While we were on our fabulous holiday in Casteldeffels near Barcelona I was very impressed with the bougainvillea that flourished with abandon everywhere. There were bushes of this magenta beauty growing magnificently all around the pool at our apartment block (yes it was a FABULOUS! holiday 🙂 I was a little green with envy as we had bought a bougainvillea in Johnstown Garden Centre during our spring into our very late Spring. We planted it in a planter in the sunniest spot in our garden (I can currently see it’s reflection in the screen) at the corner of the office. And it promptly withered, wilted and generally looked sickly and sad. This was the second plant we had put in this spot and it had never taken off either so we chalked it up to even more experience and went off on our aforementioned holiday.
While we were away Ireland experience a heatwave, the like of which had not been experienced since 2006. I remember the Big Heat of ’06 as I was also big with child and it was most uncomfortable. We were expecting disaster on our return but thanks to my brother the plants nearest the house were very well watered. I forgot to mention our vegetable patch to him but everything was in great nick. And the bougainvillea was MAJESTIC! It hadn’t been watered for 2 weeks and it was fabulous. So much of gardening is a fluke for us. I do the odd bit of research but become flummoxed easily when I come across a term or practice that I am unfamiliar with. I go with the logic that if the weeds can grow that well most other things with a little care can do it. If Stone Age Man became agrarian surely I can too? (And thus she demonstrates her ignorance of history too – BAM!)
The other day as I attempted to encourage the bougainvillea up the trellis I accidentally snapped a piece off. As I don’t own any bud vases (I know – unbelievable) I decided this was a perfect opportunity to try out this project I had found on Pinterest. (In a side note check out Pintrosity who inspired this post and many of my Pinterest projects.) I had also been dying to try out the Mod Podge that I had picked up while in New York at Easter. However as I had bought it in a paper shop I accidentally bought Paper ModPodge. From my reading though I got the impression that this ModPodge was formulated to work better with paper to avoid yellowing as it aged but works exactly the same way in all other manners. Nipper 1.0 decided to give it a go too. We found the glue often dried before we managed to wrap the yarn over it. This was particularly frustrating for him and so he didn’t complete his cool looking bottle. You can see my finished jar in situ below.
