Dreamin'

It's mid March, 70 degrees and my first crocus bloomed today! Knowing that we could very well have snow ahead of us I am trying desperately to keep Spring Fever at bay. But once I post this entry the flood gates will open and there will be no turning back. Not long after I hit the "publish" key I'll be checking every single plant on a daily basis. And in no particular order, what I am looking forward to the MOST..............

1. The three daylily divisions my sister gave me from her garden at the end of last year's season. I put them in post-blossom so their exact color will be a lovely surprise.

2. At the end of the season I planted a "Brookside" perennial geranium that was foliage only when I planted it. I love perennial geraniums, have a few varieties, but if "Brookside" measures up to its picture, this could turn out to be my favorite.

3. Last Spring my bright orange Oriental Poppy looked garish where it was. In my mind it also looked garish wherever I tried to imagine re-planting. I finally decided to transplant it right next to the white lattice, knowing that white can befriend ANYTHING on the color wheel. Can't wait to see if my re-lo works.

4. In its youth, my last year's Iris Siberica Butter and Sugar only put up two or three blossoms. Will it have grown exponentially over the winter? (See title of post)

5. There seems to be a disconnect between Mertensia (Virginia Bluebell) and myself. How can a color so perfectly blue and alluringly lovely be so resistant to my cajoling it into living? They do die back completely during the summer and disappear below the soil, but my last one never emerged from its dormant state. So I did what any gardener would do, put in another one. It too disappeared, as it is supposed to. The question is, will it re-appear this Spring? I may be able to live without mertensia, but I'm really not sure.......

6. If, on my garden map I enter a teeny-tiny "IC" next to a plant, it means that I have mentally put it in "Intensive Care" and doubt it will return. Flax linum, gallardia and a gloriosa daisy looked wan enough last Fall for the notation. I can't wait to see if they defied the odds.

7. Digitalis (Foxgloves) are biennials - they propogate by re-seeding. Well, in other people's gardens. Mine? Not even if I talk pretty to them. Will my last summer's new foxglove (Camelot White) reward me?

8. Will the local nursery call to say that the hard to find Niobe clematis I requested last Fall has come in? If so, I will dance all the way to the nursery.

9. Another sister (sisters are wonderful) gave me a plant I admired in her garden but we aren't quite sure what it is - thinking blackberry lily. If luck is with me it will celebrate its first Fall in my garden.

If you are a reader I would love to know what you are really excited about finding this Spring. Go ahead, feed my frenzy.

An Arrival

Good-bye household chores.

Hello chair.

March Comes In Like A Lion

Uh-oh.....

Move over, Martha

Ssssshhh, don't tell Martha Stewart, because this idea is MINE, all MINE! I had to create a system of organizing for reference my plant purchase tags. I had been using the "shoe-box method." Whenever I needed to look something up I dumped a shoebox filled with these tags and poked around until I came up with the right tag. I was doing this with great regularity and annoying myself with the time it took. If I wanted to put in another columbine and couldn't remember what color had bloomed two months ago.........out came the shoebox. If a friend asked for the exact name of the achillea whose color is eye-popping (Pomegranate) ............ the shoe-box shuffle. If I wanted to know why Clematis Angelique wasn't sprawling all OVER my new trelllis.........shoebox dumping again. (OOOooooh, the tag says this dear little angel maxes out at 3-4 feet.) An idea was born. My first step was to find a ring large enough to hold my hundred or so tags, some of which have moved with me two times. Office Supply stores and online sources yielded ZIP. After weeks of searching, Hank entered the challenge and found this 3" ring at a craft store where it was intended to organize cards of embroidery floss. The next step was to punch holes in the tags in preparation for the most fun of all - alphabetizing by Latin name from Achillea to Veronica. I keep a fine-tip black flair near my tag ring so that I can make notes on the back to reference the nursery or where I planted it. Oh, and did I mention that it just happens to slip right down the handle of the wheelbarrow? And in the true spirit of garden sharing, if Martha comes knocking on my door for the copyright, of course I will oblige.

Footprints in the Garden

I confess to a pang of guilt when I remind myself that as much as I love our home, the lot preparation probably agitated a few birds and animals. And so we try to get back into the good graces of our woodland friends by planting bird-friendly plants and shrubs for their summer pleasure and inviting them to the bird feeder in the winter. Until my happy gardening season returns, a little bit of back yard tracking keeps me out of trouble and reminds me of another world.

The canine track below with four clawed toes is likely that of a dog, but because our neighbors never let their dogs roam, it imagine it could also be a fox. Our three year old grandson would like to believe it is a dino print.

These dear little prints match up with a junco or a sparrow.

I do believe a red squirrel has been making himself at home.

What have we here? Genus Hankus Americanus - the print of HE who faithfully fills the feeders every day. Neither snow, nor sleet, nor mighty gusts will slow him down.

I like that tracking gives me the reassurance that there is a life out there that exists only under cover of dark and starry skies. I've heard the owls, so I know they are there. But when insomnia strikes I really like thinking about things that come out of the silent woods, take a look around, and creep back in. There's something very mysterious and comforting about that night life.

There is one night visitor who leaves the best footprints of all and has been doing so for centuries:

best and coziest winter book ever!

nighty-nite

Let It Snow! (Please)

"In the bleak midwinter

Frosty wind made moan

Earth stood hard as iron,

water like a stone."

These 1872 words of Christina Rossetti and the picture on the left describe my January garden as the calendar page turns. The next line of this hymn,

"Snow had fallen, snow on snow,

snow on snow"

is wishful thinking. In this unusually snowless season I am growing impatient. Most of my perennials can shrug off the frigid temps without nature's blanket of snow But there are also a few tender perennials such as Flax and Geum, whose roots are not likely to survive being exposed to the winter blast.

I will admit that mulching is not my forte and in a bow to that admission I try to cut my losses by avoiding fragile perennials. But this year I planted my first mums as a challenge to my "wintering over skills." Openly facing the west wind, they invite destruction. Today I tried to talk them off the ledge. I first cut back and blanketed them with their own brown stems and blossoms. Their next blanket was a generous layer of leaves. After we dismantled Christmas, Hank cut several branches of our tree to lay atop the leaves to anchor it all in place. In May I will know if my efforts were rewarded.

When the task was complete, we put what remained of our tree out to the curb, inviting the obvious observation from passers-by. "Oh, those poor Cardinalis....what a pitiful Christmas tree they had this year.