Tea Time

I just love tea! It's probably my biggest 'food' obsession. The picture of the tea cupboard is only a selection of the tea I have. Sadly I have more in my pantry. I love trying different teas - I've even asked the lady at one of the tea shops to just surprise me with flavors. I know I have tons of flavors... although some flavors overlap(more than one orange spice - but different brands have different tastes).
In my cabinet of teas I have the following:

By Brand

Bigelow: Orange Spice; Spiced Chai; Eggnogg'n(I know it sounds odd, but I love this tea!!)
Celestial Seasonings: (Factory is right here in Colorado!) Green Tea; Cinnamon Apple Spice(I think it tastes like oatmeal); Mandarin Orange; Country Peach Passion(Great cold); Wild Berry Zinger; Tuscany Orange Spice; Vanilla Strawberry Rose(Amazing tea!!); Tropic of Strawberry(Which I'm drinking at the moment); Gingerbread Spice; Chocolate Raspberry Bliss; Sugar Cookie Sleigh Ride(Also love!); Mint Magic; Black Cherry Berry; Mango Darjeeling(Also amazing cold); Apple Banana Chamomile(Available only from the CS Factory - or in Mexico); Chocolate Caramel Enchantment Chai; Raspberry, Sleepytime Vanilla; India Spice(Honestly wasn't that fond of this one - liked the Bengal Spice better)
Lipton: Regular(black); Orange, Passionfruit, Jasmine Green tea; Peach tea
Private Selection(Kroger brand): Earl Grey; Orange Spice(Quite good)
Stash: Green Tea; Earl Grey; Ginger Peach
Yamamotoyama: Oolong

Loose Leaf

Spice Trader(Booth at the Renaissance Festival): Hibiscus Breeze; Pirate Chai; Raspberry Chai; Licorice Spice; Bloodberry - These are all so good, I just want to buy everything he has!
Laura Lee's Teas: Kyoto Cherry Rose(Completely awesome tea); Cinnamon Orange(Smells like Red Hots); Bourbon Street Vanilla; Caramel; Oolong; Banana; Wild Cherry; Irish Cream; Prince of Wales
My Cuppa Tea: Earl Grey de la Creme(Best Earl Grey EVER); Orange Blossom Oolong; Christmastime Black; Jungle Fire
Honestly I love this place, I just wish they didn't close so early.

Hooray for plants that lived!

Sweet! My lemon basil is doing so well! It'll only be a matter of time now before they start sprouting their 5th & 6th leaves. Once those open I'll have to replant my basil into a larger pot. Honestly I can already see a root or two peeking out on the pot it's in.

Beginning sprouts:

1st set of leaves:

2nd set of leaves:

About to sprout 3rd set(need to replant soon):

I took this photo this morning :) These little dollar plants are doing so well! On a sad note - I killed my tomato plants... they got too much rain :(

My little bitty strawberry plant is starting to get a new sprout. It's so cute!One of the leaves is even jaggedy! It's too cute for me!! XD

My pepper plants are doing well at the moment too ... I dunno how, but a tomato seed got in with these so an extra tomato is growing in here!

Yay Tomatoes!

I don't know why I decided this year to plant tomatoes, honestly I've killed almost every plant I've ever been given. This includes a philodendron which I was told was impossible to kill... I admit it took me longer than normal but I succeeded in even killing that. It's not like I was trying! I just don't have quite the knack for plants. My mother-in-law gave me 2 pots of basil and.. yup, you guessed it. Dead. I love basil. I was really looking forward to those basil plants too! She also gave me a mint plant which I'm happy to say is still living :) ....for now.... So these tomatoes, again I don't know why I wanted to plant them so bad, but I got my way and now they are happily sprouting!

I started them in a plastic cake holder - We ate the cake first of course :P I didn't want to throw the plastic out, I figured I could always use it for something else. Now the sprouts have been out for 2 weeks I had to move them into the cups. The plastic was being bad and I hope this doesn't harm the tomatoes moving them so early. My tomato sprouts are so cute!

And then there is lemon basil...
I was at Target last week and in the $1 section (I love the $1 section, nothing quite like good quality junk!) they had little pots of various things to grow. Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Strawberries, Lemon Basil, Parsley... I think there was something else, but I can't really remember. Anyway I bought the Strawberries, Lemon Basil and Cucumbers. I haven't planted the cucumber yet, but I did plant strawberry and lemon basil. The lemon basil sprouted this morning! I saw cute little sprouts when I walked into my kitchen this morning. This is really giving me hope that I won't kill everything. I planted some peppers too, but have yet to see sprouts on those... Well, we'll see. (You can see the cute strawberry pot next to the basil.)


Just a few random garden pictures - I have an Iris that blooms in my yard, not sure where it came from, I think it was planted by the lady who used to own the house(I know the rose bushes were.)


You can see the mint plant in the corner next to the rose bush.