Cheap but not easy~!

We were laughing the other day, when my husband called me a “plant rescuer”. We were sitting outside with friends when he made that statement. I had to laugh, I knew what he meant. 

He pointed around and made statements like “a dollar”, “25 cents”, “50 cents” and he went on and on. I was surprised, when I heard him putting the right amount on the plants.

Plant rescuer sounds so much nicer than saying I am cheap. Every year in spring -when I have spring fever like everyone else- we drive around and stop at all of our favorite nurseries and local hardware stores with a garden department.

The winters have been hard lately and our plants are covered with snow for a very long time. Many plants come back, but we loose some to the freeze every year…off we go to buy new ones.

I have lost touch with the raising prices a while back. Our income and the living costs are out of balance since a few years. I can’t, or don’t want to afford hundreds of dollars every year for just a few new garden plants. So I buy “clearance plants”, the ones that nobody wants to buy anymore, just because their blooming season is over, or they might have some temporary flaws.

Somewhere hidden in the back of each store are the unwanted plants, the ones that got marked down for a last chance sale, before they will die in a dumpster. These shelves are bargain heaven for me. My middle name is “cheap” and “clearance” is my all time favorite word. So today, on Frisbee Wednesday, I show you some of my bargain babies.

A little palm tree was in a card at Walmart after Mother’s Day. It looked pitiful. The dirt was dried out, the leaves were hanging down and it was stuck in the ugliest orange pot I had ever seen. 50 cents was all they wanted and I took it home. This was 2 years ago and yesterday I took some pictures of  my “Baby”. It is outside, big and healthy, enjoying the daily rains and the humidity and I just noticed the new growth on the bottom.

The following are pictures of the plants I bought last year, most of them for 50 cents or a Dollar. Just the key-lime Hydrangea was more expensive, I paid $6 for both plants. I bought them, because our old Hydrangea’s were not coming back and I had never heard of a key-lime colored one. I wasn’t sure they wold make it, the looked so tiny and unhealthy. Now, just one year later they are the “star” in our yard. They grew over 3 feet and they are full with blooms, that we will enjoy, if it ever stops raining.

So I guess the saying “I am cheap, but not easy” is fitting for me like a butt on a bucket 🙂

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Serendipity’s photo prompt or Frisbee Wednesday

This prompt is fun!