Category Archive

I love that little skunk from Bambi.

Saturday I took more pictures of the garden.  YAY!

This is my herb bed.  This is my herb bed on plant crack!  The tall stuff in the back is oregano I’ve got to prune.  In front, with the dragon, is oregano-thyme, next to it is lemon-thyme, then winter savory and then English-thyme.  The coconut thyme is back there, it’s just still tiny and ashamed to show itself in the face of all these over-achievers.  The stuff with the pink flowers in the back next to the oregano is the cranesbill.  To the side of the lemon-thyme is tarragon.  Tarragon, meet the people.  People, meet tarragon.

Below are pictures of the tomato bed.  The one on the left is the bed when I first planted the lovely-to-be tomatoes.  The one on the right is the tomato bed after heat, water, compost and tomato food.

Ignore the weeds between the beds.  They don’t exist.  These aren’t the droids you’re looking for…  In the picture I took Saturday I really like the bed to the left, the herb bed with the dragon.  You can see how the thymes spill over the edge and get all dramatic looking.  And you can see the garlic chives hiding behind the too tall oregano.  Further back you can see the orange day lillies.  In the foreground you can see the leaves of my zucchini.  YAY for baby zucchini.

Here you can see the path that leads past the roses.  When the roses are blooming this is the most lovely path to take, it’s pretty, fragrant (in a good way) and cool.

You can see the honeysuckle on the forsythia bushes in the left front and the fire pokers in the back center.

Below are the Moss Roses.  You need to grow these, if you can find them.  They aren’t easy to get, thankfully my Mom planted them long ago.  That smell, the Lemon-Verbena and Lavender-Thyme.  Oh. My. Lanta.

Lavender.  In a clean glass.  Neat.

We have buckets of bees in the lavender all day.  Seriously, from the moment the sun slightly illuminates the back yard till just about dark, there are bees all over this plant.  You can see several if you look closely.  This lavender is right off the main patio, the bees are so drunk on lavender pollen they don’t even look at us humans.  Juicy will take a swing at the bees from time to time and they ignore his shots across the bow and get right back to the lavender.

Just look at this next picture any time your tummy feels bad.  That should help.

Chamomile.  Sigh.  Pretty pretty chamomile.

This is the most recently renovated bed in our yard.  It had been a collection of ivy, roots and trash that the people going to the park threw there.  Seriously, I won’t let anyone in my family drink Milwaukee’s Best, where do you think that can came from?

There is a canna to the left, an astilbe I’ve still got to plant, three ferns, a funky groundgover and a stump that I like.  The purpley plant is an oxalis.  The leaves will always be that really pretty purple and the flowers are a very light lilacey color.  To the right is a lovely huchera that I ended up planting in the backyard.  Behind it is a hardy begonia.  Yeah, is that cool or what?  Hardy begonia?  I had no idea.  The lawn here is more of a collection of moss and stuff because of the deep shade up here.

Lastly, my calla lillies.  I planted these about 22 years ago, they have continued to grow even though they are supposed to be tropical and die in this zone.  Yeah, whatever.  I love them.

Have a happy flowery day!

Earlier this year I posted a picture of my patio in mid-spring, this morning I took a photo from the same angle. Below is the picture from the spring:

I love the light, it’s an afternoon shot on a cool day. I love the way everything is so intensely green but immature. You can see the half moon bed at the back is full of daffodils.

Below is a picture from this morning, more late morning. See the lavender? The light is so completely different, not just because of the time of day, it’s the season.

I love how the park disappears in the summer only to reappear in the winter. The orange day lillies in the half moon bed will take over the world some day, I think. You can still see the seed pods on the iris stalks. They are so interesting to look at so I don’t cut them down. More pictures later.

It’s cool how bright the patio still is, isn’t it. Blindingly white. Like some people’s chicken legs after a long winter.

Ooops. Did I say that out loud?

Sorry.  Below is a side by side.

These roses smell heavenly, their scent floats through the yard dreamily. You can actually follow it to the source.

At the garden gate they beckon you to enter. Just don’t eat all my radishes.

These are on the other side of the gate, with the clematis.

These are the first of my grandmother’s roses. They also smell wonderful, but are more delicate. This weekend will see their full bloom. And hopefully the moss roses. Oh, the moss roses. I wish beyond anything I could give you a way to smell those flowers.

More clematis and roses. Looking at them I feel rich beyond imagining.

The full gate, on display. YAY for flowers.

There is some rule that you are supposed to prune clematis. I never have pruned this one, it’s never complained.

I love these little columbine, they are spreading through my yard volunteering themselves to bloom everywhere. I haven’t the heart to weed them out. Pretty much if a plant offers to be pretty in my yard, I’ll let it.

This is true geranium, or cranesbill. I love it. It blooms nearly all season, somewhat more slowly after the first riot.

Here is my pretty little ranunculus. I adore these flowers and have tried to grow them forever. This year three took and I am happy. Like a little greedy baby, I’m happy.

And some pretty rhododendrons, though I saw one that was a deep delicious red and now I’ve got envy, sinful evil envy.

Finally, here is my lavender becoming bloomy. YAY for bloomy lavender.

Okay, so not the last with the lavender. I really love this shot of a toy I played with when I was a child.

When I went out this morning to see my lovely yard I was dazzled by the light on the flowers. Yay for light!

Welcome to my yard at dawn:

Iris you were here:

My tractor, this is what I use to clear land and to do all the hard tasks I need to accomplish on my vast estate:

More later. Unfortunately I’ve got cheese to buy and more plants that are calling my name, forcing me to buy them and plant them in my yard.

Yesterday the guy behind me at the checkout in Safeway piled the belt high with all organic product. Organic juice, organic milk, organic toiletpaper (I’m not kidding.) Most of what he purchased were organic convenience foods. Organic macaroni and cheese, enchiladas, etc. All stuff you can heat in a microwave. All crap.

On TV I heard a celebrity state, in tones of hushed wonder, that she bought the organic apple because that’s what she believes in! Alice Cooper wears organic cotton shirts on the golf course (in the dessert mind you).

The first guy accomplished nothing for the environment by purchasing all that prepackaged food, he gets no street-cred for that. Not unless he can effectively compost all the packaging. Even then he loses because of the production and shipping costs. He’s also lost any gain he may possibly have had from eating food because it’s all pre-packaged. It’s rather like smoking organic cigarettes.

Want to accomplish something for the environment? Something really meaningful, something that will make a difference now and a difference in your wallet? Plant a garden. Grow your own organic tomatoes, radishes, brocolli, strawberries, etc. There is no shipping involved, no oil or corn is burned in a combustion engine getting the strawberry from your patio to your lips. Another thing you can do is learn to cook. It’s not difficult, really, and the benefits far outweigh the time/cost. Most of the time, ingredients are cheaper than a finished product. Most of the time the food I make from scratch is of far better quality and far tastier than anything Annie’s or Stouffer’s can muster. Plus, my leftovers go into reusable bowls, I compost the vegetable waste.

Want to accomplish something local? Buy local produce, shop from the farmer’s market and in roadside stands. Even if it’s not ‘organic’, it’s better for you, fresher and more nutritioney.

Just because it says organic on the label doesn’t mean anything much, especially not if that organic food is wrapped in layers of plastic, cardboard and print. Conventionally raised products won’t kill you.

I love shopping at farmer’s markets and roadside stands; they carry many more types of produce than the supermarket does, it’s fresher and I get to meet the people who grow it.

This is an homage to the lasting and wonderful euphoric effects of flowers on the soul:

The smell of the water after a week is something to experience, a singularly horrid olfactory haunting.  However, they went straight into the compost heap to nourish next year’s crop of beans, peas, radishes, tomatoes……

This will just be a whole bunch of pictures of my flowers. YAY for flowers.

Crabapple Blossoms: (do you like the power lines? Yeah, me neither. Except that they run my stuff. Nevermind.)

Creeping Phlox

This is one of the more interesting muscari I got as part of a mix. They start out looking moldy, I nearly cut them out so they wouldn’t infect the rest, but then looked more closely and saw that they just had really closely packed buds.

And this is a dramatic shot of my favorite flower in the genus Taraxacum, in the family Asteraceae. These lovely plants flourish everywhere and add color to every lawn.

Enjoy!

My brother-in-law, the Gallo Negro, Dad and I powerwashed the patio a couple weeks ago. I was going to post pictures of the process and before/afters. However, we had rain for days so the dang thing never dried up enough to see the difference. Now I’ve got proof: Power washers ROCK.

It began, innocently enough, when Dad pulled a couple of things out of the shed, one of them being the power washer that my nephew, Keg, lent to Dad. I was drawn to it like a moth to the flame, I could clean with POWER!!! So, I decided to set it up, clear the patio of stuff and wash it.

Except that I couldn’t make it work. At first I thought “surely this can’t be power washing. I could scrub better with a toothbrush.” I had it hooked up properly, I knew that, but just couldn’t get the power thing going.

So, Dad called Keg who ran over and fiddled with the power cord, then suddenly I HAD POWER!!!!! (insert mad laughter here)

Here is the Patio before

See how it’s yucky looking? It’s got 40 years of muck.

This is the power washer up close and personal:

I started the process, then I had to stop to go see RiotGrrrl’s achievement celebration. (Which rocked.)

Here is the Gallo Negro at work:

and here. If you look closely you can see the muckety build up of goo where the patio meets the flower bed. Euw.

Now, here is a picture I took this afternoon, see the loveliness of a clean patio?

Just a note: My Dad was out there cleaning in his basic Dad uniform. Shorts, white socks pulled up midcalf, white t-shirt and slippers. I was tempted to photograph him, but decided that I would do it a different time. He was a lovely sight.

Extra note: Gallo Negro is my Brother-in-law’s nickname.  Sometimes it’s also Gallo Frito.  But that’s personal.

It’s been awhile since I posted.  Sorry.  I’ve been planning (all in my head) to do recipe posts with photographs.  Hopefully this week I’ll be taking pictures of my baitChocolate Chip Cookies I’m making for the Spring Conference at Church. 

If I can figure it out, I’ll post a scratch and sniff area so you can smell the cookie.  In the mean time, though, I’ll be adding a recipe/food blog on the blog roll.  It will contain all the sites I actually visit regularly and like. 

Meanwhile, I’m hoping to get more pictures of my garden taken and up this evening.  The peas are up, as are the carrots, broccoli rabe, beets, radishes and the strawberries have babies out.  (Baby strawberries are the blossoms.)

I’ve been taking pictures of the flowers in my garden as spring progresses.  Later of course I’ll take provocative shots of my Zapotec tomato.  But for now, I give you my yard today:

Finally, a picture of my new cat.

The superpowers of the weedworld, Dandelions are difficult to kill. Their roots go deep and, like ticks, you must get the whole thing if you hope to kill it.

Well, yesterday I was planting some late spring/summer bulbs with a bulb planter when inspiration hit me. This thing digs down 3 plus inches, it fits around the roots and digs out the dirt around the root, giving me the chance to get the whole dang thing. Huzzah! I dug out about 15 of them yesterday, root and all.

Now I’ve got another 300,000,000 to go…..at least I have a battleplan

(the weapon*)

*muuaaahhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!

Insomnia has been my ever-present friend these past few weeks. The drugs aren’t working as well anymore, so I don’t get to sleep until hours after I go to bed. bleh. Nevertheless, I’ve gotten some reading done, watched a few shows on the pyramids, Rome, Greece and seen most of Bride and Prejudice. Last night wasn’t any different; I was awake well into the wee hours and finally went to sleep.

Until the thunder came rolling in, then I was awake again for two hours, listening. I leapt out of bed when one huge strike hit the ground somewhere nearby, close enough to rattle the windows. Thankfully, we never lost power. Most of the thunder was of the low, rolling kind, which is actually kinda comforting.

I woke up late this morning, oversleeping is the curse of the insomniac; you only get to sleep right before you must wake. Oh well.

My cat, Moxie, insisted that I get up and feed her. She’s heavy enough that when she plunks down on my stomach I lose my breath, but she’s cheerful about it so I don’t mind. Moxie is very vocal and likes to make sure I know she’s ready to eat.

So, I get dressed, take care of personal business and go downstairs to feed the beast and make coffee. When I sit down to have my first cup I look outside to see the washed, dewy landscape of a summer morning after the midnight rain, and there in the middle of the yard is a doe eating the lower leaves off our mulberry tree. She’s lovely, dainty even, so I don’t scare her off, which I know Dad will the moment he sees her. He can’t stand that something would eat anything in our yard without invitation and that the deer may damage the trees. She leaves before he wakes up.

Later, I’m still drinking coffee and reading, Dad is also and he’s reading the morning paper, just enjoying a companionable silent morning sit. Out of nowhere, the outside dinner bell begins to ring. I turn in time to see a little brown wren clinging to the clapper cord desperate to figure out where this noise is coming from. She lets go and flies away. Then it was time to leave for work.

This year my garden is producing few peas, I don’t know why, and many many more radishes. Growing up I wasn’t a fan of that little spicy red thing, but now, oh yum. But anyway, I’m still not so enamored of the straight up radish. I like it slightly marinated in Rice Vinegar, a little salt, a little pepper and I’m gone. By slightly I mean about five minutes. That seems to take the bitterness away and leaves the clear taste of the radish.

Even better than that just straight is a salad made of fresh greens and herbs straight out of my garden, seasoned with salt, kosher or sea salt, fresh ground black pepper, add a dash of really good olive oil. Then pour the bowl of marinating radishes over the lettuces and toss. Oh my lanta! That’s a really good salad. You can add a touch of grated Romano, but you don’t have to. It’s nearly perfect exactly the way it is.

Last week I had a chance to move two fairy roses from where they were dying to someplace new. One of the roses I planted in one of the front beds. The soil was okay, but it was basic Maryland soil, very clayey and needed plenty of humus and fertilizer. The other rose was going in the back yard. The soil in this back yard bed is a fabulous dark loose lovely soil that will grow anything. I didn’t need a shovel for this hole, I could have dug it with my bare hands.

That soil is the gold my mother left to me. Everytime I dig in it I remember her, more specifically I remember her in the garden, in this sturdy white dress that had sunflowers on it. It’s a memory from when I was a child. I would come home from school and not even go inside, I would head around to the back of the house because I knew that in the spring time, she would be there. I remember her hands, but especially I remember her hands covered in the soil.

When we moved to Maryland in 1969 my mother set out immediately to change the dead soil we bought with the house into a rich piece of living earth. The builders scraped away the topsoil and sold it, then built our house and laid down sod. I was too young to remember if the sod survived, but I think I remember the reseeding process.

Mom’s garden was magical to me when I was little. I remember running home from school in the spring and the fall and not even going in the house, but running around back because I knew that was where she would be, and joining her in the garden, me to play, her to continue working. My brother and I had a section one summer that we begged to be kept just dirt so we could play. We built an elaborate system of roadways, tunnels, rivers with real water and houses that we could run our vast collection of matchbox cars across, over and through. We used our Tonka toys to move that dirt around and we played out there for hours. I can still hear her shouting from the house to shake off as much of the dirt from our clothes as possible while still in the garden.

From the beginning Mom wanted an organic garden, so she used grass clippings to keep the weeds away. Not just from our yard. One of the most embarrassing recurring episodes of my growing up years, Mom used to take me and my brother out to collect grass clippings from the neighbors. The embarrassing part is that Mom would roam the neighborhood checking on who used Chemlawn or some such service and note that house. She then noted those homes where chemicals weren’t used and then almost daily during the summer we have to get in the back of the old station wagon and ride with her to pick up bags of other peoples grass clippings, we would beg to avoid classmates homes. My brother and I used to hide, lay low and throw those bags in the wagon as fast as we could. Once we got home it wasn’t a big deal to unload. The worst was if there was trash mixed in with the grass.

But all those years of spreading grass clippings over the beds and in the garden have surely done an incredible job of making the pure clay soil of 30 + years ago into some of the richest and deepest garden loam in our neighborhood. Now that she’s gone, I’m so grateful I have that treasure of gold. This summer I have come back to the garden with renewed vigor and hope, and it has repaid my attention with delicious peas, raspberries, tomatoes, lettuces and micro greens and bounteous fragrant herbs. It repaid the deer with the cucumbers, which they ate down to the ground, stalks and all after we only harvested one or two. Even now in the waning days of summer I have bushes of basil and lemon verbena I must put to good use and a ton of tomatoes that will never ripen. Planning for next years garden has already begun.

When I lived in Colorado I ached for rain. Not that it doesn’t rain there, it just rains for a couple of minutes, then it’s over, have a rainbow, move on. I missed the kind of rain that goes on for days and days, when you stayed inside and read good books. I missed rumbling thunder and lightning, I missed a cool breeze on a hot day that smelled of water. I missed hurricanes and so I was very happy when God moved me back to the East Coast.

Yes, I missed hurricanes. The air running before a hurricane smells of the sea and turns the world green, telling it’s tale of wind to come. Then the wind does come, and it howls like an animal, then the rain, washing everything away. Hours later the clearing comes and the world is fresh again. I can’t stay inside during the storms, I have to see the sky mad with boiling fury, feel the wind lashing in anger and the rain crying itself out on this poor earth. Somehow, at least to me, the world feels more alive when hurricanes blow, like God is walking beside me when I am out there.

Now there is the pesky matter of storm damage and deaths, I do pray that people are able to find secure shelter and that the damage isn’t too high. But always remembering that with out these storms the world would become hopelessly and forever polluted. It is just that we humans have built up and love our things so much that we forget that these storms have scoured the face of the earth for millennia, and like the forest fires that are currently ravaging the west, they are necessary to our very survival.

So, here I remain, one of the few that is actually excited at the prospect of a busy hurricane season.

Here is my list of reasons why keeping an organic garden ROCKS!

10. The smell of the dirt, it doesn’t smell like anything other than dirt, which means the smell is clean. That is a lovely smell.
9. You can assign children to work in the garden with out worrying what limb will grow out of their back in a week. Nothing out there is really unsafe for handling at anytime.
8. You can use that nasty light beer left over from a family gathering to catch slugs. You won’t waste it and you can then make more room for good beer. And it works.
7. Peas. Peas in June, right off the vine. Oh, my, that’s nice.
6. Eating a salad in which the only thing you didn’t grow is the dressing. (Olive trees don’t grow in Maryland. )
5. Raspberries, right off the bushes. right off, no washing.
4. The smell of the herbs as the sun warms them.
3. Mint. Just pick a leaf and crush it then rub it between your hands. That is a heavenly smell.
2. EVERYTHING tastes incredible. There are no chemical aftertastes, it’s all just really lovely. really.
1. Being able to barely rinse, or not, the things you eat. I need to find a waterproof salt shaker to keep next to the tomato beds, so I can just stand there and glut myself on sun warmed vine ripened heirloom tomatoes. The taste of fresh herbs on everything. Nothing like, really. There is such a difference between picked two days ago and picked three minutes ago.

Last night there was a fabulous storm and the fading light of the day mixed with the greening air of the coming storm to create really lovely light. The roses, peony, clematis and the rest of the flowers were just gorgeous. I took pictures which I hope to post in the next few days.