#29 African Violet

When I was 13 and 14, I was in a 4-H club based on botany. We did crops judging, flower arranging, and the care of houseplants. I loved the flower arranging and remembered years later how to use the wires and tape to make coursages and head wreaths and boutonnieres. We each had an African Violet to take care of, and that I didn't much like. I remember a great fear of the presence of mealy bugs, or of watering incorrectly.

Last winter, there were two African Violets in a batch of plants given to me. I didn't figure they would live, and I didn't take very special African-violet care of them. In Spring I put them out in the yard with other plants, in a shady place where they could be watered easily.

I was sometimes careful to put the water on the dirt and not the leaves, but they were outside and sometimes getting some sprinkler water and rain (not much rain this summer).

Then one day in late September there was a bloom!



It lasted several weeks.



I know the leaves look terrible. They had too much sun and too much water. (They greened up after a few weeks in the kitchen.)



So African violets aren't local, but this one came to my house and bloomed.