If you are a gardener and live where there are four seasons, you're probably like me in February--itching to get your hands in dirt. Along about now I find myself longing for color. It helps if there is snow on the ground to cover all the brown, but after a while that doesn't even help. So this morning I found myself looking through my Photo Library where I collect the photos I've taken of my garden through the years. . . .
I planted my first garden when my youngest was two. He would be my last child and I knew that nurturing a garden would help me let go of my children as they grew up and left home. Over the last 26 years I've dug, and hauled, and planted, and weeded. I've enjoyed walking through others' gardens to get ideas and perusing garden centers for plants. Each year I look forward to Spring when the perennials begin to poke through the earth again. I'm eager to discover what has made it through the winter. Some do not survive, but this gives me an opportunity to start over.
Designing my garden beds is intuitional for me. This is the part of gardening I love the most. It allows me to express my own sense of beauty--putting textures and colors together. But, like life, gardening has it's struggles. Sometimes it can be disheartening when after a beautiful Spring, Summer brings heat and humidity to decimate my garden. Colors fade, leaves shrivel, then the bugs and powdery mildew have a field day!
This is why I take photos. They remind me, like memories, of the best part of gardening and give me hope for Springtime. . . .
I planted my first garden when my youngest was two. He would be my last child and I knew that nurturing a garden would help me let go of my children as they grew up and left home. Over the last 26 years I've dug, and hauled, and planted, and weeded. I've enjoyed walking through others' gardens to get ideas and perusing garden centers for plants. Each year I look forward to Spring when the perennials begin to poke through the earth again. I'm eager to discover what has made it through the winter. Some do not survive, but this gives me an opportunity to start over.Designing my garden beds is intuitional for me. This is the part of gardening I love the most. It allows me to express my own sense of beauty--putting textures and colors together. But, like life, gardening has it's struggles. Sometimes it can be disheartening when after a beautiful Spring, Summer brings heat and humidity to decimate my garden. Colors fade, leaves shrivel, then the bugs and powdery mildew have a field day!
This is why I take photos. They remind me, like memories, of the best part of gardening and give me hope for Springtime. . . .
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Take Joy!
LOVED, LOVED, LOVED....the walk through your garden! It was absolutely gorgeous & I especially enjoyed that you captured the bumblebee, butterflies & praying mantis' (or were they grasshoppers?). Thank you for sharing. Love, your Sister Sandy xoxo
ReplyDeleteYou're correct. They are praying mantis. I hope when you come the heat and humidity haven't gotten to it yet. ❤️
DeleteOh Cathy, what a sublime little video-visit that was. And a tease too! We've had a really easy Winter overall so far and yet I STILL want Spring to get here soon! So we can go back to having green and then more colors around here. So tired of gray and brown and white. Plus I'm itching for Spring after looking over Barbra Streisand's book again. You know how I have my inspiration books and boxes, full of photos and ideas and samples and swatches and paint chips etc etc for my "Someday" house? Well I have a couple of boxes - now really computer folders - full of garden ideas too. And I saw so many of the plants and flowers I've "clipped" for my garden in your video. You have really great taste - LOL! And your colors - lots of purples and every shade of pink and white - are my main colors too. I think my very favorite flower are violets - such pretty little faces. I hope Olivia is interested in helping in the garden this year. Maybe she could plant her own little pot of flowers somewhere at your house, water it when she visits, take care of it etc. Or have a tomato plant or a pepper to look after, and then get to eat the "fruit of her labors" when it's harvest time! My paternal grandfather was a master amateur gardener and i remember him letting me water the snapdragons along his stone fence when I was little, even before I went to Kindergarten. I remember taking it SO seriously. I was actually worried about giving the plants too much water and drowning them. And then of course my Dad ordering those 200 tomato plants his first year in the country at our new house. I remember Grandpa asking my Dad about that order before he sent it off. "Dick, are you sure you want 200 tomato plants?" My Dad insisting that he knew we had plenty of room and could make good use of them etc. And he was right - there WAS plenty of room. But he never realized how many tomatoes a single plant can yield. And 1967 must have been a banner year for tomatoes because we got literally 1000s of them. Every surface in the barn and garage was covered with tomatoes, every spare basket, box and bag we could find was eventually full. We even borrowed a hay wagon from the farm next door so we could sell our overflow supply in front of the house - and my Mom told me years later than they used the $$ from the tomato sale to entirely pay for Christmas that year! Oh gosh, yackety yack. She's back! Take care and talk to you soon. 🍊
ReplyDeleteTwo hundred tomatoes?! Had he planned on selling them when he planted that many or just thought your mother would can the "extras" ? I'm glad they didn't go to waste and you got an extra special Christmas that year.
DeleteLooking through Streisand's book put me in the mood to look at my garden photos, too. Probably not this year, but next year I think Olivia will be ready to help me plant a Peter Rabbit garden. ☺︎
Nope, Dad hadn't planned that we sell any at all. He just knew Mom would can lots, and freeze homemade tomato sauce, and make ketchup, spaghetti sauce, chili sauce etc. And of course for nearly 2 solid months there was a huge bowl of cold cut-up tomatoes on our supper table. I do think he planned on giving away a sizable amount too, especially since we had often received treats from family and neighbors ourselves. But I don't think he ever really did the math. That's why Grandpa kept asking him "Are you sure? 200 plants?" If I remember correctly, the second year of "The Great Garden" Dad only ordered between 25-40 and we STILL had more than enough to eat, preserve, give away and sell. Grandpa retired from the fire department about a few years after we moved to the new house, and he'd come out from the city at least once a week, Sunday morning usually after church, to see all the projects my Dad was working on - inside and outside. He'd prowl all over the garden, in the barn-turned-garage, back in the orchard, everywhere - before finally coming in the house for coffee and usually lunch. 🍅
DeleteJanet, I think you should write a book about your family! A bygone era of a large family and all the goings on.
DeleteLOL, maybe you're right. I can get started by just digging up all my old comments right here on your blogs. Most of the time they turn into family stories, don't they? 📖
DeleteThat would be great! And I'm sure your nieces and nephews would love hearing about their grandparents and especially their parents.
DeleteI always enjoy visiting your garden. It is such a delight and I love your words, pictures, and your story.
ReplyDeleteSeasons? Well, we should have four but last year they sort of all rolled up into one extended version of an early Spring! I'm itching to get out thee soon as I can but oh! the weather is not playing nicely at all.
~~~Deborah
Thank you Deborah. I enjoy "visiting" your garden, too, and hope you can get out there soon. Gardeners really have to learn how to get along with the weather! It's definitely a love-hate relationship.
DeleteYou hit a home run this morning, Cathy! I usually read your post early in the morning and I can say this has been a joyful beginning to my day. Such beautiful color and the green...so green! Green is what I have come to notice, since it's a color rarely seen here. I have been dreaming of gardening again this year. That means using water and that makes me nervous! The prediction of a wetter than usual winter was a flop, and February has been warm, even in the 80's, windy and dry. We have spent the last 5 years just trying to keep foundation plants alive and I haven't dreamed of planting more.....,but I am getting antsy! Maybe I will just step forward in faith and follow through with all the plans I keep putting on paper. If not I will just live vicariously through you! I am dying to get outside and work in the ground. Thanks for the beauty you spread this morning. Chris
ReplyDeleteI so glad my little video brought you delight, Chris. When we have dry spells in the summer it's very disheartening. I eventually give up on some of my plants and just tend the potted plants. I collect rain water in a barrel, water that I run to get to the hot water before doing the dishes, and even the air conditioner condensation water. It normally drains from a hose into our laundry tub, but I collect that and carry it outside to put on my plants. We have a well, so I don't want to chance using up all our water when there's been no rain for awhile.
DeleteCathy, you really know how to tease a gardener! Your garden is full of joy and wonderful color combinations. About now, it sure is nice to be reminded of what is to come! I can hardly wait! Enjoy your weekend. ♥
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad you enjoyed walking through my garden!
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