Bye-bye babies!

Three of my babies arrived safe on the other side of the world after 24 hours of traveling in a cardboard box!

My first babies are blooming!!!

Things seem to go pretty well for my African violets and the nursery is getting bigger and bigger.
But the highlight of the month is that my first violet babies are blooming for the first time. I'm a very proud mom! They are my first propagation experiment. The mother leaf was put in a pot at the beginning of January, so the two babies are around 5 months old.

African Violet Show in Montreal, april 2013

A month has passed and I did not upload some of the pictures I took in April at the African Violet Show hosted here in Montreal. For me it was a premier, I have never seen one before. I went there hoping to buy some plants but unfortunately for me almost everything was already bought. They were still in the show but some happy owners were waiting for them. I took some pictures, I talked to a nice lady that is an expect in this tiny miracles, I bought six leaves and I almost registered in the Society...but shy as I am, I didn't.

Here are some of my favorite varieties, but I must confess that Lyon's Red Rocket was mon coup de coeur.

And the violets chosen by the Society as being the best:

Six new varieties in my collection

The leaves I bought yesterday at the African Violets Show in Montreal.

Sansoucy Coco


Ness' Orange Pekoe


Pueblo


Taffeta Blue


Lyon's Pirate's Treasure


Guelph's Dynamite

The Family is Getting Bigger

I was so decided not to buy violets until next weekend when I'll go the African Violets Show...but I failed. This week while I was coming back home from shopping I stepped into a flower shop and I saw some cute violets. It was so difficult cu decide if I should buy and which I should buy, but finally I took a decision. And so two more violets joined the family. Here they are:





Meanwhile I separated the the babies of my second leaf. They were not very big, but they looked very crowded. While I was separating them I realized that my guess was true: they were three, not just two.

Separating Baby Violets

Last weekend I decided to separate the babies of my firs leaf. I hope they were not too young for this operation (approximately 5 weeks). I decided to continue the wick-watering method and to cover them with a transparent plastic container, to make the change smoother. Losing the mother leaf is already enough stress for them.





And here they are on the new shelf starting their journey to adulthood!

Propagation Experiment Using African Violet Leaves

Immediately after I bought my first violets in january I realised that two leaves were damaged during the transportation, so I decided to use them in my first propagation experiment. After some research on the Internet I realised the stems were too short so I took a sharp knife and I cut both of them creating longer stems.

Leaf no. 1 before/after cutting:




Leaf no. 2 before/after cutting:



I put them in a mix of vermiculite and African violet soil (50%, 50%) but before that I made a hole in each pot. Trough that holes I passed a synthetic mason line that I kept in water for a while and then I put the pots in a bigger reservoir (be careful the pot not to be in the water, only the lace). This is the wick-watering method and I find it very smart. I covered both leaves with transparent plastic containers after I made a hole in each. This will allow the leaves to have humidity inside and also fresh air.



I put them close to my kitchen window and then I waited…and waited.
On February 27th leaf no. 1 showed its first tiny green heads. What a joy! I kept track on the evolution taking pictures, but leaf no. 2 was still doing nothing.

Leaf no. 1 on march the 1, 10th, 24th 2013:




Leaf no.2 turned out to be much lazier. Only on march 18th it showed its tiny green heads. This is a picture that I took on march 24th 2013.


I keep you posted during the next weeks :)

My First purchase of 2013

Today I bought my first two violets of 2013 so my collection is just getting started. I went shopping close to my home and I decided to stop by the flower shop. I was hoping to find some violets and surprisingly I did. Unfortunately they don't have the name of their varieties on the label. Here they are!

My first books about African violets

Some days after Christmas I ordered my two first books about African Violets. Today they arrived! Here they are:

Me and my violets

In summer I bought two mini African violets. Recently, at a better look I noticed that each pot has four tiny crowns. So I decided to split them and plant them separately, to give them the chance to a better growing. This will be my first operation of such kind. I had African violets before, but they were mature, and they never had babies. The second premier is that I will try the wick-watering method. I'm sure this will be a lot of help for me. So here I am, at the beginning of an interesting jeorney...me and my mini violets!