Hibiscus Sugar Tip .. One Sweet Shrub!

I've always been dotty about variegated foliage. Combine splashed leaves with a flower that's so alluring and it's difficult to imagine one lovelier. I'm over the moon about this stand-out shrub in Alice's Garden.

Hibiscus 'Sugar Tip' offers a delicate white tracery on its leaves, while the petite blooms with their colorful centers are sweet additions to flower arrangements. The double frilly flowers are subtle, about 1 and 1/2 inches wide with an eye-catching vermillion center.

 It's won me over completely.

And I'm not known for selecting pale pink flowers.

This ProvenWinners Color Choice Shrub arrived as a trial plant, and remained a beloved summer bloomer in my California garden.

Revisiting the Blue Poppy

Among the most magical of plants,

the Himalayan Blue Poppy (Meconopsis) is quite the mythic character within our community of avid gardeners.

At one time it could be found growing to perfection in the Pacific Northwest

at the Berry Botanic Garden, which sadly now, has shuttered its gates.

It was in this setting of rare flora that I first came upon a vigorous stand of blue poppies
intermingled with blooms of pink, peach, and red!

An unforgettable sight.

Be that as it may, I'm currently enjoying a very wet San Francisco Bay Area winter,
where Napa & Sonoma Wine Country always beckons.
Especially when the sun decides to peep through the clouds.

Paris in the Fall ...

These delectable cheeses featured in a picnic lunch last Fall, while traveling through the South of France: 

purchased at a market in the delightful town of Uzès, in this instance.

But the fact is, I'm mired in the technical so-called 'back-end' of the blog today.

While I would love to do nothing more than reflect on the magnificent sights, sounds and flavors experienced in Paris & Provence last September ... Case in point, this terrific potager in the charming wine village of Tavel,

I'm engaged instead in a frustrating battle with an advertisement that I have been unable to remove from my posts here.

I would much prefer to recall the jaw-dropping beauty of Gordes, 

and the wonderful Sunday in Paris, when I strolled along the elevated gardens of the 'Promenade Plantee' - where a staircase right outside the door of my Air B&B allowed access.

C'est la vie!