I first fell in LOVE with this tree in mid March of 2007 as I headed down to Winston Salem, NC for an InterVarsity training weekend.  I was so ready to get out of dreary rainy Newport News and experience a new Southern city.  Somewhere along Interstate 85 it hit me: this drive was BEAUTIFUL!  There were gorgeous trees in bloom in all different shades of red, pink, purple and white.  What a glorious welcome! North Carolina must be just a little ahead of Virginia in blooming season because a few weeks after I returned my eyes were opened to all of the Crepe Myrtles that we have right here at home!  These trees grow so well in Southern climate.  I actually missed them when I went to Wisconsin for a few days last week.  Life just seems happier with some bright blooms in the midst of all that summer green.

They are so vibrant and cheerful and their blooms are the strongest here after all of the early summer flowers have begun to fade.  So when my Azalea’s and Gardenia’s start to wither, I just look up and little by little those Crepe Myrtles begin to bloom for me!  They are such a sweet sign of summer in the South and I’m sad that their blooms are already beginning to make an exit.  So enjoy their beauty here until next summer!

Any guesses as to which color I want growing in my yard one day?!