Tag Archives: gardening

TENDING MY GARDEN

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IMG_0896The rain is done, but the clouds and wind are still making their presence felt.  I’m edgy with unease. Sheba is bugging the hell out of me with her demand to play.  She’s a barker and quite vocal about her needs.  Grrrr!  Good thing someone has taken her outside.

I dispelled some of my distress this morning on my perennial beds. I dug, weeded, thinned and mulched.  I still have a long way to go. But now, they at least have a definite shape and not just a jungle of greens.

The rains had made the ground soft and easier to work with.  I guess God is looking after me in his infinitely wise ways.  He smiled just now, beaming sunshine as I’m tapping away here.

The wind is still here.  I like to think that it is God, breathing, sighing and whispering as he looks over his creation.  I hope he is pleased with what I have accomplished.  My raised beds are doing remarkably well for their first year.  The kohlrabi and peas have grown with the rain.  The onions, radishes, lettuce and kale are thriving.  Then there are my tomatoes and peppers.

IMG_0899The main garden is coming along, too.  Now we need some steady sun and serious heat for everything to come to their full potential.

EVERY DAY HAS ITS CLOUD

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IMG_0866The clouds can get to me.  Their shifting shadows feel ominous, giving me a sense of impending doom.  It feels as if someone is walking on my grave. I’m waiting for the shoe to drop.  It never has.

I’ve learned to live with this holding my breath, waiting for the shoe to drop – waiting to wake up from my free fall through space and hitting the ground.  I never have.  And so, I’m braver now.  I have wings and I can almost fly.  No heavy landing for me, thank you very much.

IMG_0876Still, the clouds can make my heart skip a beat at times.  But that is okay.  I flutter my wings a bit to calm it and carry on.  There’s early bike rides with Sheba trotting by my side.  She needs someone ahead to chase after or else she digs her heels in and say, No!  We ride when the sun shines or not.  I feel like a postman.

The sun is shining now.  It has been playing hide and seek with the clouds all day.  I am playing along with both of them.  Whatever works! The rain has made the ground nice and soft to dig.  It is a good opportunity to clean up my much neglected and overgrown perennial beds.

I’m hoping they will look better in a month or two.  Digging and clearing is good therapy.  I’m cleaning my inner space along with my outer space.

OF PROMPTS, COMMENTS & OTHER THINGS

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NaBloPoMo_0614_298x255_prompts_0Wednesday, June 4, 2014 
Have you ever deleted a comment? What would make you delete a comment?

I have not ever deleted a comment from my blog. No wait, I have – spams, comments that have nothing to do with my posts.  That answers the second question, doesn’t it?  I would delete spams and hateful, rude, attacking, etc. comments.

And why not?  There’s no discussion in those kinds of comments. They do not gender connection or helping each other out.  They do not build positive outcome.  There!  Now let’s get on with the rest of the day.

IMG_5692We had a beautiful bike ride with Sheba in tow this morning. The streets were peaceful and quiet. The sky was overcast but the sun came out as we were riding out. There’s something about the early mornings that calm your soul.

I have finished planting the last of my tomatoes and onions.  I am feeling happy with my gardening efforts.  The tomatoes are looking great.  The Sunberry is blooming.  Will I be baking Sunberry pies this year?  The onions, radishes, lettuce, kale and kohlrabi are all showing up.  How splendid they look!

IMG_0854I got caught in the afternoon rain.  Once I was wet, there was no need to hurry any more.  I was past the point of “keeping dry”.  The only dry part was my head, thanks to my hat.  I hung it on my new shoe rack on the deck, along with my pants.  No, I did not have my umbrella with me.

But all is well.  The rain is gone and the sun is shining brightly on this mixed bag of a Wednesday.

COME SATURDAY

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Today is one of those perfect, perfect Saturdays.  I hear the Sandpipers song, Come Saturday Morning in my head.

“Come Saturday morning
I’m going away with my friend
We’ll Saturday-spend to the end of the day
Just I and my friend
We’ll travel for miles in our Saturday smiles
And then we’ll move on
But we’ll remember long after Saturday’s gone”

The song brings a picture of a happy sunny spring morning. And I am feeling mellow and happy. There is a spring to my step as Sheba and I started out on our walk.

IMG_0773The sun was shining, the air fresh and warm. The birds were singing their own melodies.  In the park the children had ball practice. Sheba and I watched awhile and then we went on our way home.

The day has flown by.  My peas and beans are finally coming up as well as the carrots.   The potatoes are pushing their way out of the soil.  As much as I love the birds in the yard, I do not want to share my garden goods with them yet.

I heard that shiny objects deter them.  I hung a couple of shiny red bags along the fence where the peas are and strung some ribbons on the obelisk for the scarlet runners.

It looks a bit like a party, doesn’t it?  I hope the birds don’t think and come!

HOW GRAPE THOU ART

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IMG_0823The rains has stopped.  The days are a bit cooler but the sun is competing with the clouds.  Perfect weather for more planting.  I am excited and impassioned.  I have the green bug in me.

IMG_0826We rushed out to Dutch Growers yesterday and came home with 2 Beta Grapes.  They are planted along the side of the sun room. This morning the frame for the vines to climb up was erected.  Hopefully next summer I will be picking blue-black grapes and making juice and jelly – and maybe wine.

It looks like the clouds are now winning.  A light rain would be welcomed.  Perfect for my grapes and raspberries to get a good start.  Someone up there likes me!  How great is HE!

I better take advantage and run out and put in my onion sets, scarlet runners and more carrots.

 

 

 

 

AFTER THE HEAT

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IMG_0810After a couple of days of heat, the clouds and the showers came.  It was a welcomed relief for the garden and gardener.  I took the opportunity to do a bit more planting in between raindrops. Two raspberry bushes went into a sunny corner, right in front of the cherry tomatoes.  One will produce red fruits in midsummer and the other gold in autumn.  I don’t imagine they will fruit this year but I can always hope.

I had really neglected my green thumb the last few years.  It was really hard doing shift work and raising Sheba.  Something had to give.  Gardening was one of them.  I used to spend endless happy hours starting seedlings and transplanting in the spring.  And later, I moved things here and there, hauled gravel and created flower beds.

Somewhere, sometime, when I wasn’t paying attention, everything went to pots.  And as a result, my yard became a mess – over run with ground-covers and weeds.  The pots stood empty except for dirt and weeds.  But now, my green thumb has returned.  The flower bed and pots are lovingly filled again.

The ground-covers and weeds are still running wild.  They will be tamed in good time.

ALL ON A SATURDAY MORNING

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IMG_0805I think summer has finally come.  We are rejoicing in the sunshine and the warm.  It’s a bit of a shock to the system to adjust from a single digit temperature to a sizzling 30 degrees overnight.  Some of us take refuge in the shade.

We have our first bloom in the flower bed.  And the last two raised beds are planted with peppers, tomatoes and celery.  Now it’s time to sit back and see how they do.

WOMEN AT WORK

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IMG_6628The sky was overcast, the morning air sweet with the smell of rain. The birds sang in full chorus.  Bring it on!

I have a little gas in my tank and I am ready to tackle the day.  No more procrastination, at least for today.  I am fuelled by my recent successes.

  • I called the city about the poor condition of the back alley and they showed up on Mothers Day to grade it!
  • I made an appointment and got a date to have my car’s rusted tailgate repainted.
  • Yesterday, the roofer showed up to fix a faulty flashing on the garage roof without a reminder.  YAY!  I love businesses who live up to their reputation.

IMG_0723I am pumped and ready to go.  So I might as well strike while the iron is hot.  Is that how the saying goes?  Even though I can’t move a mountain physically, I can metaphorically, in small loads.

IMG_0732Sheba supervised from afar, making sure that I don’t screwed up.  I got 4 loads before the rain came.  Good thing the roofer came yesterday!

So you’re probably wondering where and why I am moving my mountain.  It is for creating little gardens of eden – 4 of them this year.  Hopefully we will harvest aplenty in the fall.  We won’t be able to feed the world but it’s a start….in a good direction.

TRYIN’, CRYIN’ TIMES

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IMG_0529I woke up this morning to be greeted by more snow.  This was after a day of rain all day on Wednesday.  Thursday morning, we discovered large amount of water had leaked in around the skylight in the garage.  So a quick call was sent to the roofer’s.  The trouble had started since the roof was re-shingled.

Then coming home yesterday afternoon, we see that there are large water muddles in our back alley – a problem we had the city fixed two years ago.  It is a bit disheartening to see we got our problem back.  Nothing to do but write the city again and send more pictures.  If only the neighbours IMG_0527could have done the same instead of digging a ditch to divert their puddles.

I could just cry but it would just add to the puddles.  Instead, I check on my bedding plants.  I turn on the grow light and bask in its brightness.  I see that the peppers, leeks and tomatoes are coming along fabulously.  If you look very carefully, you can see the celeriac are germinating.  There is one lone geranium, lost among them.  I will have a garden and spring and summer will come.  The leak and puddles will be gone.  I have faith and believe in the divine.

 

 

 

SUCCESSES, FAILURES, AND IN BETWEEN

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What is success?  What is failure?  I tend to think in black and white.  Sometimes I see in black and white in times of stress – life in Kodak moments.  But that is not how life is.  There are many shades of grey in between.  There are other spaces between success and failure.

You would think, looking at the picture above, that I’m a successful gardener.  And you would be right.  I am successful for that much, but as for the rest of the garden….We hope to do better next year.  It is in the other spaces in between success and failure that give rise to our better selves, where we are motivated to do not perfect, but BETTER.  There are no spaces in perfect, no room to grow.

My teachers in high school had such high hopes for me.  They pushed me to go to university, when all I want at the time was to be a secretary.  So I went to university.  I succeeded in finishing two years, but not in getting a degree.  I dreamed of being an artist and a writer.  I did not become such, though I dappled in both.  But I did end up being a secretary for awhile, until my heart became discontented.

I became a nurse then, not because I want to serve mankind or such noble causes.  I was bored and felt unfulfilled.  I wanted to be an executive secretary, but I did not have that kind of persona.  I could not move up.  I was a failure!  And so I moved on.  I became a nurse….now for more than 30 years.

I’m still trying to write.  Now it is purely for my own pleasure, for my own growth.  I started this blog with an intention of a thousand words every day.  But I am falling quite short of a thousand words!  But I am writing.  I am still working towards my goals.  Maybe I will have to change my goal to a thousand posts a year.