{"id":299,"date":"2008-12-20T10:03:30","date_gmt":"2008-12-20T18:03:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/2008\/12\/20\/solstice\/"},"modified":"2009-11-13T18:13:06","modified_gmt":"2009-11-14T02:13:06","slug":"solstice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/2008\/12\/20\/solstice\/","title":{"rendered":"Solstice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The upcoming winter solstice marks the shortest day of the year, but on the California coast we&#8217;re lucky to be able to garden year-round. Despite the pre-winter chill, my friend Kim has lots in bloom in her garden. She lives a few blocks from us near Dolores Park, and she&#8217;s an orchid nut like me! Her beautiful Maxillaria picta made a great display on the day we visited.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Maxillaria picta flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_maxillaria_picta_-1_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_maxillaria_picta_-1_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Maxillaria picta flowers\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Maxillaria picta flower\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_maxillaria_picta_2_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_maxillaria_picta_2_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Maxillaria picta flower\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>On the left, bromeliad flowers look like blue ribbons. In the middle, a little black bug tempts fate on the edge of a carnivorous pitcher plant. On the right, a tiny purple flower shows beauty on a miniature scale.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Bromeliad flower\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_bromeliad_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_bromeliad_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Bromeliad flower\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Pitcher Plant\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_pitcher_plant__640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_pitcher_plant__640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Pitcher Plant\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Purple flower\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_purple_flower_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/kims_garden_purple_flower_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Purple flower\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Hens-and-chicks sit among fallen ginkgo leaves, providing some autumn color on a San Francisco street. Back in our garden, the hot pink flowers of a Christmas cactus brighten up the short days. In the wild, Christmas cactus grow alongside orchids as air plants in tropical rainforests.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Succulents with fallen gingko leaves\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/dolores_park_gingko_leaves_and_succulents_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/dolores_park_gingko_leaves_and_succulents_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Succulents with fallen gingko leaves\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Christmas cactus flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/christmas_cactus_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/12\/christmas_cactus_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Christmas cactus flowers\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The upcoming winter solstice marks the shortest day of the year, but on the California coast we&#8217;re lucky to be able to garden year-round. Despite the pre-winter chill, my friend Kim has lots in bloom in her garden. She lives a few blocks from us near Dolores Park, and she&#8217;s an orchid nut like me! [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-gardening","category-photos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1243,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299\/revisions\/1243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}