Flowers in the rainy season...

We are in the midst of the rainy season...
Incidentally, Typhoon Number 4 is currently scraping over the Japanese archipelago as I blog, bringing with it much rain and strong winds...
Luckily, our place is not along its path...



And yes, rainy season in Japan is the season to enjoy the blooms of Ajisai (hydrangea)...
The first specimen was given to us by a neighbor the other day...

I actually prefer the other type of ajisai that the Japanese folks call gaku-ajisai (gaku = frame, as in picture frame)...

Apparently, the real flowers are those dotty little things in the middle area...

Rather intriguing, don't you think?

My sweeto haato takes care of mainly herbs and flowers (while I do vegetables and fruits)...

Here, I was privileged to capture one of her creations (of roses and English lavender)...

Some years ago, I tried sowing some edible chrysanthemum seeds...
Thereafter, they self-seed and I really do not have to do much except harvesting them...

They are an excellent vegetable to eat...

And after the eating is done, they provide plentiful flowers that are so pretty...

And once again, I was delighted to be able to capture yet another arrangement made by my missus...

China root berries, strawberries, pineapple sage, etc...

There has been just so much rain this year...

Not to say that I am complaining... 

It is just marvelous for the plants, in fact...

This is a picture of the berries of a climber plant called 'China root'...

They grow wildly in our property... 

The young shoots can be eaten as a vegetable (pictures next spring?)... 

Some folks use the berries to make wine but apparently they do not taste good... 

For the time being, we just plan to enjoy their beauty...

I bought two types of raspberry plants from the store some years ago... 

And they do give very good fruits...

Only thing I really have to do is to fertilize them more...

I had thought that this specie fruits only in spring but we found it fruiting this season...

Hmmm, lovely, of course... 

We had taken the liberty to name this beauty 'Princess Pink'... 

My suweeto haato found it growing semi-wild in the hills...

We took back some cuttings and this beauty of a rose has been thriving very well in our potager...

This white chrysanthemum is also grown by my missus... 

As with the above mentioned rose, this cutie has adapted very well to our environment...  

And finally, the pineapple sage... 

Apparently, the name comes from the pineapple-like fragrance that the flowers leaves emit when crushed... 

Wonderful autumn days...

It is days like these that I wish would last forever...

The temperature throughout the weekend was a pleasant mid-twenties...

No rain, no wind... heavenly it was...

And the moon at night... wooh,  so bright and lovely...

Spent the weekend doing a wide range of activities in the garden...

Last year, raccoons came by to rob us of our sweet potatoes...

Luckily this year, there was still no sign of them coming...

Anyway, harvested some of the sweet potatoes in our potager...

We had four types: Anno (left), which has orange flesh and is really delicious... Naruto Kintoki (right top), which is the main type sold in the stores around here... and Murasaki imo (right bottom) which literally means purple sweet potatoes... have yet to harvest the fourth type, Beni-azuma...

Read about the rose hips in Tanya's Lovely Greens blog...

Then asked my missus to harvest the rose hips from the wild roses in our property...

The hips are tiny, less than one centimeter or so...

They taste sourish and we shall be having them as tea, eventually...

Tried growing some hyacinth beans this year...

They have flowers that resemble those of wisterias...  

Apparently, they make good curries...

Will certainly request my missus to give it a shot...

Lantanas have taken a liking to our garden...

My missus bought only one pot some years ago but it seems that they since self seeded...

We can find them in numerous places in our garden...

Strawberries... the 'tamed' and the wild...

Am very happy with the strawberries...
We get to harvest only a few fruits per day...
Good enough as an additional topping to the yoghurt for breakfast...

The rue is a member of the citrus family...
The Italians apparently use it to flavor a liqueur...
The smell of the rue is supposed to repel (stray) cats...
But not so for the cats in our neighborhood...  

Last year, I enjoyed harvesting some wild strawberries in the nearby hills...
Think they are called Japanese wineberries...
Brought back some canes to plant in our potager...
And woah, they grow like crazy...
And their fruits... ooh, so lovely...
Almost no maintanence at all...
In fact, I need to weed them out of the walkpaths as they grow so fast...

 
Another 'big' harvest of the strawberries from the potager...

Our Rosa banksiae is flowering very profusely...
Thought it was not a rose, but it actually is part of the family...
I like it because of its immense volume of flowers...

My missus picked this up from the hills in one of her walks...
The wisteria is all over the hills this time of the year...
I think they make very beautiful flowers...

We grow a vegetable... the edible chrysanthemum...
It is very good with soup dishes especially in the winter...
After we are done eating their leaves, it is time to sit back and enjoy their flowers...
Looks a bit like hard boiled eggs... no?

There was no label for this rose when my missus bought it from the store...
This particular specie emits a really sweet, classic rosy scent...
And, unlike the other species, this one makes a lovely preserve...
Hence, 'Sweet Pink'...

Japanese plum flowers, winter roses

Autumn Belle asked about the plum flowers...
We have two white plum trees, and one red...
The whites are flowering now... 

One of the them gives us good fruits every year...

And wine is what we make them out to be...

As a starter for many a dinner time, it is plum wine... 

My partner Y is into flowers...
Roses are one of her favorites
This so-called 'King Rose' keeps us company throughout the winter...

We saw this cutie growing amongst the pathwalk bushes in one of our walks in the hills...
We took a branch and my partner managed to propogate it successfully...

I'd like to name this pretty one 'Princess Pink'...

It's flowers are about just 2 centimeters across...

And it flowers almost throughout the year...
Being from the hills, this little plant is very hardy...
The petals somewhat remind me of mickey mouse, no?

Tiger lily... pink rose...

We put on the kerosene stove to keep us warm in winters...
On top of the stove, we sometimes put a pot there...
From the pot, we cook soup, boil water, and at times, red beans...
With the red bean soup, we put in the bulb of the tiger lily...
My missus bought them from the neighborhood market...
The bulb peels off like the onion...
And we kept the inner innermost layers, so as to try planting them...
(Actually, my missus did the planting, and me, only the picture-taking...)

See the pretty flowers?
They are the result from the bulbs...
The so-called tiger lily... pretty and delicious...
Shall be planting them this weekend...

We bought our Honda CRV more than 10 years ago from the local Honda dealer...
I am hopeless with machines, so we send the car to the Honda workshop once a year or so...
Never have had a problem all these years...
The pink roses... yes, birthday presents for me...
As in the last few years, the Honda salesman had been bringing me birthday presents...
Madagascar jasmine, garbella, anthurium, rose... 
I suspect he is trying to win my heart into buying a new car from him...
Anyway, we always try to plant these plants after a period of enjoying them at the dining table...
They all died...
And my missus just told me a minute ago, that the rose had probably died too... sigh...