Trying to Get Rid of Spider Mites

My impatiens plant has a terrible problem with spider mites. I've been fighting them for a long time. I've sprayed them several times. I haven't been feeling well, so it kind of got neglected and almost all the leaves died. You can see in this picture here that the poor thing looks...very sad:

Here's a close up of the little buggers web:

The little white specks are the nasty critters. I decided it was time to get really serious with the things. You'd think I could have come up with a nicer way to do it. The plant was really struggling anyway, but they're about as hardy a plant as ever I've grown. I tipped it over the sink and sprayed it all down:

I got it from every side corner and angle I could think of. You can see that it washed almost all the leaves off. They were dead anyway.

Here's a close up between the branches showing where all the mites were washed away:

It has been a couple weeks since I did all that. I'll take pictures of it now and share them with you another day. About my health, I'm waiting for a referral to visit with a Rheumatologist. Because my blood work didn't show anything really obvious, my regular doctor doesn't want to put me on anything without a for certain diagnosis.

It's Been Raining...

And raining, and RAINING!

I was glad for these pansies that came to brighten my day. It has been raining for a LONG time now. I don't even know how long it's been. All I know is that it hurts, but we need it! Here in the desert, we don't get rain like this hardly ever. I'm surprised it's not snowing. I took this picture from my window. I don't care to be out in the cold. :P Anyway, how's life for everyone? :)

Missing My Morning Glories

I don't know how anyone else is feeling, but I'm missing my morning glories. They were SO lovely. The old dead vines just got torn down. Here are some pictures from a few months past. I think you'll agree that these were BEAUTIFUL!


I love how they get a little star on them and the center almost glows.

They are bigger than you'd think.


So while I'm feeling rough with the cold getting to every joint in my body, I can rest with this assurance...it's springtime somewhere! :D

My African Violets

I sure love flowering houseplants. African Violets are so much fun for me on my plant shelf. They just love it there. Here are some pictures of them.

This one is really flowering well right now. I don't know if I've ever seen this many flowers on an African Violet at once:


This one flowers such glittery white flowers that you fall in love with it in an instant:


And this lady is just getting ready to throw out a bunch more flowers I'm sure!


Here they are all together on my plant shelf with there little flip flap friend:

I wish I wanted to tell you all about these lovely ladies, but my wrists hurt so I'm too lazy to make myself type. I hope you enjoy the photos anyway. :)

Where has Missy Been? - Diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis

So you're probably all wondering what became of Missy with her lovely gardens and houseplants. We've had some pretty good rain storms and the cold has set in here. Along with rain and cold comes Missy's reminder...achey bones. Around here we don't get a lot of rain, but when we do everyone is so glad! I am too...when I can think past the pain. When I heard rain drops and started crying a few weeks ago, I knew it was time to do something about it.

I consider myself an emotionally strong girl, generally, so when tears come, something really is wrong. I have an aunt who is a Registered Nurse. She also has a BlackBerry. I got on my BlackBerry and sent her a message telling her that I was taking the highest recommended dosage of ibuprofen and it wasn't even taking the edge off the pain. Her reply? "You need some very expensive testing." Nice of her to be honest, right? I'm always fretting about how much things cost. After giving it a few days thought and only feeling worse, I decided she was right. She told me to look a few things up on the internet. My symptoms all matched up with what she told me she thought I had: Rheumatoid Arthritis. Click on the picture below to read about it on MedicineNet:



A 21 year old girl doesn't just accept that she has a chronic debilitating illness like as if she'd just been told that the cookie jar was empty. It's a big deal! I finally scheduled an appointment with my local doctor. She's a really nice lady. After listening to my symptoms and feeling my joints she said, "She's got to have it."

She ordered a bunch of tests and told me to take lots of things. Now we're waiting for the results in order to know what to do next. In the mean time I have good days surrounded by bad days, I have bad days with bits of good mixed in, and good days with bits of bad mixed in.

You know how it is when you go to the doctor? You almost feel like it made things worse, but really, why did you go to the doctor? Because it wasn't getting any better, and just because you went to the doctor doesn't mean it's suddenly going to get better.

So how does an avid gardener and houseplant lover keep up with a hobby like that when they can barely get around? Let's take a spin around my bedroom.

When my wrists don't hurt too bad, there's nothing stopping me from reading. I have a little collection of gardening books and magazines in my bookcase:

You can probably guess my hobby by looking at my dresser. Butterfly Thermometer/Clock, Flower Vase, Rose Lamp, Rose Clock, Flowery Jewelery Box, and a Little Hand Crafted Birdhouse I made once:

I'm learning Spanish, and I don't see why I can't mix it in with what I already enjoy. Thus, I got this Spanish book on the Life Cycle of the Earth Worm:

And my Calendar with beautiful flowers every month:

First glance at my bookcase would make you think, 'Yep! This lady is sick!':

But, I haven't lost sight of the things I love which is shown by these plastic Cosmos hidden amongst all the pills (And yes, I need to dust!):

I also have my beautiful plant shelf that I've shown in other posts. My bedroom looks very "gardeny" as a whole, so nope! It's not going away any time soon. Rheumatoid Arthritis or not I'm still a gardener at heart!

Yes, I've accepted and rejected the diagnostic about 150 thousand times in the last few weeks, but I still have the old reminder, pain. I've been so glad for things like Ibuprofen, Tylenol Arthritis, Lavender Oil to soak in, and all my wonderful friends and associates. I looked back in my old chats with my co-workers. I was mentioning my knees in April of 09 and talked about my achey bones through the winter of last year and into this year. It was interesting because I kind of felt like it was a little "all the sudden". Apparently, it was not.