Cold and dreamy

Sept 11—Joe came by again, and this time he helped me put the string lights on the back porch.  How beautiful light is… all lights!  And I’ve been wanting to hung some string lights here in the porch for such long time!… always dreaming, planning and dreaming some more.  And now, it feels as if the night, the stars in the sky and I are one and the same thing under the soft lights of my porch.

Joe, also helped me put some wire or some type of support on the lower roof of the porch for the grapevines to climb onto, so they they will have an adequate support next spring to grow and cover the porch in green curtains.  I can hardly wait to see the progress.

After Joe left, I cut some roses and made a lovely bouquet for our bedroom…

The afternoon was crisp and sunny and everywhere I looked it was gold and emerald, and I wanted to pick roses and dance barefooted on wet green grasses.  How beautiful, and how lovely this time of year is, and feels...

Sept 12—our little world turned cold all of a sudden today.  We woke up and were surprised to find that Winter had swept over the land and, like some sorts of a mythological hen molding soil and loose material with its body and feet, it had made a nest on our little world, sat down on it, and I'm afraid it is here to stay for a while.  

I put on my PJ's and cozy slippers... and all day long I wore this outfit.  I supposed this is the end of summer, and days are deliciously perfect and soft and full of magical moments.

This morning, I brought in most of my potted plants.  Trying to find them the right spot in the house took me a few hours; moving them up and down, placing them here and there.  They are doing marvelous, but I know that soon they will start losing leaves as they adapt to inside temperatures and dryer air.  

I try to make everything beautiful around me in our house, but in the garden, is where my soul wants to live all day long!

Just the still melancholy that I love — that makes life and nature harmonize. The birds are consulting about their migrations, the trees are putting on the hectic or the pallid hues of decay, and begin to strew the ground, that one’s very footsteps may not disturb the repose of earth and air, while they give us a scent that is a perfect anodyne to the restless spirit. Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns. ~George Eliot, letter to Miss Lewis, 1st October 1841

Tomatoes and succulents

Sept 08—Morning glories are such interesting little things—their seeds are.  Ah yeah, capricious little things these flowers are, for alas, I suppose they must have a brain of their own.

You see, this spring I put a few seeds by the feet of the “Naked Tree” below, for them to grow and from where to welcome the dawn with trumpet-shaped flowers...

How beautiful they'd had looked going up, up on the white trunk in their amazing coloration—ipomoea tricolor, ipomoea nil and ipomoea purpurea, Heavenly Blue Morning Glory, Pearly Gates and Scarlet O’Hara Morning Glory.  But, alas, what disappointment they were!  

Three times I tried planting these seeds in the same spot, and on each occasions they flew away and flew and flew away... then, decided to reseed themselves in a totally new place... far away on the opposite side of the garden, to say the least.  I finally gave up, and let them grow where they wanted to be…

But now, the best of the summer is gone, and chilly September days a here to stay, so today, I cleaned the morning glory patch and pulled them all out.  Morning glories die at the first sign of frost, and I don’t like to leave those ugly naked vines up all winter.  Sooner or later, they will have to be pulled out.  So, the sooner, the better, before it gets too cold.  But what pity!  For they were still so beautiful!

Sept 10—I was finally able to plant all those beautiful tulip bulbs that have been waiting in their packet for me to plant them for way too long… and what a beautiful thing it was planting them with bare hands, as I caressed the soil and parted the womb of the earth and deposited the sleepy rhizomes in it...  then, covering them with soil as my hands felt the warmth and miracle of it all; the very scent of earth ascending from the ground; a scent that always reminds me of death and life and all forms of hope.  I filled the rotunda with all these tulips, and I also put some in the dried creek garden side of the garden... now I sit, and wait until next spring.

Elves, nymph, fairies and goblins are watching… eyes silently following me everywhere I go; watching everything I do.  The garden has acquired that magical feel of pre-autumn and crisp apples and terracotta leaves, and I can only sit out here for hours and hours to come and just let my soul be enfolded in all the glories surrounding me… 

The sun sits on a low cloud these days; it's mellow light like globules of mercy and grace and forgiveness, and sometimes, when I go by the path that takes me straight onto the garden, I think I see it nesting on the leaves of the Virginia Creeper. 

Angels, big and tall, small and chubby live here too!  What a precious sight they all are to me!

Today, all the tomatoes plants were pulled out too.  What an amazing crop we had this year!  I kept some for ourselves and put the remainder on a bucket by the side of the road to share with neighbors, but I supposed everyone must plant tomatoes around here, for none stopped.  All the veggie boxes were cleaned up too.

Sept 11—I went to Lowe's this morning and brought home a few more plants, and another bag of tulip bulbs.  Tulip Angelique and Blue Diamond.  I planted them all in the epicenter of the garden, by where the larger fountain sits.  

Among the plants I got today, I brought home an African Violet plant, and a few more succulents.  I also bought a new flowerpot to plant my new succulents.  All my other succulents have nicely survived our hot summer days in the garden, and are doing splendidly. Except for the one pot I keep on the front porch, they are all now inside the house for the winter.

For this one, I decided to paint the terracotta pot all black.  I have found out that if you want to paint your terracotta pots, using acrylic paint is the best way to go.  The paint run smoothly on the porous terracotta and it adheres to it perfectly.  Much better than spray!

My gardens have such a strange way of lending me peaceful energy.  I like to tend in the cool of the morning and pick in the waning sun of the evening.   As the sun sets, the light dims and fades until my plants are in delicious shadow and the mysteriously dank scent of tomato leaves begins to spiral upward. The cool of wet earth spools around me and I find myself refreshed and invigorated in a quiet, sensory way.  I think this is how flowers feel when the day finally breaks back upon itself and a riptide of night moves fast to the West and the bugs spread their wings and fly towards the last of the sun.

I hope you all are doing well, and I hope you go sit outside sometime today or tomorrow, and just let Nature nurture you.  Close your eyes, and let your spirit fly.  Be blessed! 

Home and gardens

Sept 4 -- Last week I worked long and exhausting hours in the garden, making sure that I started preparing it for winter, so as not to have to do all that work that must be done out there when it is already too cold and dreary to worry about it. Thus, aside from all I did, I also dug out from the ground a few of the precious blue hostas that were being eaten up by bugs and put them on pots.  

I have found out that around here, hostas grow better in pots than on the ground, and keeping them on pots has to their advantage that they can be moved easily to their preference.  Sun or shade, or semi shade.  They also do well during winter, and will come out again in the spring time after time.

Now that the weather has mellowed down and the days have acquired that certain tint and awesomeness of pre-autumn, all the roses have been putting new shoots again; growing taller and healthier, and what a happy thing it is to see my Paradise rose growing stronger, and putting new plum shoots the color of sweet wine, as it becomes wider, and taller.  This special rose took a little bit to get established, but finally it is getting there.  Flowers still thriving in the pre-autumn garden have revived, and everything is looking beautiful and full and it is like a second spring.

Sep 6 -- The crab-apple trees are swollen up with their tart fruits and the grapevines are teeming with puffed-up grapes that soon will be swapping their green colors for the colors of wine and ripe plum...  

From our windows on the upper floors, far down onto the horizon I see the landscape shifting into the shades of pink cotton candy and sweet lemon lime in front of my eyes. The panorama, littered with tiny golden specks of light. The earth has started to spin into its magical cycle.  And we wistful creatures of the land would wait, and get ready to start cozying up our furrows and lairs, and build us a warm nest by candlelight.

Just the still melancholy that I love — that makes life and nature harmonize. 

Today, I wore my mustard color vintage boots, jean leggings and that new top resembling an autumnal garden in colors and design.  I felt young and happy, and totally out of season, because although nature is changing fast around here, temperatures are still in the 80’s, and it was hot and people are still wearing their shorts and sandals.

Sept 05—our new mattress finally arrived, but the box springs were too thick… so big they were, that only with a ladder we could had climbed into bed... So, I send them back and ordered new ones.  Now, we shall wait another 7 to 10 days to finally be able to have our new bed pleasantly completed. 

Sept 07—Yesterday, I cancelled the smaller boxes I ordered, and went and bought new ones from another store that did had them on stock.  I couldn’t wait another day, so alas, we went to pick them up today, and now our new bed is looking awesome!

What have you been doing lately?  Anything fun, special or pleasantly the same?  Do share!

See you around!

  

Angels

Sept 4—I finally dug out all that Phlox that was suffocating one of the Knockout roses on the east side of the garden, and what a freeing thing this was… for the roses, and for me too!  For I had wanted to do this for the longest time, but always lacked the courage to do so.  Until now. 

I have also pulled out all the irises on an adjacent bed, where another Knockout rose was being swallowed up by too many of them, including all the lemon balm that had spilled out of their bed, and taken over every available space outside and beyond their designated territory. How gallingly persistent this little herb is… How irritating.  I have almost eradicated them by now, but I shouldn’t be too confident thought, because these little critters keep reproducing faster than I can pull them out.

All those irises I removed from that one spot are now replanted in the little “Dry-creek garden” I created in memory of mom, and I have planted there too part of the Shasta daisy I dug out last months from its original place. 

At the beginning of spring this year I relocated some of my Phlox over to this area as well, but this is one of the shadiest spots in the garden, and although they have thrived throughout the summer, they hadn't put any flowers thus far... I’m hoping one more winter in the ground will do the trick to make them come out next year stronger and as aggressive as they tend to be in some other parts of the garden.

I want this special space covered in flowers—all kinds of them.  By the fence, behind the big angel, I planted a tiny branch of the Virginia creeper growing on the other part of the fence, earlier this summer, and it has survived. It’s tiny, but growing strong each day.  So alas, another little miracle to look forward to seeing develop into something marvelous next spring!  Oh, and have you noticed something else?  A very lovely cherub is guarding this area now too!

I waited for him for so long, that he’s almost like a brand new baby to me!… You see, I fell in love with him from the very moment I saw him, but decided to wait until the end of summer when everything goes on clearance.  

Every week I waited and waited and waited some more, then Walmart lowered their prices on all of their patio and garden stuff… not much, thought, and I knew that if I waited a little longer I would get a better deal yet, but… I was risking losing him.  Don't you just love that little face!

After we came home from our most scary Florida vacation with my husband feeling ill, I went back to Walmart to check on him, afraid that by now he was going to be gone… Until I found him!  He was standing all alone in a desolated corner, all garden fountains gone, all other statues gone! Only him waiting for me!  He didn't have a price tag on, but at this point all I wanted to do was bring him home with me!  And I did.  Because the garden attendant didn't show up when the manager called for a price check, she said, "$15".  "Do you still want him?"  Oh boy, was I elated!   

He's supper heavy, super big and super adorable, and I love love his praying pose so much!  Sometimes when I go by him I feel as if he's really looking up to heaven and smiling.  I would then do the same, look up to my Heavenly Father, and smile.

It is not known precisely where angels dwell — whether in the air, the void, or the planets. It has not been God's pleasure that we should be informed of their abode. ~Voltaire

Well, we may not know, but I least this one lives here now!