigs and spiders. And thieves.

Someone, was it Planto who sprayed a plant w/RAid? lol
That takes nerve, girl.
I have Raid for spiders, but rarely spray. Spiders are either vinegar'd or swatted.
Sorry to you spider lovers, but they terrify me.

Purp. I might have asked before. Regarding Aug 9 post. A pic w/Corty and variegated/green and white spotted plant.
Is spotted plant, Dracaena? Croton or none of the above?

Toni

Toni, that's Dracaena surculosa. I don't know which grows slower, that or 'Janet Craig.'

Here are my bromeliads, sago palm and begonias enjoying the summer outdoors. The earth star is a pretty deep pink color since I put it outside. They all have grown so much over the summer.

My starfish cactus, moon cactus, and succulents on my porch along with a jasmine vine cutting, sensitive plants that the kids planted yesterday, and a Boston fern we saved from ikea. They're all responding well and the fern is now showing new growth

Love the broms and others Tamela!
Nice arrangement too...hanging out on the stairs would be a regular passtime for sure. You're making me feel guilty for keeping my cryptanthus indoors because it started out nice and pink like yours but not anymore. maybe I should get them out while there's a little summer left...couldn't hurt.

Here's another shot of the tree area from the backside of the waterfeature. Features my benjamina and my tradescantia spathacea mostly. Both get a lot of sun in that location.

Very nice, Tamela! I love the optimism of taking note of a pot with seeds in it. The green column thing with the bulbous red head is so cute. I'm always tempted to get one of those but they're always so wet, I'm always afraid they're rotting and it's just not apparent yet.

Love the angle of that shot, Asleep, those pretty purple leaf-backs. Little Ficus tree looks great!

I love looking at everyone's yard/plants! When mine go out for the summer, they sort of get stuck everywhere to the point that it's sometimes hard to walk around them! I use a lot of rock to keep the pots from blowing over, however that doesn't protect against the dogs when they think there's a shrew hiding under one of them.

That's awesome! That Canna is really the star of the show, isn't it? But I wonder, what in the world is the bench facing? Looks backwards from this pic.

LOVE the waterlilies! That container i wicked! It looks like the same size as mine but mine has these steps in it to place plants on or something and so your's holds a bunch more water Greybird. Such a nice arrangement. :)

Purple, the bench is actually a swing, and it faces a small fire pit. To the right is a hosta garden, and ahead to the right of the birdbath and under the cypress tree (where nothing is blooming but the lilies) are planted ferns and Spring blooming natives. Grapes growing on the fence!

Asleep, the water garden is a 110 gallon water trough for cattle that I got at the farm store. It used to have a nice little fountain in it, but after our dog took the second one out in the yard and chewed it up, I gave up and now just keep a few small fish in with the water lilies.

Just curious...what kind of fish?

Oh wow, there's definitely a sponge bench-worthy view that direction! The more pics I see of yours, the more I see that our tastes are so similar.

Here's one yard in OH, June of '04, house plants here'n'there. It was just grass when I moved there in June '02.

LOL Purp...

You and Toni and your seinfeld cracks. I love it! :)

Here's a fern that's kinda tucked in the middle of the jumble so it's not so obvious until you lean in and look,if you know what I mean.

Hidden in the back is my "micans" which was once a wonderful mess of vines all wrapped around two tomato cages wired end to end. I put it out a tad too early this spring and the wind obliterated it and stripped it bare. After a hard chop and learning the hard way that these guys are a touch more reluctant to root than others of their ilk,this is what is left in the container. Gave it an old piece of bamboo as a support which it doesn't seem to like that much.

If anyone has any Senecios, you may want to check them for army worms. I've found them munching on 2 kinds! These are NOT going to make a beautiful butterfly. Also time to inspect Coleus and Begonias for little green caterpillars that turn into 'cabbage whites' moths. Another bad boy.

Army worms!
No kidding?
I haven't seen one of those things since childhood. That's wild!

Here's a shot taken earlier tonight...