Wordless Wednesday: Working In and Around the Willow Arbor

Begonia grandis and Tradescantia pallida 'Purpurea'. 

Neglected Festuca californica with a columnar apple tree and black cat. 

Tagetes erecta 'French Vanilla'. 

Cyclamen hederifolium. 

More apples from the tree. 

Behold! An Artist's Studio has Grown in the Garden

For the last month I've been working very hard to make this studio possible for a good friend of mine. Years ago when I first moved into this house I'd wanted this space very badly to be a writing studio. After I went through that phase, I'd hoped to clean it out and use it for my Etsy businesses, but like many things in life, it just didn't quite work out as I'd hoped.

I can say now (with complete certainty) that cleaning out that space taught me a great deal about myself and my divorce. In each and every object I could see and feel a memory or two and I'd find myself taking mental steps backwards, revisiting these memories, going deeper into my former life, and this allowed me to review repeatedly both my own unhappiness and the many arguments which had occurred. 

This was an incredible experience to say the least, and in a strange way, I'm very happy it took place. 

Mona—the youngest of the 3 black cats—trying her hardest to remain as feral as possible until she can no longer take the wet cold. At that point she'll move into the basement to remain toasty warm all winter. 

The garage/studio is now free of all of those objects and I'm free of their bad memories. The process truly had me working through some intense emotions and for weeks I was physically exhausted by that process. I'm finished with that for now—except for some ongoing trash removal—but otherwise, I've found a great deal of closure. 

Begonia hemsleyana from Cistus Nursery.

For the first time in months, I finally feel like I'm getting closer to my new life and this is an exciting time for me. I've turned the corner and have finally moved past the chaos and am back outside again in the garden.

Rhododendron sinogrande amongst little friends.

I enter there and find that my garden sanctuary is now covered in mysterious autumn mists with a sprinkling of yellow and red leaves that are lifted and spun around by the crisp, sharp winds that punctuate the rays of tilted October sunbeams. 

.Aspidistra elatior.

Often these brisk breezes take me completely by surprise—especially when I am somewhere in the shade.

Great creeping Coleus that I hope to overwinter indoors as a houseplant. Why not!

It has always amazed me how differently I feel about the shade at this time of the year. Whereas it was my friend just a few weeks ago, now it's become the dark alley I don't want to be caught in for fear of some unknown impending danger. (OK, for me that might just be some foot cramps and purple fingers but those can be at least a tiny bit irritating.)

Hardy Cylamen. 

During the last few weeks of summer I allowed myself to fully enjoy my back garden with many friends—both new and old. I'd never done this before and will always remember the late night conversations drinking wine beneath the stars. Like many other gardeners I'd made the space to be lived in, to be enjoyed, to laugh in, and to grow in—that finally happened for me, so now, as I move on (and possibly away from here), I can do so knowing I grew in this place. 

That is what is important to me. I grew. They grew. My friends and I all grew together. It may take a village to raise a child, but I think that growing together as a group of individuals makes something much more vibrant and alive—much like a natural ecosystem. We all have our part to play and are necessary to one another.

I grew as a woman and as a person in my garden this year and it's thanks to the plants I planted which supported us all as people searching out in the dark for meaning and substance.

Lithops. 

Soon I will be posting more about the houseplants as they move indoors again.

As always, I'm returning more and more to my peacock sense of fashion.

Virginia Creeper, (Parthenocissus quinquefolia).

And this peacock gardener is enjoying the riot of autumn colors before they're gone. Sure, not everyone is a huge fan of Virginia Creeper but it does provide the most amazing fireworks-like finale in the garden.

I often sit out in the cold now with the little cat and she takes it all in with me.

The hummingbirds talk to us, and I am happy to have them since they also look at me through the back window in my music/plant/writing room on the mornings when I sit down to write.

More on my own creative indoor studio next time...

(And yes, more to come on indoor plant labor-i-tories soon!)

È arrivato l'autunno! And darkness is falling...

Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia) from the bedroom window. 

Due to my seed collecting and my husband's grape harvesting, bottling, and pressing, for us autumn is when we return to our roots. It's when I begin to feel like cooking again and it's when I return to my Catholic past. From now until Easter we'll cover all of the holidays with food and friends. Once Easter hits though it's back to the "fields" for both of us. (I still have 4 weeks though before Mr B returns home for winter from California. That's when the kitchen really gets going!)

Burst of gold from the bedroom window. That's our old garage behind the house and beside it is our overgrown willow  arbor. (This is what happens when you break your pruning fingers.)

This year I will be making one last road trip to the San Francisco Bay area and I will be taking everyone along with me again. Believe it or not blogging along the way makes the traveling a bit less lonely. And trust me, the Redwoods in the rain and fog can be very scary even for this girl from the heavily forested Pacific Northwest. 

Looking into the heart of the Cyclamen. 

Before I leave I still have so much work to do and that's why my blogging has been a bit slow. At least the Ikebana work has been picking up thanks to my enrollment in a course. My teacher is a wonderful woman I met over 20 years ago when I worked with her husband as an ESL helper for Japanese exchange students. He is also a much loved Buddhist minister and it was such an honor to me that he came to our class solely to say "Hello" to me on my first day. I am still smiling about that! Glowing really.

Perennial Impatiens arguta.

Autumn has had a few surprised for me in the garden too. With the onslaught of a lot of rain, my perennial Impatiens has gone crazy with bloom after bloom. It is so beautiful to see such delicate jewels just before it's the end of the season. The lilac is so unlike so many of the other fall colors but I don't mind a bit.

I couldn't help but chuckle a bit when this box arrived on my doorstep. It's full of dried plant material for crafts, as well as heat sealable teabags and dried kelp for making compost teabags. 

There are all of the last minute craft projects too that I have been planning for my shop. Some are things I have always wanted to sew, like sachet bags, and some are new ideas, like bath time teabags with fresh local dried hops and honeycomb extract from France. Sounds tasty too, right?

Dried Praying mantis. 

Autumn is also the time we have to say goodbye to things we find beautiful until the next season, and when I found this amazing specimen dried between my exterior and interior window today, it saddened me and I felt a little tear well up in my eye, but there will be more Praying mantis bugs in my garden next year. Until then, it's a little bit of feasting around these parts...

"Ogghiu di 'n summa, vinu di 'mmenzu e meli di 'n funnu." 

"The choice oil is from the surface, the best wine is from the middle, 

and the best honey is from the bottom."—Sicilian saying

(I tend to practice my Italian this time of year too by singing a lot out of boredom so here's a little Italian pop music courtesy of my favorite Italian singer Jovanotti. The first one is a corny love song, the second is a classic funny song about love, and then the last one is s new "magic happy" song I am kind of really into right now and the foster kids seem to love it because it's bouncy: Baciami Ancora, Bella & La notte dei desideri).

Fall Round Up

Our summer was a bit of a dud here in the NW due to El Niño. What's funny is that I remember another summer like this during the 80s when I was a young girl. My family lived on a medium-sized creek and each summer I was able to purchase a new raft for my own use. Usually I just tied it up under some overarching bushes, and with my trusted radio by my side, I'd read all day. That summer, it was just too cold to hang out in the creek all day, and I feel the disappointed feelings of that memory creeping over me as I write this. I don't think I like El Niño a lot.

Yesterday, while cleaning up my overgrown jungle with a weekender foster child, I saw these blooms and I knew what they meant. Ah, how I adore my Cyclamen, but they are the bellwether of autumn whether I like it or not.

Cyclamen hederifolium

This little darling popped up and I have no idea what it is, but I would love to find out if any of you have and idea. I am sure that I planted it, and that it is in my database, but I just need a hint to figure it out. There are at least 729 entries in my spreadsheet now. Yikes! 

Sedums and the like are some of my favorite little garden friends. This is an image of Old Man's Bones. 

Sedum globosum

Another thing I have become more and more proud of are my ivy topiary items. Since ivy is considered the ultimate evil in these parts, even if you just have the completely non-agressive type, I keep it around just in case. The leaves on this are the tiniest I have ever seen. 

Hedera helix 'spetchley'

I only have one of these that's made it through my neglectful care this past season. I purchased the seeds from Thompson and Morgan and I intend to grow more of these next season. I have never seen such amazing dark leaves on an annual snapdragon. 

Antirrhinum majus nanum 'bronze dragon'

The last single specimen plant in my garden that I am showing is my dwarf pomegranate shrub. I am really sad that it did not make it very far this year. We have tons of blooms, but nothing resembling a small fruit is anywhere near making it. It is a true perennial in this climate though, and I don't regret planting it at all. Last year I had two small pomegranates so I can wait another year to try again. (I have harvested about 50 figs from my dwarf fig tree so I am quite happy with the fruits of my labors.)

Punica granatum var nana

Here is the pomegranate in context. It is to the bottom left in the corner of this picture. The grapes are escaping their supports in this picture and are about to reach out to strangle their neighbors. (These are Italian wine grapes. I planted them to remind me of all the hard work my husband does making wine down in California.)

This picture is meant to show how unremarkable our porch is this year. Typically, the porch would be lit up with late summer color. I have color, but it just didn't really grow enough. Better luck next season. I WILL be back.

Here is the cleaned up front area. In my mind, it is the least attractive area in our garden. I think it is due to the heat during the summer. The Provence lavender was finally harvested at least for crafts and gifts. It had eaten the sidewalk and folks would walk around it to avoid it. Now I will be able to watch more neighbors walk by since they won't avoid our side of the street anymore. 

The backyard and I have a love/hate relationship. The greatest accomplishment back there this past season though was the additional growth of items that block our view of the small apartment building behind us. I have hated the view of this building for some time, and I really don't like the walkway that is frequently used by the tenants and their continued curiosity, as well as their loud cell conversations. Maybe I should add that I would also like a sound buffer from the busy street a house away from me, and that maybe next summer, I might like to have an outdoor movie setup but I have to protect them from my noise then too so it is a two-way street, right? I want to be a good neighbor, really I do. 

Oh, and this is my big boy Maurice. He has had a rough summer with the foster kids and has taken to living privately in the basement with his friend Mona. He has been mishandled by too many kids these past few months and today we spent several hours alone together in the garden. He was very happy.