Mexican Flowers

My Mexican shell flowers are blooming! I'm so excited, as this is the first year I've grown them, and didn't know what to expect. I've tried to stagger the blooms in my garden planting things that flower throughout the season-but that doesn't always go to plan with our unpredictable weather. These will be a welcome burst of colour as we wait for the gladiolas to bloom.

The wasps and bees are enjoying the garden as well. Danny tells me this is in fact not a wasp, but a robber fly. I learn all sorts of interesting things from that kid.

Speaking of beautiful florals from Mexico...here's the vintage hand-tooled leather bag I bought last week. The inside is lovely too...

In person it looks like pale, watercolour flowers. My camera isn't doing it justice. Sadly, the Armadillo bag arrived broken in pieces from poor packaging, but the seller issued a full refund so at least I wasn't stuck with a, "Busted Armadilla". On the positive side, I get to shout, "Busted Armadilla"  to amuse my son. Sure, other people look at us strange, but when don't they? Busted Armadilla! I'll get my bag, someday. 

Keeping with the floral theme, I gave this embroidered dress another wear. 

I can't decide how I feel about it. This will never be the first dress I reach for, but on beastly hot days when the thought of sleeves makes me break out in hives, I'm glad I own it. The top needs to be closed with a brooch unless I feel like letting it all hang out (which is fine, but not on a weekday morning when I'm headed out to do mundane chores) but that's clearly not a problem as anyone that's seen my brooch collection will know. I went with this replica of a Pre-Columbian nose-ring. I do like a good museum reproduction piece.

Outfit Particulars:
Embroidered dress-Goodwill
Brooch-Salvation Army store, Lincoln
Earrings-K Mart
Vintage Handbag-New Life Thrift
Flip-Flops-Hand- Me-Ups
Square bangles-K Mart
Other gold bangles-various thrift stores
Fragrance-Eau de Gaga (Nice! It has a dominant lime note that sticks around for hours. A little leathery, a little woody, this was five bucks well spent).

 I have a few more flowers to share. This skirt *almost* matched the bag. So close-gah. I wore it anyway, but I must admit, I wasn't happy once I got outside in the light. Still, I had people stopping me to compliment the skirt, so it couldn't have been as distracting as I thought. It is harder to match poppy prints than you'd suspect!

 At least the necklace and earrings were a good match. They look like raspberries, but are tiny beads. It is heavier than it looks.

Outfit Particulars:
Talbott's cotton skirt-Hand-Me-Ups
Top-K Mart
Ted Baker handbag-Goodwill
Necklace and earring set-Hand-Me-Ups
Cinnabar bangle-Hand-Me-Ups
Gucci shoes-Goodwill
Fragrance-Sophia Vergara Tempting

Also blooming in the garden at the moment-nasturtiums, violas, geraniums, salvia, calibrachoa, dianthus, and borage. The columbines are about ready to bloom, and my mums from spring are starting to bud again. I wasn't kidding when I said the weather was strange. The poppies died (boo) but everything else seems to be doing well. We've had plenty of honey bees, but not a single bumble bee this year. That's odd too.

I hope wherever you are, something is blooming, if only in a fab print or a tooled handbag. Oh, and one last thing...
                                                        BUSTED ARMADILLA!