A Proper Arrangement

Ahhhhhhhhhhh....... Spring is truly here!  The gardens are in bloom, busy birds chirp from branch to branch, and a fresh color palette rises from the earth as all watch in wide-eyed wonder.

 My green thumb is inspired by my mother's and grandmother's gardens where height and texture variations created a natural canvas that kept admirers oohing and ahhing, begging to pick a few blooms, me included.  I think they both new that a childhood me + a pair of garden scissors = total deforestation.  Patience would have to be learned first. 

One of my favorite floral traditions is the flower frog.  My grandmother introduced me to these glass wonders when I was a little girl; when it became obvious that my wee hands could not be kept out of the garden. 

My grandmother's home was (and still is) formal, as were her gardens.  Cutting flowers would be a precise task with a specific end. The reward would be a table centerpiece fit for a proper ladies' luncheon.  So with scissors in hand I was allowed to snip prized blooms to fit in the flower frog.  I would spend hours in the garden, visiting ladybugs, and making the final cuts. Back inside, my Grandmother was selecting a fine crystal bowl for the finished frog. Once the bouquet was arranged and set in the bowl, my work was given a place of honor at the center of the dining room table.  We would then sit with our lunch, note the sun reflecting prisms through the crystal bowl,  and admire my work.

Now as a big girl, I fill the frog in much the same way.  Color, color, and more color!  Varying heights for definition, and texture galore!

 I take my time to choose just the right bowl.  Today I am going with a vintage country feel as this bouquet will grace my outside office space.  

 With today promising to be beautiful spring weather in Connecticut, I know both my Grandmother and my mother will be outside tending their gardens.  Perhaps at lunch time, all three of us will be sitting on our patios, admiring the rewards of our patience.

 

LOVE  &  GARDEN TRADITIONS

 

 

 

Playing In The Dirt

One is never too old to play in the dirt.  In fact, as we get older we hone our dirt playing skills into the fine art of gardening where we play with the hands-on wonder of a child.  Mounds are palm-sanded to smooth perfection, dirty kneecaps prevail, and colors are chosen like crayons from a fresh box.  Yes, playing in the dirt is good for us.  Every gardener knows this.  And the unspoken truth is that much more than we tend our gardens, our gardens tend to us.

Unfortunately, my body doesn't always support my child-like ambitions and much of spring's garden prep work usually leaves me in a head to toe Thermacare body wrap.  But this weekend I was blessed to have two helpers with strong backs to do all my heavy lifting, weeding and mulching.  It was the best gift ever!

  All that remained was the task of setting the flowers in place. 

Having lived in this house for a full year now, the first year plants have secured their roots and have filled in the backdrop.  I added daisies, zinnias, and vinca for color pops.  In between, coriander has exploded everywhere!  Peppers, crepe myrtle, and grapefruit tree seedlings have also been carefully transferred to sun themselves in well fed pots.

You'll have to check back to see what that spider-ish looking thing grows into.  I am constantly collecting seeds and chucking them into the winter garden to see what will take root and offer me a spring surprise. I am hoping it is from the seed pods I gathered back home in Connecticut last fall. 

 

LOVE  & SOUL TENDING

Signs of Spring

Signs of Spring here on the Texas Gulf Coast are less dramatic than Spring awakening where snow has forced a winter slumber, but we still get just as excited here!  After all, Spring means a return to garden tending, walks in the sunshine, sweet blooming trees, and the return of songbirds nesting for chicks.

 

 

 

I am not a textbook gardener.  Martha Stewart's lessons are lost on me.  I am more like Johnny Appleseed or Lady Bird Johnson with pockets full of seeds that I simply scatter about.  I am known to pull up a wild specimen from an abandoned rural garden for a new life in my backyard.  Iris and daffodils still remain as old houses crumble, standing like guards of the final decay.  Now, some stand guard at my own front door and I feel the spirit of the women who once tended their country gardens with pride.

 

 

Outside my kitchen door is a small patchy garden that has received many a seed over the winter.  There have been discarded pepper seeds, eggplant, meadow seeds, and it is also where I dumped out the remainder of every batch of my mulling spice grungy soak. Suddenly my kitchen patch is alive with seedlings! Coriander is definitely winning the growth race! It's EVERYWHERE!

 

 

Because the Gulf Coast rarely sees a hard freeze, some plants stay in bloom year round.  This wee plant grew from seeds from my best bud Ashlie Blake.  It is a lot like our friendship: strong, resilient, delicate, and enduring.  Growing in an unlikely crevice it is a reminder that all things are possible.

 

 

Soon all our gardens will be alive with blooms and stories of horticulture phenoms!  Blogs will be full of splendid scenes of floral bliss, nesting cuties, and green as far as the eye can see.

 

 

"Oh give us pleasure in the flowers today;

And give us not to think so far away

As the uncertain harvest; keep us here

All simply in the springing of the year."

                   ~Robert Frost

 

LOVE  &  SPRING