Matthaei Botanical Gardens Conservatory - Succulents

As I mentioned in my last post, I visited the Matthaei Botanical Gardens in Ann Arbor in early April. Nothing was yet growing outside, but the conservatory had plenty of interesting plants to look at, especially in the succulent room. There were so many bizarre cacti and other spiky plants, many of which were in flower at the time. Here are some of my favorite photos, below:

Matthaei Botanical Gardens Conservatory - Tropical Plants

I recently visited the Matthaei Botanical Gardens in Ann Arbor. It was early April, so there was nothing yet growing outside - but there were some lovely tropical plants and some interesting cacti and succulents in the Conservatory (the green house), which I took several photos of. For today's post, I'll show some of my favorite tropical plant photos. (Check back soon for a second post of succulent photos.)

Spring Flower Photos 2017

I like to take photographs of flowers I see - from the plants in my yard, gardens I see around town, and even bouquets and potted plants for sale in stores or markets. Some of these I'll end up using (eventually) for future artworks, looking to these photos as reference materials.

Here are some recent pictures I've taken. There are always lots of great flowers on display for sale around Easter and Mother's Day, and this year was no exception. Other pictures below are from the blossoms on the trees and bushes around my house, as well as images taken after a rainstorm at the garden at my local public library.

Close-up of yellow tulip bouquet

Daffodils for sale

Hyacinth for sale

Love these colors!

Rows of hyacinth, purple tulips, and Easter lilies for sale

The tree in my front yard

The tree in my side yard

The leaves of this tree are always a dark reddish purple - so pretty!

Flowers in my backyard

At the library, after a rainstorm

Wet daffodils

Love the purple on this flower!

Gorgeous raindrops!

Tree blossoms

It's hard to take photos when your dog is pulling on her leash to keep walking - but I did my best! :)

Poinsettia Photographs

This December, my husband brought home a white poinsettia plant from a fundraiser at work. When we ordered the "small" size, I expected it to be a lot smaller!

As always, I took a lot of photographs of the potted plant, with the intention of drawing some colored pencil pictures based on the photos.

Here are some of my favorite photos:

Late Summer Flowers at My Parents' House

My mom and grandma had a much better bunch of flowers in their yard this year (probably because they actually took care of them and watered them...) ;)

Here are some of my favorite photos I took in July & August of the flowers in their front yard.

And a bonus photo of a carnation bouquet on the kitchen table:

Michigan Orchid Show (Post 3)

This is the last post I'll make about these orchid photos from the Michigan Orchid Show - I promise! :)

I took hundreds of photos, so these three posts certainly don't cover everything they had. But they're a pretty good representation of the wide variety of orchid plants they had on display and for sale. My grandmother purchased a white orchid - and bought me my very own spotted orchid as well.

They also had a display for a fake orchid wedding dress. Such a creative idea!

These are purple orchids sewn into the tulle train of the wedding dress.

And here is my new orchid plant, on my kitchen table at home!