Paperwhites a Tall Tale

Hello friends, I’m sure you agree there are certain flowers that are associated with holidays and seasons? For example, Poinsettias, Paperwhites, and Amaryllis for Christmas and Daffodils and Tulips for spring. I had been planning on force bulb growing Paperwhites at Christmastime for years. I used to refer to Paperwhites (narcissism) as the other Christmas flower. Can I tell you a little secret? I thought Paperwhites were as delicate as Orchids, and I was “scared” to try. Never be scared to try anything (within reason). I tell others that all the time, so I took my own advice, and this is my story, my “Paperwhites Tall Tale”.

Forced bulbs are commonly planted in pretty glass vessels or fancy stone-filled jars. This one is growing in a glass tight neck jar created specifically for forced bulb planting, and I got it at, are you ready for it? Walmart! The jar with the paperwhites bulb already inside. It was less than $5, please join me, in saying “score!”

I watched my wonderful Christmas flower Paperwhites grow, and grow ( it grew to be 32 inches tall) and then the blossoms arrived. Beautiful delicate little white flowers. I was so happy, I think I may have done a little happy dance. Side note-I used a wood shish kabob skewer to help keep the stems from bending as it grew.

Forced bulb planting has been around forever so many of you are probably already familiar with the process. If you’d like to give it a try yourself, I created a How to Force Bulbs to Grow Out of Season tutorial, just click on the download below.

This is where the Paperwhites Tall Tale takes a bit of a turn. While I was doing the dishes one morning I kept smelling something, well, stinky. After clearing the garbage disposal and adding some baking soda I walked away. Later that evening while I was making dinner, I smelled it again. After checking the disposal, trash bin and other possible sources I was puzzled. I asked my hubby to walk around the kitchen to help me locate the smell. But he didn’t smell anything. I love him so much, but he’ll be the first to tell you, his smeller really isn’t very good. I was desperate to find the offending source, so I asked him anyway.

The smell was really bothering me, and I hated that I couldn’t locate the source. Okay, I’ll bet you saw this coming, right? I leaned over to rotate the paperwhites and………………. ding, ding, ding, yes you guessed it, sweet friends, my pretty white Christmas flowers are STINKY! I tried to find a better place to put them so I wouldn’t be directly in the “smell range”.
I moved them to the counter, still to stinky for me. I moved them to the buffet, still to stinky.

Where did they end up you ask? In the garage! Where they continued to grow, and my hubby didn’t mind having them in there at all. I hope you’re laughing because I certainly was.

That’s my Paperwhites Tall Tale. Will this encourage you to try forced bulb planting? Or will you wait until spring when your flowers are supposed to bloom?

I look forward to seeing you at this week’s TFT blog hop link party. In case you missed the announcement about a new hostess please click HERE.
I’m hoping your day is filled with happiness and only nice smells ( wink)!