Mosaic Monday ... Feathers, Fur, Wing and Skin.

My holidays didn't turn out quite as I expected.  I've been sick with some nasty sort of virus during my semester break and haven't really been able to do much at all.  So much for the long list of household chores I was going to catch up on!  

Anyway, I can't complain too much ... instead of furiously cleaning, I've been chilling out just enjoying the weather and the views from my verandah instead!  So I thought I'd share a little of what I've been observing in between little nana naps on the rocking chair!!

 Forest Kingfisher

Yellow-Bellied Sunbird

Agile Wallabies

 Blue-Banded Bee

Garden Lizard

Cute little green frog

For more fabulous mosaics, check out all the posts at Mary's Mosaic Monday meme.

It's Time To Flaunt An Australian Daisy

One of my all-time favourite flowers has to be Bracteantha bracteata or what we commonly call, the Everlasting Daisies.  Many may know them as Paper Daisies or Straw Flowers.

I love watching the little coloured papery bracts open up to reveal the fluffy flowerhead in the middle of the bloom.

Look closely at the bloom on the right.  Can you see the flowerhead in the middle surrounded by those bracts?  Very often the bracts are mistaken for petals.

This is one of my favourite shots of the Bracteantha.  It shows pretty much all the stages from tight flower bud to open flowerhead.

If you look very closely at the bloom in the middle, you will see that there are actually hundreds of tiny little flowers centrestage amongst those brilliantly stiff bracts.

These masses of little flowers are always yellow, no matter what colour the bracts are.

Once the cone-shaped buds have matured into these brilliant blooms, they will close up overnight and open once again every morning until the flowerhead turns to seed.   You can see the white Bracteantha in the middle of the photo above turning to seed.  It's about this time that I pick off the flower and sprinkle the seeds in the pot so lots of new little ones will spring up.

I love everything about these daisies ... their wonderful texture, their form and their fabulous colours.  These hybrids come in shades of red, pink, yellow, orange and white.

For loads of beautiful flower posts, please visit Tootsie's Fertilizer Friday / Flaunt Your Flowers meme.

I'm also joining the Today's Flower meme.

Wordless Wednesday ... Sunbird.

I'm joining the Wordless Wednesday meme today.

Words about the Yellow-Bellied Sunbird here!

Enjoy!

Just A Little Flaunt!

I'm joining Tootsie for her Flaunt Your Flowers/Fertiliser Friday meme, Mary for her Mosaic Monday meme and Today's Flowers with my post today.


I would encourage you to pop over to these blogs and enjoy the posts.

The moon won't go to bed today and is still hanging around our winter sky at 10.00 am  in the morning.  It's another beautiful blue-sky day with just a hint of a chill in the air.  So let's take a quick peek at what's blooming around my place on this winter's day here in north-eastern Oz.

As I was strolling along the little pathway to the courtyard ...

off to my right, I noticed the first coloured bracts on my variegated Bougainvillea, which had to be trimmed back severely in the post-cyclone clean-up.

Very soon those bracts will open up to reveal the tiny white flower that generally goes unnoticed inside. 

To my left I noticed the Sanseviera trifasciata is showing a spike of greenish-white fragrant flowers.  This plant is regarded as a weed in my area of the world, but my patch is contained in a garden bed at the back of the courtyard and hasn't spread anywhere else as yet.  The patch has been flowering sporadically now for around two years.

Around the courtyard there are various potted plants in bloom.

The Impatiens hawkerii 'Celebrette Orchid Star', Azalea, Spathoglottis, Petunias, Gomphrena globosa, Antirrhinum 'Strawberry Crush' and 'Velveteen', as well as the Osteospermum are all in bloom.

My Zygocactus is showing off at the moment and makes an eye-catching display on the wooden table in the centre of the courtyard.

There is quite a bit of colour from foliage plants as well, and not just from the annuals which are starting to make themselves known at long last.

There's a little pot of Lavender and Lobelia which just can't go unnoticed.

As I wander on into the house and out into the shadehouse garden,

I notice the various Impatiens walleriana are flowering wonderfully once again.  I missed their colourful display during the long wet season and it's terrific to see their colours peering out between the fronds of the Giant Sword Fern.

The Dragon Wing Begonias power on in all conditions, wet and dry.  I just wouldn't be without them.

Wandering through the shadehouse garden, I stop to take a look at the tiered garden bed just outside.

The Iresine herbstii 'Blazin Rose' is simply covered in spikes of white flowers ....

... and a few of the old faithfuls are still carrying on as usual.  Mandevilla 'White Fanstasy', Euphorbia pulcherrima, Cuphea hyssopifolia, Pentas and Gerbera.