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.

Knowing me, Knowing you..... Aha.....!

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Malaysian Flora USDA Zone 11
Welcome to our exotic world of everlasting summers and tropical rainforests!

Friday, March 26, 2010

Blooming Friday in My Nice Garden


What's blooming in my garden today is my Adenium obesum (Desert Rose) in shocking pink. I'm glad it coincides with Blooming Friday's theme today of "Perfect Pink Pouts".


This the Lagerstroemia speciosa tree in front of my house. It's common name is Pokok Bungor Raya (Malay), Banaba (Philippines), Pride of India, Queen's Crape-myrtle.

It was planted by the housing developer. I took good care of it. It has been blooming intermittently for a few years already. This year, the buds started to form in early February just as I was welcoming Lichun Day and by early March it was blooming profusely. I just love the lavender purple flowers which has 7 petals each. One by one, the flowers will drop to the ground like money falling from the sky. This is because whenever it blooms, good luck comes to me. On the tarmac road, they look like purple cherry blossoms. These flowers attract bumble bees, butterflies and I see birds on its branches too.

Can you see the fruit on my ixora plant? These berry like fruits turn from green to dark purple but they are not edible.

Helen (islandgal246) of My Rustic Bajan Garden once told me in a comment that the best time to photography butterflies is in the early morning. That's the time when some of them has just emerged from their chrysalis and would need to dry themselves just before their maiden flights. And yes, that was how I found this butterfly on my champacca tree, lying quite still on the leaf. It was long enough for me to take a few close-up shots.

Do you still remember my pineapple plant that bloomed in February? Well, after the Chinese New Year season was over, I harvested the small, little fruit and this is what I get. Three slices of sweet, juicy pineapples.

I caught this spider crawling around my window pane. It looks like those spiders that the boys like to catch and bring to school for a game of spider fighting during my younger days.

While watering my plants, I stumbled upon this nest on my flower bed. It looked like it has just fallen from my palm tree above. So, I took out the nest from the bushes and peered inside.

Look what I found! There are 5 little birdies, huddled together in the nest. So, I called out for My Dear's assistance. We took a tall ladder and put the nest back to the palm branch, using a rafia string to tie around its nest to make sure that it will not fall again. We also made sure that its position was at a height that was difficult for the cat to reach. That night, I prayed that it will not rain heavily as I was not very sure whether we had place the nest correctly. Well, it rained heavily that night and I was very worried. The next morning, to my utter joy, I heard the sound of birds chirping happily. Now, I can hear this sound whenever mummy bird comes back with food for the babies. Mummy looks like a little black sunbird. Now I feel so relieved that I had successfully rescued my little friends.


Here's another little friend on my Jasminum sambac. To this little guy, the flower look huge. I wonder what he wants to do.

I would like to dedicate this post to my first commenter, Ms Lona, from Ohio, USA of Hocking Hill's Garden blog. She is posting lovely anthuriums and daffodils with a nice poem.

My grateful thanks to Katarina at Roses and Stuff for hosting Blooming Friday. To see what others have posted or to participate, click here.

This is also my entry for Fertilizer Friday. My grateful thanks to Tootsie at Tootsie Time for hosting Fertilizer Friday. To see what others have posted or to participate, visit here.

38 comments:

  1. OOOh Autumn Belle, those little birdies are forever grateful to you for saving them. That pineapple has my mouth watering. I am glad that you were able to capture the swallow tail butterfly. Have a wonderful weekend!

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  2. Oh what awesome photographs!! Lucky little birdies, thanks for sharing!

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  3. Autumn Belle:

    With your good heart to the birdies, and Lagerstroemia speciosa blossoms, good luck sure will come to you!!! Those birdies are so lucky to have you!

    I also have desert rose in my garden, not as deep pink as yours, it is light pink with deep pink edge, and the center has a little yellow. Yours is very pretty. I LOVE desert rose!

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  4. Nice blooms, yummy pineapple and so glad on the good report of the baby birds!!

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  5. Aww, those sweet little birds! Have you noticed the mama bird come back yet?? So sweet!

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  6. Wonderful post! So much to be thankful for! Except for the spider maybe... a bit creepy to me. Your butterfly photo is beautiful and your pineapple looks so delicious! I love your finding the nest and saving the babies!! Delightful photos and blooms as well!

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  7. Oh, I am glad the little birds were saved successfully by you!

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  8. ahhh that was a great save there Autumn Belle. You have some really beautiful flowers in your garden. We grow Ixora as a houseplant and its not really all that popular so I was shocked to see that it produces fruit.


    I used to grow the desert rose - its another one of those plants you have to be careful of with its sap.

    Now that I have finished for the weekend I must get my post for Blooming Friday done - I've got just the thing for a pink theme!

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  9. I am so glad you spotted the bird nest and put it back up before something got them.
    Oh, the butterfly is beautiful and so is the Desert Rose. You have some wonderful shrubs and plants in your gardens.
    Have a wonderful weekend!
    Lona

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  10. Absolutely wonderful post. I envy your photography skills!

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  11. hating the spider...loving the butterfly and am overwhelmed that you saved those babies!!! what a wonderful post today! thank you for linking in to share this with us!
    spring in your garden is beautiful!

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  12. aloha autumn

    i can just smell some of those wonderful blooms in your garden...amazing

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  13. Oh those poor baby birdies!, so glad you were there to help them!And the pineapple looks sooo good!
    I am over the moon with the tree with the lavender blooms!! gorgeous!! I am partial to lavender, but that is beautiful, I would love to have something like that in MY garden.... sigh.. lol
    Beautiful! Great post! Blessings to you

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  14. You really have a wonderful garden. I am a bit jealous of your pineapple. It looks really fresh. Keep up the great work.

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  15. I want to take a bit out of that pineapple. The desert rose is exquisite. Fantastic photos and a beautiful garden

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  16. Thanks goodness you saved those birds. I am sure they are all very happy to be resting in that warmth nest. Btw, your pink desert rose flowers are very pretty. Enjoy the blooms!

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  17. A delightful post Autumn. Those baby birds are so lucky their home was in your garden, when it fell out of the tree.

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  18. wow, so many things to see today! First those birdies - I'm sooo glad they made it - and how wonderful that you were able to save them. You always hear that once humans get involved, the mother birds don't come back - that's my biggest fear, but that's great that they're doing well!

    That pineapple ended up being beautiful!!! Hope it tasted just as good!

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  19. oh yeah, and good tip about looking for butterflies in the morning. Maybe this would be a good time for me to observe b/4 they start flitting around and freaking me out.

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  20. Heisann!

    Just wonderful.
    Wish you a happy Easter!

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  21. So glad you looked inside that nest and managed to put it back! Such a happy ending!

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  22. What an exciting post! Lovely flowers, something good to eat from your garden and baby rescue. All in a day's work in the garden.

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  23. Great pictures and interesting information! Thanks for sharing with us.

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  24. Autumn Belle, I've never seen Adenium Obesum before; thank you for introducing me to such a beautiful flower. -Jean

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  25. Autumn Belle,
    Lucky little birdies :) Thanks goodness that you spotted the dropped nest and saved the birdies. Very interesting post ;)

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  26. Shocking pink oh lovely and my fav pineapple hm drooling. So in nature we do have structural defects of nest tumbling down either bad engineering due to insufficient experience of a new papa bird or the wind was too strong. Lucky the 5 little ones were not hurt and even luckier you spotted them early else the cats would have a sumptuous meal. Nice to hear the chirping of birds especially in the early mornings. tQ

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  27. Beautiful flowers in your garden and a lifesaver to birds all in one post. Seriously, I am so glad that you were able to save little birds as their mother must also be :-)

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  28. Safe and sound and waiting to fly away when ready. great to hear the chirps - thanks for the rescue:)

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  29. Beautiful photos AB! I want you to bring a little few of those flowers my way...here in Yellowstone Country!

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  30. That purple flowers are blooming over here too. Due to the rainy days after prolonged sunny days, some of the mempat and Trumpet tree are mass blooming.

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  31. Glad to note that you have rescued those little babies. They will surely die if you haven't helped them.
    And if the tree is out of reach - they its all up to you to nurse & care for them until they grow up.

    Truly they are such a cute and adorable things.

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  32. Dear Autumn Belle, What a happy, happy post! Love the crepe myrtle! So glad you rescued the baby birds.

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  33. beautiful blooms and lovely creatures.. you have such nice guests

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  34. I laughed at that saving episode. It is good the mother still cared for them again, most of the time when humans interfered with the nestlings they just leave. They are fortunate you did not touch them, only the outside of the nest. It happens also in our property in the province, in fact i have some nice photos of them in the old posts.

    BTW, last week during the graduation of my nephew i also had fotos of those Banaba in bloom at the school premises. They are so beautiful. We also have the big tree species, whose flowers are different from that one, though the color is the same. That swallowtail butterfly, we have lots in our garden too. I miss your posts Autumn Bell. Maybe when i post again nobody will be viewing them again, as i took a detour for awhile.

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  35. So glad to read about you saving those little birds. What a kind person you are!!

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  36. aloha autumn belle,

    what a beautiful post, your photos of all your tropicals amazing, i love your desert rose especially.

    Thanks for sharing your flowers today!

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  37. Hi, I found your blog while I was finding some gardening tips online.I'm impressed with all your pretty flowers & efforts you put in your garden.
    I would like to get your advise on planting the desert rose though. I have 2 desert rose plants with big roots at the bottom. I'm not sure when and how its root becomes soft. While touching on it, I can feel there are like bags filling with waters. Do you think they still can be rescued? Please help!Thanks!

    Mei Leng from Penang, Malaysia
    pml81@hotmail.com

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  38. Hi, Mei Leng, Welcome to My Nice Garden. I am very delighted to know that you read my post. Thank you very much for the encouraging words.

    About your Adenium plant, first check the soil condition. Make sure that the soil is not too wet and water-logged. Overwatering will kill the desert rose plant. You may need to repot the plant with soil that has good drainage.

    Do check out this link:
    http://mysunnyhappygarden.blogspot.com/2010/07/adenium-given-haircut.html

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