Tell Me Thursday: Christmas Trees and Trumpet Vines

There are two parts to the story about my Wordless Wednesday post, and two lessons learned.

Back in the Spring, Little Dude found these itty-bitty pine tree seedlings in our back yard. He grabbed my hand and dragged me to them “Mommy, I have to plant these. I want to grow them and make Christmas Trees”.

Super cute right?

So I carefully dig them up and together we replant them in the pot. They live on my deck along with their flag and rocks (“to keep them safe”). Each day, Little Dude checks on them and waters when necessary. He pulls weeds out when he sees them and adds plant food once a month.

These seedlings were no bigger than my fingernail when I dug them up. They are now each just over 4 inches tall.

Lesson learned: anything will grow when nurtured correctly – even by a toddler.

Now notice the vine and flowers growing on the rack and surrounding our precious “Christmas trees”? It’s actually called a trumped vine, and it’s a weed.

I’ve been diligently weeding my veggie garden, which is along side the deck, to protect my tomatoes and cucumbers from this aggressive weed. But I neglected to pull it from the lattice surrounding the bottom of the deck. Now the trumpet vine has made it’s way all the way up onto the deck and wound itself onto the rack in the picture. It’s also making it’s way around the furniture and other plants I have on the deck.

Lesson learned: Well, there are two lessons here.

1. If I had just taken a few extra minutes while I was weeding the veggie garden, this trumpet vine wouldn’t be taking over my deck.
2. Another point of view can be that even weeds can be beautiful. The flowers are lovely.

Be sure to visit TellMeThursday for more stories behind the pictures!