PICTURES OF ROSEMARY

 Flowering Rosemary ( Rosmarinus officinalis)

SANDPAPER VINE: The Story Continues

The flowers are complex: the calice (chalice) bears a bud

that opens as a very impressive, intensly colored 

( blue, purple or blue-purple) violet/pansy-like flower

that drops within two days, leaving the star-like

calice to slowly fade from lilac-blue to hazy- gray.

The leaves of the Sandpaper Vine are very rough on both
sides, like a sandpaper, even when they are young and green.

The flowers of the Sandpaper Vine come in racemes ( like

grapes). This raceme/bunch is the first "historic" one.

 - Our vine is in bloom for the first time, since it was

 planted five years ago. It grows in a clay pot outsde

of the family room window.

THE UTILITARIAN ASPECT OF PETREA VOLUBILIS

Petrea Volubilis aka Sndpaper Vine is a very 
 beautiful plant to watch when in bloom.
The leaves of Petrea V. are very rough on
both sides, like a sandpaper! So, naturally,
 I thought they can be used like a sandpaper,
especially when dry ( no trace marks of green).
And that is the utilitarian aspect of Petrea Volubilis!

I tried to sand an old piece of  wood with a dry leaf, and it worked.

Sandpaper Vine: the leaves are very rough, like a sandpaper!

TROPICAL WISTERIA MAGIC

Tropical Wisteria a.k.a. Queen's Wreath, Sandpaper Vine, Petrea volubilis, Bluebird Vine in Bloom: Full Magic Power. Pictured here is our Wisteria

grown from a seed and planted under the "art room window". Photo: MK

This beautiful double flower has a double life in double color. It charms with two different shades of blue: the bottom petals are hazy lilac-blue, and the top flower is vibrant blue-purple. The bottom petals dry on the vine and lose their color, but the top delicate, soft violet/pansy-like flowers drop to the ground creating a magic carpet - I doubted that they belonged to the Tropical Wisteria I saw last Tuesday on the grounds of the little botanical garden by the painting studios of the U of M Art Dept. in Coral Gables (where I painted as a postgrad student 17 years ago). Lidia was there with me.