By Lee Scott
My husband called me from the grocery store the other day. He said, “I’m here in the flower department and I can pick up an Easter Lily for the centerpiece on Sunday.”
I told him not to bother, I already had something for the centerpiece.
When he got home and looked in the dining room, he saw a beautiful butterfly embossed tablecloth, our good china and silver, and there in the middle of the table was the Yellow Poinsettia he had bought for Christmas.
I had put it in an Easter Basket. He laughed and agreed with me. “Why waste a perfectly good plant.”
Now this Poinsettia has been with us since early last December. He had called me from the store, two weeks before Christmas, and asked me what color Poinsettias I wanted and how many. I told him to only buy one since we were going to be out of town with relatives and I did not want to have too many dead Poinsettias lying around the house when we got back.
He came home with a beautiful yellow Poinsettia, my favorite, although the tag says it is white.
Before we left for our trip, I watered it and put it in the kitchen sink so none of the leaves would be on the living room rug. To our surprise, when we got back home, it was still alive. So, I gave it more water and placed it on a plate in the living room, knowing it would probably be dead in a few weeks. But no, it lived. Valentines Day went by, and then Saint Patrick’s Day and still she thrived.
Since she looked healthy, I kept watering her, knowing that it would not be long before I saw the leaves lying on the plate. She seemed to do very well siting on the end table in the living room with its full sunlight. Although I did not want her to die, I was really surprised she was still alive.
I decided to do some research. According to the garden experts, I was doing everything wrong. First, my husband should have bought a red Poinsettia in the first place since they live longer. (I can almost hear my yellow plant laughing) Then, I should have been watering from the bottom up. Finally, on April 1, I should have placed her in hibernation. But despite my incompetence, she and I have had a longer relationship than any Poinsettia I have ever owned.
And so, the Easter Poinsettia is the centerpiece on our table.
But as it turns out, we are not the only ones. In Chili and Peru, they call them the Flor de Pascua, the Easter Poinsettia.
