Acalypha hispida (ah-cuh-LIFE-uh HISS-pih-duh) is also called foxtail plant or red-hot cat tail, but it’s most like fat and puffy pipe cleaners or chenille stems. I must have a miniature version in one of my patio pots, because the descriptions I’ve read and most of the pictures online show a 4-6 foot tall bush with longer chenille parts hanging gracefully in bunches. This one is cute, showy, and carefree; after a while, the fuzzy tails start to get ratty and brown and have to be clipped off. Otherwise, it’s pure fun.

Our Labor Day family gathering was fun on many levels, but one of its purposes was to introduce Christy’s future husband Matt to her brother’s family. One thing she has learned in the last few weeks is that when you announce your engagement you better have a ready answer to at least two questions: Have you picked out a ring? and When is the wedding? Although the second is a subject of lively conversation, along with the nature and location of the wedding celebration(s), many window shopping expeditions have resulted in a decision about the first. Matt calls it the Space Ring--since Pluto is no longer a planet under the new definition, this ring (with its resemblance to Saturn) probably qualifies as a secondary celestial body, too. In line with their artistic temperaments, their search for the perfect ring led them not to jewelry stores but to the galleries of jewelry artists and craftsmen, and they have selected the ring that suits them entirely: unique, handmade, and just far enough out in its own orbit to suggest eternity.

We tend to think of sunflowers as those massive, seed-heavy, lemon-yellow ones (view here) in farm fields. The iconic sunflower image by Vincent Van Gogh (view here) reveals the shapes and colors of real sunflowers in all their glorious imperfection, at least as they grew in his day. Today, these cheerful flowers are hybridized to produce a palette of rich velvety shades and various arrays and density of petals. This image displays the actual colors of some of our sunflowers with names such as Moulin Rouge and Strawberry Blonde (rosy ones), Ebony & Ivory, Jade, and Vanilla Ice (pale to green ones with dark centers), Autumn Beauty (fall foliage shades), and Sunrich, Sunbright, Moonbright, Sunbeam, Starlight, and every other combination of celestial bodies to suggest the yellows.

Scabiosa is an airy, graceful annual that produces beautiful cut flowers in the pink and purple family. Black Knight, pictured here, is a purple-black color with pink pins, although I’d really like to grow what may be an even darker English cultivar, Ace of Spades. The botanical name arises from the fact that the flowers were steeped to produce a “tea” used to bathe people with scabies (infestation with mites). It is widespread in Northern Europe and was brought to America by early settlers who carried it further westward (when people owned one outfit).

The vine Clitoria has a flower that is like an open sweetpea, and in fact it produces a pea-like downy seedpod. When I saw the name and the photo in a seed catalog, I knew I had to try it. Georgia O'Keeffe would have liked to paint it! Even when you consider the disappointing facts that a.) the seeds need special treatment (soaking before sowing), b.) most of the seeds didn’t germinate, c.) the remaining ones dwindled to exactly one pathetic plant for transplanting into a large patio pot, and d.) the flowers are white rather than the startling blue pictured in the catalog, you still have to admit that it’s a great match of name and appearance. For an amusing historical account of scientists and their wayward methods of naming plants, including this one, go here.

[This is the first in a series of flowers or plants I’ve been trying out, and they range from amazing to amusing with a few disappointments along the way.] Looking for all the world like a collection of miniature glowing cigars with rims of ashes at the ends, Cuphea Ignea is a cinch to grow from seed and makes a pleasing two-foot wide mound in a low planter. In New York this Mexican native shrub is grown as an annual. Either the flowers’ tubular shape or their color is the attraction for hummingbirds, and I have watched them hover for several minutes, sampling from each of the hundreds of inch-long blossoms before moving on.