Count Your Blessings!

With love and passion, everyone can have a nice garden...Elaine Yim

Count Your Blessings!
Count The Garden By The Flowers, Never By The Leaves That Fall.
Count Your Life With Smiles And Not The Tears That Roll.
..... Author unknown.

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Tuesday, February 18, 2014

My Feb 2014 DIY Garden in Malaysia and My First Million Page Views



FINALLY! I have reached my 1 millionth page views. Nothing to shout about. Many have done that and been there but for me, this is my "first", hehe. It was a lot of hard work since the day I started blogging back in Jun 2009. It's going to be 5 years of garden blogging soon. I guess this is a passion which has not died down despite the many ups and downs that I have experienced and sometimes I was so close to calling it quits. But then again, I guess I am "Once a gardener, always a gardener", like the famous quote:

"The love of gardening is a seed
once sown that never dies" 

..... Gertrude Jeykll

What have I done to my garden?
Well, I'm a DIY gardener who love native plants of Malaysia and Southeast Asia. This year my interest and challenge is in "Frugal Gardening" . In my country, prices of so many things has shot up, so I'm going to learn to make do with what I have and tone down on my spending. There are quite a number of plants given by my gardener friends in the form of cuttings, rootings and seeds from plant exchanges and meet-ups, so I am actually quite satisfied with what I have now. I'm going to improve on my plant propagation skills. I'd also be looking at growing plants from kitchen discards.

I plant gingers like torch ginger, galangal, turmeric and common ginger plants and treat them like ornamental plants. I grow pineapple plants from the crown of store bought fruits. I also plant herbs like cat whiskers (Orthosiphon aristatus), lemon balm, pegaga (Centella asiatica), hempedu bumi (Andrographis paniculata). They grow like weeds in my garden but these weeds are edible and have medicinal values. Native plants are low maintenance plants, perfectly suited to my busy schedule.

The ixora plants attracts butterflies to my garden while my favourite little sunbirds love the common Hibiscus rosa-sinensis (bunga raya). If their young are born on my citrus plants, I'll give them a home, raise them and release them as the lovely butterflies that they are meant to be. Moth love to perge on my bamboo tree. Frogs, toads, spiders, lizards and dragon flies help me take care of the dreaded mozzies. Flies and ants? Well, they gotta be careful of my carnivorous Monkey Cup (nepenthes) plant.  Tailor birds can sew a nest with only 2 hydrangea leaves while other birds build their nests on my Lipstick palm trees (Crytostachys renda) the whole year round. Besides the usual sparrows, mynas and sunbirds, magpies also come here to 'play' in my garden. So, can you imagine how nice it feels to wake up to the sound of birds twitting, chirping and singing?




My cattleya orchid last bloomed in December 2011. There were no flowers for 2 years from 2012 and 2013. So it was a pleasant surprise for me when there it bloomed during Chinese New Year from Jan 31st 2014 (first day) to Feb 8th (9th day). There were only 2 flowers but how wonderful!

“My Feb 2014 DIY Garden in Malaysia and My First Million Page Views, a copyrighted post, was written for My Nice Garden blog by Autumn Belle @ http://www.mynicegarden.com/ on February 18th, 2014.




Does this flower look like Mickey Mouse?

It was planted from seed collected from a roadside plant in January 2011. It bloomed for the first time in July 2013 but there were no seeds. This time, it bloomed again in January 2014 and now I have seeds.

To my fellow gardener bloggers and blog visitors, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!


21 comments:

  1. One million page views is quite an achievement I think. Congratulations. I have a long way to go before I'm anywhere near that. I enjoy seeing the plants from your garden and the special events and garden shows that you share with us.

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  2. Wow, that's wonderful. Congratulations. I'm a regular reader and sometimes commenter who just loves your blog posts and I understand why so many people are viewing your posts. Keep up the great work ... both in your garden and on your blog.

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  3. Congratulations again Ms Belle! You deserved a hug from me ;)
    I've learnt a lot from you and your experience so please keep on blogging :)
    Well done! I don't think I will get this many page views on my 5th year of blogging...LOL!

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  4. Wow ~ I think a million page views is quite impressive. I have a LONG way to go to get that.

    It is always a treat to see what you have growing there in your gardens.

    Your posts are informative and you have wonderful photos, so it's no wonder you have so many people visiting you.

    Happy Blogging ~ FlowerLady

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  5. Lovely blooms. So nice for those of you that can do Orchids in your gardens.
    Cher Sunray Gardens

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  6. Congrats, Autumn Belle! Much deserved. I'm terribly happy and excited for you! Love reading your well-expressed and informative blog posts whenever I've the opportunity.
    This current post is awesome… right from within the heart of a great gardener and nature lover… I love it! ;)

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  7. Congratulations once again, Autumn Belle - looking forward to reading more of your posts ^.^

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  8. Congratulations, Autumn Belle. I always enjoy your posts. It is so interesting to see what you are growing on the other side of the globe in a different climate from mine.

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  9. Congratualtion! You have very interesting blog!

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  10. Congratulation! This is a great milestone for your blog. I've always enjoyed your posts. May there be more posts to come.

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  11. Congratulations... well done!

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  12. A million views is huge, Autumn Belle! Congratulations!!

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  13. That is huge 1 million page views. It will be quite a while before I even get to 100,000. I too am working on planting natives and being a frugal gardener especially since retiring.

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  14. Congratulations! That is quite an accomplishment. The blooms are very lovely.

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  15. Hi Autumn Belle,
    Congratulations on your million page views! It is a great achievement!
    Have not stopped by for quite sometime now. I have been slacking in my garden front and did not do much, excuses are the hot weather and pure lazinbess!
    You have a lovely garden and clearly the passion in gardening reflects in your blog posts.
    The last pic does look like a mickey mouse! Cute flower!

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  16. Congrats! I enjoy reading your blog :)

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  17. Congrats on your accomplishment!
    I don't know why but the last pic reminds me of the clown fish, Nemo... :D

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  18. Hello,
    I love gardening! I am Peruvian living in Putrajaya for almost 2 years. I am having great fun taking care of my garden, it is amazing how fast plants grow in Asia, love it!
    Last year I found a good Nursery close to Cybajaya, unfortunately it is out of business. Can you please recommend me a good Nursery close to Putrajaya, with a nice selection of plants, pots, soil and fare prices? I really need to buy big pots and good soil ASAP. I am really excited about Floria 2014, it looks like is going to be amazing this year!
    Thank you very much for your help.

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  19. Fiorella, Welcome and Selamat Datang to Malaysia! I'm sorry I'm not aware of any good nurseries in Putrajaya. Putrajaya 2014 is a great place to look for bargains. They sell fertilizer in bulk and you can look our for promotions of all sorts of items.

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  20. Hello there. I find your blog post very interesting. I am also from Malaysia, a place called Miri in Sarawak. My mum is an avid orchid lover and have been planting orchids in our backyard ever since I was little. Lately, the weather in Malaysia is very humid and dry and it has taken a toll on my mother's beloved orchids. I will try to be more hardworking to help my mother water the orchids everyday. Haha. I agree with you with the price of most thing suddenly shooting up. Luckily, my mum also was given orchids in the forms of cuttings and rootings by her friends and also my grandmother to plant so she doesnt have to spend so much to buy new orchid plants. She mostly just buys the pots and charcoals to plant them in. She currently hangs the orchid pots on the branches of my rambutan and mango tree in my backyard. Thank you once again for the information on this blog. Great pictures and you have one of the most beautiful orchids I have ever seen! Congratulations on the one million page views! (:

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    Replies
    1. Hi, Jasmine, thank you very much for your words of encouragement. So good to know about your gardening experience with your beloved mom. What cherished memories it shall be and it will be remembered fondly in the years to come :)

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