Morning beauty

This morning I woke to this beautiful sight. This orchid was given to me by a friend in the winter of 2009/10. It had been given to her by another friend of hers who was moving and couldn't keep it. My friend was going to Florida for the winter - lots of Canadians go south for the winter  as you no doubt know. She couldn't keep the plant either.

So I was the happy beneficiary of a plant that looked - well frankly sort of dead. There were three or four leaves, that was all. I set it on a cool north windowsill and gave a bit of water every week, and I do mean a bit. And sort of forgot about it.

After about two months, sometime in either late December or January I was completely surprised to see a tiny stem.

It grew and bent towards the window, I kept turning it so it would sort of grow straight...I have to tell you I have never had an orchid plant... so I was going by the seat of my pants. Eventually I had two stems - archng towards the light with 36 blossoms in total over a three or four month period.

I fell in love with these flowers. I bought three little guys at the grocery store, a yellow, a burgundy and a green. They bloomed - but three or four blossoms each. I put all of them, when the buds started to swell, into a west window, but back from the window so it doesn't get much direct sun except late in the day and then only for about an hour. These orchids are called Phalaenopsis. There are many different exotic and truly amazing species.

This year, same treatment, two arching stems each with branches and now I have 46 buds including two that started to open yesterday. I kept glancing at them every hour or so and watched as they slowly unfurled their beautiful petals. This morning the two were fully open. I'd forgotten their delicate colour... actually it's much richer than in this picture - I had to use a flash - but WOW. To think I'll have 46 beautiful blooms.

Talk about spectacular-in a small corner of my home - I have this beautiful plant. Pretty amazing gift from Mother Nature - don't you think? And just in time for Valentine's day. Hope you get something special for Valentine's Day too!