Pomegranates again

Hello blogging world. I have been absent from my page for quite a while.

I left thinking about pomegranates, and my thoughts return to them now, with a little story!Well it might ramble on a bit...

A few years ago, I asked a painting group if anyone knew where I could find a pomegranate to paint. Lovely and talented Liz turned up the next week with two beautiful, ripe pieces of the fruit . She had visited her sister in the town of Dwellingup at the weekend, to find her tree full of pomegranates, and kindly thought of me.

I was touched by her kindness, but also by the thought that Dwellingup is a pretty little forest town in Western Australia, which was almost completely destroyed by fire, over 20 years ago .

The fruit seemed to me a symbol of resurgeance and new life.

I think I am right in recalling that Liz's sister's family had experienced the whole trauma. Recent fires have devastated similar towns in the state of Victoria, on the other side of the country. Far worse as so many lives were lost. WA has been less affected of late, and I am sure our preventative burning of fire breaks is the reason. Greenies, beware of what you wish for!

Anyway, back to the pomegranates!

I painted them in oils.

This hangs in our dining room , with some quince and fig paintings, each 12" X 16".......................................................

Then we ate them.

But I kept some seeds to plant.

They grew into tough, thorny little bushes.

I had bought two cast iron urns for my husband's birthday, which got so hot and dry in the sun, that almost nothing would survive in them.
But I thought of the pomegranate that survives in the desert and is in so many Middle Eastern recipes.

Two bushes went into the urns, where they have done really well, and after a couple of years there, have started producing fruit.

I have almost killed them a few times, when they have been deprived of water while we have been away,but they keep coming back. One is being nursed back AGAIN as I write, so I thought I must photograph the other for posterity, just in case. My husband just ate the biggest pomegranate!

I have every intention of painting the daughter fruit, and hopefully growing grandbaby pomegranate trees for the Dwellingup parent.

My photo shows a very sparse lookng plant. The leaves are small, and it has lost quite a lot in our recent absence, but looks better in real life.

Excuse the messy area.. ahem... that is where I should be at work, not on the computer.

The dog is Harrison, licking his lips. He probably would eat the pomegranates, as he has just consumed our pretty crab apples, green tomatoes on the bushes, and is eyeing the ripening passion fruit..