Visiting Sunflowers For Wishes in Griswold

The Uplifting Sunflower Photos

I had heard about this place (Sunflowers For Wishes) from friends who visited last week. It wasn't a long ride so I wanted to check it out and view the sunflowers. It is on the Button Farm in Griswold, CT. 
Tomorrow (July 27, 2014) is the last day of their season. So if you want to go you have one more day.

All purchases of their sunflowers and items in the small gift shop go to the Make A Wish Foundation. 

They have rides for kids (as in the above picture) around the sunflower maze and a 3/4 mile hayride for all. 

The area surrounding this sunflower farm is really beautiful and be sure to check back as I'll be sharing more from there.

It's been a long time since I had sunflowers growing in the yard and this place inspired me to plant some next year.  

Have you ever visited a place like this in your area? 

And do you know the scientific name for this flower?

June Blooms Around Southern New England in Photos

Can you name the flowers above that are in bloom this June? 
A hint about these first beautiful flowers via a tweet I received yesterday:

@Lisapatb poisonous, digitalis is a heart med, handling the plant can interfere with heart, very bad if pets eat the plant.
— Cynthia Toti (@CynthiaToti) June 21, 2014

The first photo flowers were given by an aunt of mine for my mother before she passed away. I was raking leaves through some of her garden yesterday when I spotted them. The second of course is my all time favorite peony plants.  Not only are they a pretty flowering plant but they smell wonderful. It's too bad they don't blossom for long. 

What are you favorite flowers during the month of June?

Summer in the Little City

Gorgeous Pink Flowers

Colorful Orange and Pink Flowers

Love the Old Architecture in the City

Flowers Are Everywhere in the City

Big Yellow Tiger Lillies

The Hills Are A Challenge to Walk

I finally had a chance to walk the city during lunch this week and the flowers were so pretty. They look so different from season to season. You may remember last fall how the flowers rich colors looked. Even the Spring flowers have different colors.

The architecture always makes me stop on my walk to look and wonder how they built that building so many years ago. 

The hills are great for you that like to exercise as I do. 

They can be a challenge to walk up and down!

Are you seeing all kinds of flowers this time of the year? 

Do you have Tiger Lillies near you? 

Chippy the Chipmunk is Back With the Pretty Flowers

If you have visited this blog for a year you may have remembered Chippy. He was the friendly chipmunk always ready for a photograph. If he is the same chipmunk this year he is a little shyer. He hid a few times before I got this shot of him. Chipmunks can live for 2-3 years and do not store fat when they hibernate.

The white flowers grow wild all over the yard near picky bushes. Can anyone tell me their name?

The peony, my old time favorite for it's color, short life and beautiful smell, has come out again for a few short days.

What are you favorite flowers this time of the year?

Rhododendrons and Peonies All In Pretty Pink

It's about that time of year again when the rhododendrons bloom beautiful bright pink colors and the peonies starts to bloom. The peonies really started to bloom with the temperatures reaching the low 90's the past few days. 

I had to look back at last year and see when they started to sprout blossoms and it was early May.

Do you have lots of flowers that are now in bloom? 

And are your allergies acting up? According to an allergy doctor the ugly plants are the cause of it.

It's been a bad year for allergies here! 

Planting Flowers - Annuals or Perennials?

It was fun shopping for flowers to plant over the weekend. I ended up with both annuals and perennials. It seems the annuals had more color and the perennials would last year after year and be easier to manage.  I could not resist the Senetti flowers. The purple and white colors just really popped out from the rest of the flowers. 

The flower boxes ended up with Red Flame Phlox which are not yet in bloom. I really was inspired by the flowers I saw in the city last week that I had to plant a few around the house to enjoy them and brighten things up.

Do you prefer annuals or perennials?

Flowers That Did Not Check The Weather Forecast

This budding flower did not know it was a very cold day in November

These flowers were where the butterflies lived 2 months ago

Gorgeous flowers along my walk on a cold November day

I was surprised to see so many plants still blooming on this cold day

These plants were beautiful 2 months ago and are almost completely finished for the season

More surprises along my mid-day walk

I was surprised to see so many leaves on this tree in mid November

Most of the trees looked like this one!

It was so cold I had to stop and get a hot chocolate from Dunkin Donuts

It was a cold November day this past week and I went for a walk on my lunch hour. It was the most relaxing hour of the week for me. I was surprised to see what I  found along the way. I wasn't planning on taking pictures. When I saw the flowers still in bloom and some plants budding I was very surprised. Didn't they know what the temperature was? They probably did not pay attention to the weather forecast. If you are in the path of where Sandy was a few weeks ago you may want to check out the upcoming week's forecast calling for possible flooding. Let's hope they are wrong.

Do you still have many flowers blooming in your area?

Can Nature Be Beautiful In The City?

These photo's made me wonder if nature can be just as beautiful in the city as it is in suburbia. The last photo seems ironic with beautiful flowers with city buildings in the background. The butterflies were everywhere around these pretty purple flowers. I was lucky enough to catch one for that first photo. Catching butterflies in a picture is not easy. 

Does your city have beautiful nature?

Flowers Around An Organic Garden Center

These flower pictures were taken from an organic garden center. Can flowers really be organic and what makes them different?  

More of the Cliff Walk in Newport

A Nature Trip Around The Yard

I went to check on the raspberries to find they must have already peaked and now are shriveled. They didn't used to peak until late June. It must have been the early spring we had.

I found some areas to be way overgrown. 

This has to be the ugliest weed. I once had  a bad dream that they grew so big I could not get away.

What is growing in your yard?