While doing some Christmas shopping, I found that spring bulbs are on sale... I found all these for 50% off.
Today I planted them in two pots outside, hopefully they will all grow, a couple of the Camassia bulbs seemed a little mushy...
This is the first time I've ever tried to grow Tulips, I've never found them appealing, but the color on this Cairo tulip called out to me, and I think it will look good with the purple and blue of the other bulbs.
Buying seeds can be addicting... and frustrating - when you see seed catalogs from outside the US and find out you can't order from them. so I was excited to find out about importing seeds from other countries. Annie's Annuals posted Secret Seeds as one of their favorite seed catalogs, and as I was perusing their site, I found their instructions on how to import seeds to the US - whoo-hoo! http://www.secretseeds.com/USA_seed_imports.htm
So today, driving down along highway 680, I passed two different fields of Mustard in full bloom. I don't think I've ever seen that in December... I wonder if they will re-bloom in February/March when they are supposed to?
This one is doing very well...The yarrow is doing very well, in fact I'm worried about it invading the entire barrel. The California Fuchsia that I added in this year seems to be doing well, the Euphorbia is happy, and the monkey flower is doing well but not taking over - I'll have to watch it next year though to make sure it doesn't take over. The Echinecea I transplanted in has died back, but I'm holding out hope that it will return next spring.
Sweet Peas are doing well... Two of the Morning Glories are still growing, the other appear to have been eaten by something.
So wine barrel #1 is doing pretty well, the Bat- Faced Cuphea is still blooming, and the blue-eyed grass is starting to come back, the Euphorbia looks good though the blooms are dead and need to be cleared out, the Sticky monkey flower is done blooming, but looks good, and the Delphinium looks like it's hanging on enough to come back next year.Today I saw something interesting, I haven't seen bees around for a while, but today there was one hanging around the sticky monkey flower, that is not in bloom...I wonder if the sticky pat of the leaves is actually food for the bees when it's off bloom time? I haven't been able to find any info on that, but this little bee was really buzzing all over that plant. - and didn't touch the Bat-Faced Cuphea.
Some of the seeds are doing pretty good. Others not so much...
A while back (maybe two weeks) I planted some seeds in wine barrel #2 I planted Morning glory, CA poppy, and two others I can't remember now... and promptly forgot about them.Today I noticed that all five of the morning glories have popped up out of the soil... this is already better than my attempt at planting them in the spring ( I think only two or three came up out of 6 planted and then two of those were promptly eaten by grasshoppers). I saw some other seedling coming up out of the soil, but it's hard to tell if they are seeds I planted or the seedling that come up everywhere around our house from bird droppings (a shrub of some sort - i'm growing a couple of them to see what they are but it's going to take a while to find out).
Some of the seeds are starting to come up! The bad thing about these Jiffy 7 seed trays is that they don't leave enough room for the seedlings - there is only about a 1/2" between the top of the pots and the plastic top. Maybe the trick is to put all the same kind of seed in one tray so they all come up at the same time and then you can just take the lid off once they come up, but what home gardener needs that many of the same plant?
One of them came up and then promptly died - the CA Bluebells
All they left was a short little stump. Hopefully it will come back next year.
My mom bought me a couple of the jiffy seed starting trays that she saw on sale somewhere or another, and I'm super-glad she did because the jiffy seed starter trays that I had were intended to hold the jiffy 5 peat pots, and I had two packages of jiffy 7 refills (which don't fit nicely in the 5 trays); these new trays she got however, are for the jiffy 7 peat pots...Yay! So I decided to try to start from seed some of the plants that should be started in fall in CA.
I have never had any luck with growing anything from seed. But I've learned a few tips and tricks so I keep trying...Tip #1 tamp the soil down after planting the seeds, so there is good soil/seed contact (Thank you Annie of Annies Annuals for that tip). Also, this is the part I usually screw up on, but you need to prevent the seedlings from dying of rot (damping off) where the seedling is too moist next to the soil. I have yet to figure out the secret to this. I am putting these seed trays next to a south facing widow with partially open vertical blinds. 
Here's a list - Seed tray 1:
Transplants to California from other areas of the country often have a hard time with the lack of rain and green in the summer, and use up all of our drinking water so they can pretend that they are still living in another place. To them I say enjoy your green winters...
I went on a trip last week, and it rained the day I left. When I returned, I found wine barrel #2 had not drained and had sitting water about an inch over the soil line ( the drainage holes I poked into it last year were only with a large nail, so the wood probably swelled up enough to seal those holes up). The plants in that wine barrel looked like they were pretty much dead. I got a drill out and drilled some holes near the bottom of the barrel, and the water drained, but I think it's too late for most everything in the planter they were sitting in water for five days. The Sage may survive, it still has some living bits, but the monkey flower is long gone, as well as the pansy, and tobacco (though the last two were annuals any way so no big loss).
Three of the branches survived, but about 6 snapped off...I put the branches in a container with water in the hopes that they would spring some roots, but a couples days in, most of the branches were wilting. One of them didn't look bad, so I left it in the container with water, and took one and cut it up to try rooting it in dirt. 
I also saw Sticky Monkey Flower, and a large blue flower that I need to find out the name of...
This plant died back a bit over the winter, it seems like it took forever for it to grow back and re-bloom, but here it goes!
Now is the time that the spring bulbs are starting to go on sale. I bought some Watsonia, and was happy to find a dwarf rock tulip called little princess, which looks very much like a flower I was lusting after in my neighbors yard last spring. I got all these from Orchard Nursery in Lafayette, CA
This may be the first time that I've bought spring bulbs as soon as they came out in the nurseries, but this year, the bins for the bulbs included little plant info tags. I was very happy to see these as I usually forget what bulbs I bought by the time I get them home.
I bought a six pack of this bi-colored lantana last summer when I put together a couple of pots for the windowsills in the front yard. Over the winter they died back almost completely.
They have slowly been growing all season, and have finally started to bloom again, and I've decided to add them to the collection in the front yard to try to attract some hummingbirds or butterflies. (the purple flowered plant behind the black pot is a salvia greggi) . 
I bought two of these plants last year at Annies Annuals because of it's promise of interesting teal flowers. I planted them in pots and put them in the front yard. One was in more sun than the other, and it's growth was stunted, so I moved it to the same spot the other was. This year, the one that was not stunted shot up a flower spike, and today that flower spike started blooming.
I'm assuming that the flowers will darken over time into the teal color they are supposed to be, because this one that opened today is a lime green.
The Puya Alpestris is a species of bromeliad native to Chilean Andes and grown as an ornamental plant with unusual teal flowers
Here the info on the plant from annies http://www.anniesannuals.com/plants/plant_display.asp?prodid=1956&account=none
So, my attempts in the front yard have been to attract hummingbirds and butterflies to my house using native CA plant species in three large wine barrels. The plants have been in for two summers and I have only seen on hummingbird visit, and that was last summer.
In a desperate attempt to attract anything to my garden, I went out and purchased some salvias, nicotiana, and verbena, all in bright red tubular forms (the favorites of hummingbirds). to get them to take a look.
I got the verbena and nicotiana from Home Depot, and the two salvias from Tassajara Nursury in Danville.
I've had this rose in a pot for a number if years, A couple years ago it died back to just one branch, but it has come back strong this year after I got rid of all the rootstock shoots. This rose does not have a strong scent, but the coloring is goergeous, and it changes over the life of the bloom depending on how much sun it gets. You can see the right side of this bloom gets more sun, so is more pink.
So I'm declaring my Veggie Garden a Fail for this year, The only thing I have harvested from the garden is some super tiny cherry tomatos, everything else has either died or failed to produce, and everything is stunted in it's growth. those sunflowers? they are supposed to be 10 feet tall. The corn is only a foot tall, and the artichocke only has the same 3 leaves on it as it had when I bought it. Clearly the cheap soil I bought did not have the nutrients I needed for a lush veggie garden. and the fertilizer I used was not cutting it.
I have two butterfly bushes - one buddlejaceae davidii, and one variety called 'black knight' that I got from a garden tour last summer - this is the one that is shown below. These are also supposed to be big butterfly attracters, but again, I'm not seeing that any butterflies have figured out that they are here.
There hasn't been much going on the last couple of days.
The rose in the front yard is blooming. Also pictured - wine barrels # 1, #2 and #3.
