BloomingBuds™ - A Review

When I returned home from Florida, I went through my mail and there was a large envelope containing a set of BloomingBuds™ earphones, which are quality ear buds for using with an iPod® or other electronic devices using a standard earphone jack. Included was an extra set of Blooms for use on the ear buds.


I'd read about BloomingBuds™ and their creator, Chip Lowry, in a recent issue of a local paper and was immediately smitten with them. I loved the idea of being able to personalize a set of ear buds in much the same way I did my Crocs.

Okay, so it's cool that I can put daisies on my ear buds, but how would the music sound when I used them with my iPod®?

FANSTASTIC! Now I'm no audiophile, but I know static and flat sound when I hear it, and BloomingBuds™ earphones have none of that. They sound every bit as good as the original ear buds that came with my iPod®, and that's good enough for me.

As a gardener, of course I love the several options available on that theme - daisy, butterfly, ladybug, clover, apple, and bumblebee. But there are many more for others who are into other things. (Is there more to life than gardening??) They also have other products to which the Blooms can be affixed, like sunglasses and Bluetooth headsets. The Blooms are proprietary, meaning they only fit on BloomingBuds™ products.

I've been using my set of ear buds this week (right now they have the daisies on them) and a couple of times the daisies tilted out of the ear buds as I removed the buds from my ears. Maybe the snap-in mechanism could be a little tighter, but it's been just a minor nuisance. Otherwise, I love them and find them an ingenious idea for personal expression with otherwise boring headphones.

BloomingBuds™ can be found in various stores throughout the United States, so keep your eyes open for them. They can also be purchased on their website for $14.99, which includes two sets of Blooms, and for a limited time, this purchase will include a bonus of two extra sets of Blooms, which normally sell for $2.99 each.

Maybe I'll have to get the runner Blooms when I start running again...

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The product or merchandise being reviewed in this blog post was the sole compensation for testing and reviewing the product. All opinions expressed here are mine, with no suggestions whatsoever by the manufacturer or distributor. If I like it, I'll say so. If I don't, I'll say that, too.

Does This Look Like Spring To You?

What a difference a day makes. It could have been worse, though. Counties to the north and south of us got more. We were between snow storms, I guess. Those pictures I took yesterday would be a study in white if I took them today.

Oh well, one look at the calendar tells me this is probably exactly what it should look like out there.

Could That Be a TULIP I See?

After reading so many wonderful blog posts about signs of spring in areas south of us, and even a couple not all that far south of us, I just had to go out and see what I could find in my own gardens.

I looked for some crocuses in all the usual places, but there was nary a one...



Then I tried to find signs of hyacinths but they were not there...



And then I walked around to the south side of the house and found spears of daffodils!



Nearby, some tulips were peeking through...


So spring is on the way after all! I continued to look around and there were more spring signs...


The 'Dragon's Blood' Sedum has started freshening up its burgundy foliage and the Sempervivums are showing signs of green in the center of their winter brown.

Yet another sedum is turning green.

There were areas where the leaves had blown into a fairly deep pile, so I removed some of them and I found some new Columbine (Aquilegia) growth.

The Sundrops (Oenothera) are up and running.


Now here's a bright and shining perennial that looks as good in winter as it does in summer. Yes, this is really how it looks all winter long. It's 'Kelly's Gold' Campanula and along with another Campanula, 'Dickson's Gold,' they really provide a bright spot in an otherwise dull and brown landscape.

It's late in the winter and we're ready to be done with it. One more week of February and the fickle month of March will be upon us. In March, anything goes. And THAT means it truly is spring and we'll find many more visible signs of it in the garden.