#Magic gardens

[thelasthippie]

[victormalonso]

magic gardens | víctor m. alonso

[phillymagicgardens]

"The Gardens After Dark" at Philadelphia's Magic Gardens

[basilthesnakingthing]

So the first Inktober prompt being "backpack" finally made me work on the design of my OC who I plan to make the POV of my cartoon and really think about the stuff that she would need to have on hand all the time. Didn't have time to finish it because my sketchbook got wet this afternoon and everything was terrible (note to self: start keeping my lunch box in a separate bag, or at least a separate pocket, so that the condensation from the refrigeration ice does not get my books wet), but hey! Tomorrow's is "discover" and the whole reason this girl needs a backpack full of supplies in the first place is that she's exploring a labyrinthine old timey building + the surrounding gardens for it's faerie magic secret-y things. So I bet I could just combine the two. I bet it would work.

[litphotos]

[oldcameranewland]

[aesethewitch]

When I was a kid, we moved into a house that had a huge lilac tree out front. It was mostly rotten, and it needed to be taken down before it fell. It took a while, but eventually, it was gone.

Mostly. A couple years later, little lilac babies popped out of the ground in its place. My mom was determined to get rid of them, because she'd planted a beautiful flower garden there, and the lilac trees would overshadow and kill the whole garden. I insisted on saving at least a few saplings. She said fine, but I had to dig them out and put them in pots myself.

So, I did. I spent days digging little lilac bushes out of the ground and putting them into pots. Some couldn't be saved, but some could. When all was said and done, I had five brand-new lilac saplings. Seven or eight years old, and it was my absolute pride and joy.

Three died due to sun scorching, severe drought that no amount of watering could save, and perhaps just being moved from their place in the ground. But two survived, and I was awfully proud of them! I'd go out and talk to them every single day. I watered them by hand and made sure they were fertilized properly. I learned all about their favored environments, and I was determined to make sure they lived.

One of my mom's friends saw what I was doing with the lilacs. She asked if she could have one to put in her backyard, and I agreed on the condition that she take very, very good care of it.

It's now fucking enormous. I'm talking ten feet tall and bursting with beautiful purple flowers every spring. My mom still gets updates each year as they start to bloom, which she forwards to me. And all I can think is, "That's my friend! Thriving some twenty years on, there it is."

The other tree nearly died, too. It lived in a pot for far, far too long. I wanted to plant it somewhere in my parents' yard, but my mom was reluctant. Eventually, we agreed to put it in the far back garden. It grew okay for many years, despite the shade, but in all these years, it's never bloomed.

Last year, the massive tree casting massive shadows over the lilac and the garden cracked in half and fell. It tumbled into the garden, crushing part of the nearby shed and destroying a few plants beneath it.

It missed my lilac by inches.

The clean-up is long done. The rest of the tree has been cut down, and my lilac has full sunlight for the first time in fifteen years. It won't bloom this year, I know. But it's got new shoots up. It's taller than ever. I spent half an hour a few weeks ago praising it for surviving all this time, dreaming about its future and telling it how I believe it'll become the tall beauty it's always been meant to be.

I think next year, I'll see flowers.

[kafkasapartment]

Sunflowers, c. 1982. Andrew Wyeth. Watercolor and pencil on paper

[bebs-art-gallery]

𝓑𝒖𝒕𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒇𝒍𝒚 𝓕𝒂𝒊𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝓜𝒐𝒕𝒉 𝓕𝒂𝒊𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝓦𝒐𝒓𝒍𝒅

© Malina Dowling

[jazzymini]

flower power! ‧₊˚❀༉‧₊˚.

[tiny-delights]

Philadelphia Magic Gardens

Source: Debra Lermitte

[etherealyearning]

Northumberland

[the-crow-in-the-blooming-tree]

[happyheidi]

𝖳𝗁𝖾 𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗋𝖺𝗇𝖼𝖾 𝗍𝗈 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝗀𝖺𝗋𝖽𝖾𝗇 𝖻𝗒 𝖫𝗂𝗇𝖽𝗌𝖺𝗒 𝖱𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗈𝗇

[spiritofthemeadow]

ig - afternoondreams

[animeglitch]