Last autumn I planted several flower bulbs in various pots on my balcony. Last weekend I noticed that at least one of them survived the winter. I really hoping that the coming nights won't be too cold to kill it. I would really like to see it bloom. I have know idea what type of flower it is.

Today I removed all the sub-categories under "Plant, Garden" and "Plant, House" and added new tags to the posts that belonged to them. Felt the sub-categories started to become to numerous and would one day become two very long lists.

A lot of stuff has happen since the last update. I have replanted many flowers and have started to cultivate many more new flowers.

A few French marigold have been placed in their final locations. Here is a picture on two of them.

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Everything is growing well. The decision to stop using pelt pieces and use loose soil in milk carton instead seems to be right. I have hardly been needed to look after the plants. The soil have been keeping itself moist for long periods of time.

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The project is in full swing. I have started to cultivate four more flowers, French Marigolds, Moonflowers, Sensitive Plant and Scarlet Sage. Two flowers I tried before and two new ones. The Sensitive Plant is more of a indoors plant, so I will keep some of them indoors and some on the balcony. The Scarlet Sage is a gamble. It's not suppose to be on a balcony with strong sun, but maybe it will survive if I place it on the ground in the shade.

I started with putting all the seed on moist tissue paper and sealing them in plastic boxes.

Within a week the French Marigolds started to grow, so I quickly move them over to soil. I also noted that a few of the Sensitive Plant and Scarlet Sage seeds had sprouted very thin white roots (or had started to mold), so I moved a couple of the seeds over to soil. I did it because I feared that if I moved them later I would just damage their roots (or they all would become attacked by mold).

The Moonflowers are late starters (as usual) and are still in their plastic bin.

This years project to enrich my balcony with flowers has started with the least likely candidate, Wallflower. The flower that I failed to cultivate last year and said I wasn't going to try again. I decided to try cultivate them again because I still had a few seed left and I noticed that they could be cultivated as early as February. Might as well start of the project with a new try. This year I'm trying to cultivate them exactly as told by the instruction on the seed bag. Placing them on top of moist soil instead of starting them of on moist toilet paper.

This year I also decided to try using recycled materials from home instead of buying new peat pots. Both for personal economical reason and ecological reasons. Above I have converted two milk cardboard boxes into two pots for four small flowers each.

I have been working a little on my balcony recently. Tidied up, put out some new flowers and decorated my balcony box. I'll post a picture on my balcony box in a later post (The decorations deserve their own post). Just like last year I have bought some Heather plants, but to add a little variation, I also bought a "decorative cabbage" plant.

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Well, the different flowers on my balcony have managed the summer differently. The summer has given the flowers a period of sunny days followed by a period of rainy days and then a few more sunny days. Some of the flowers had difficulty managing the weather changes. I could have been more active helping the plants survived the summer, but sickness and forgetfulness got in the way.

I happy with the flowers I cultivated this year, sadly I wasn't able to sit on my balcony and appreciate the flowers as much as I wanted.

Blue Mink
The Blue Mink grew well and looked good for most of the summer. Only when the sun came back did some of them wither a little.

I thought the Blue Mink look good and grew well and I might cultivate Blue Mink again some day.

French Marigold
The French Marigold flowers handled the summer well. Except the ones that were placed amongst the Blue Mink. They were gradually out-rivaled by the Blue Mink and died out.

I liked that the French Marigold flowers bloomed quickly. They made sure my balcony wasn't looking boring during the early summer. Because of this I might cultivate them again next year.

Painted Daisy
The Painted Daisy couldn't handle the rainy days. During that time I was sick and had no energy to move it to a place were it would rain less on them. So sadly they didn't grace my balcony with their flowers as much as they could have.

I liked the Painted Daisies, I thought they had nice flowers, but I don't think I'll cultivate them again for my balcony. Maybe some day when I have a garden I will cultivate them again.

Jasmine Tobacco
The Jasmine Tobacco flowers looked good the whole summer. They survived both the sunny and the rainy days with success.

This is the second year I've had Jasmine Tobacco flowers on my balcony and I think I will have them again next year. Next year I might cultivate Jasmine Tobacco flowers of many different colors.

Wallflowers
I didn't succeed in cultivating Wallflowers and I don't think I will ever try again.

The Blue Mink flower is definitely a bit different. It starts to look very alien when looked at closely.

Hidden amongst the leafs of my vegetables plants, I found this little cucumber. It has become the first harvest from the plants I have on my balcony.

The cucumber on a plate to show it's size.

Me, enjoying my cucumber. It really tastes better than any cucumber I bought.

All the flowers on my balcony have started to bloom!

Blue Mink

Jasmine Tobacco

Painted Daisy

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Things are doing great. Although the Wallflowers died shortly after the last report, my balcony is still looking good with the plants I have left. Not all flowers have started to bloom yet, but they probably will very soon.

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Thing are overall going great and my balcony is looking nice. Most of the flowers from Project Summer flower 2009 have been moved to their permanent pot and spot and some new flowers have moved in. Unfortunately most of my photos on the balcony didn't turn out that great, but I don't feel like reshooting them so I'm using them anyway. I want to post this little report as soon as possible.

In the upper half of my shelf I now have three French Marigold and two new flowers. The two new plants are both birthday gifts. The plant with the blue flowers is a Hydrangea and the one with the yellow flower I don't know what it is.

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All my little flowers are doing great and have now been moved over to small pelt pots. Now I just need to wait for the weather to warm up, so I can get them accustom to the outside and later permanently place them outside.

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