If you ask Cath how she grows such great orchids, she’ll answer “Oh, I just water them. Otherwise, it’s tough love. They go outside in the summer, come back in for the winter, and are never fed orchid food”.

I know others can find her answer frustrating. Many people receive orchids in bloom as gifts, but the plants never rebloom. They’re sort of “one and done”, if you get my drift.

After years of living with Cathy and her orchids, I’ve grown to love them. Maybe not as much as she does, but I enjoy it when they bloom in the winter. The plants themselves aren’t all that much to look at, but oh, the flowers. Whether looking at the numerous budscapes, and seeing the blooms as a rush or color,

or viewing just a couple of flowers and taking in their amazing detail, I find them fascinating.

I love to look at and consider just one individual flower. They are intimate in their own way. The color, the texture, the patterns, the beauty of the flower and all of it’s individual parts – Sepals, Petals, Lip, and Column, make each orchid unique.

Looking closer, there is a sensual feeling to the view. I can become lost in thought, as I contemplate them and their allure.

It’s a nice way to spend a few moments.

I’m not an orchid expert, a flower expert, or even much of a grower of green things, but I do appreciate beauty. In monochromatic wintertime, I love the bursts of color these orchids provide…

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Addendum:

– Watching Cathy raise orchids for several years, I can add two other “tricks” she uses. First, she only rarely changes the pots they are in – orchid roots evidently like confined spaces, with not a lot of extra dirt. So, at our home, even as the plants grow bigger and bigger outside the pot, they stay in the same planter. Her second trick? In the winter time, the orchids are always in our large east-facing windows – they receive wonderful morning sun, but none in the afternoon.

– Cath comes by her growing and gardening skills honestly. Both she and her sister Bonnie inherited their mom Faye’s green thumb. And Faye? She inherited it from her mom – Juda Catherine Strickland. Grandma Strickland always had beautiful plants and flowers at her home in Alabama. Always.