gardenthoughts

i was in stu’s garden today .. we’ve been working together for five or six years now .. and we’re delighted, every year, with the progress we’re making .. a few years ago, after a trip to ontario, stu decided that he would like to make a butterfly garden .. his intention was to encourage monarch butterflies to come to the garden .. and so, both of us, ignorant really, began the process of creating a butterfly garden .. on the top and down the sides of a rock embankment that defines one side of his property .. what had been a craggy rock bluff has, with lots of hard work and love for the potential, become a garden .. it makes it a bit challenging when you put your shovel to the ground, ready to dig in, and find that one or two inches down you encounter solid bedrock .. lol .. ah, the joys of gardening on an island .. one huge rock, essentially .. anyway .. year after year, we’ve brought dirt and manure over from town .. year after year i’ve built up the soil .. layer by layer .. at this point, it’s about eight to ten inches deep in spots .. it’s been a great ‘build a garden’ experience .. yup .. we’re bulding a garden .. magic ..

i’ve never wanted to design other people’s gardens .. i’m more of a gardener’s gardener .. it’s my pleasure to assist people to bring about their own expression in their garden .. whatever that expression might be .. for stu it’s a butterfly garden .. for phil, it was a winter flowering shade garden .. i have enough ‘designing’ to do in my own yard .. thank you very much .. in our garden it’s more a joint effort .. frank builds the beds .. i plant them up .. pretty much willy nilly .. although with time i’m gathering experience .. i still don’t see it as my mission to design anyone else’s garden space .. that said, i’m happy to do the work required to create another’s garden .. and i’m delighted to maintain the gardens .. i find that every garden i have the pleasure of working in, is an expression of the one whose garden it is .. ‘designed’ .. or willy nilly .. stu’s garden is a bit of both, really .. he dreams it up .. i plant it ..

i’m beginning to realize that digression is simply part of my nature .. and so .. please bear with me ..

in the case of stu and me, ignorance has proven bliss .. and, although we haven’t yet attracted monarch butterflies, there are a number of others that are regular visitors .. different varieties of admiral butterflies (i think they’re called) .. lovely yellow and black striped swallowtails .. little blue guys .. tiny orange and black, skippers (?) .. and a few others that flit through from time to time ..

not all the plants in the butterfly garden are butterfly plants .. however, we have planted many that are .. butterfly weed .. asters .. coneflowers .. verbena .. agastache .. cat mint .. daisies .. flea bane .. red valerian .. alliums .. salvias .. to name a few ..

in the ‘non butterfly plants’ we have a startling red peony .. a gentian sage .. then, there’s a lovely big patch of lupines .. and we’ve let the foxgloves set themselves about the garden .. in fact, the foxgloves, and the lupines have been putting on the most wonderfull performance for us over the past two or three weeks .. i deadhead the lupines weekly when i’m there, and they are carrying on beautifully .. the foxgloves get taller every week .. the flowers climbing steadfastly up the stalks .. these plants may not be butterfly attracting plants .. however, they are attractive to stu and me .. we happily stand at the railing, looking over the garden .. oooo-ing and ahhh-ing ..

and, after all, that’s ultimately the point of any garden .. isn’t it .. ? .. isn’t that what drives us on .. or motivates us .. in part, perhaps .. to continually create a garden .. a space which gives us pleasure .. changing .. adding .. subtracting .. this colour .. that texture .. these together .. big patches of this or that .. continually editing in an attempt to achieve a certain picture .. or a feeling .. or a theme .. doesn’t matter, really .. does it .. it’s done for the sake of  pleasure .. and “what is pleasing to one .. ” .. every garden’s different ..

so .. butterfly season is coming upon us quickly .. every day we see more and more about .. maybe this year there’ll even be a monarch ..

i’ve just come back from one of the gardens i look after .. i was planting up some annuals that i brought over from town yesterday .. the garden is a newly, professionally planted garden .. this is its first year of growth and it’s doing very well .. most of the gardens over here are owner planted and gardened, so the professionally planted gardens are a bit of a novelty for us .. and, as a maintenance gardener i find it quite interesting to see how ‘professionals’ go about planting up a yard .. it’s a learning experience as i get to know the garden .. what’s planted where .. to see how, in some respects, the mind of a professional landscaper works ..

at any rate, before i get off on a tangent, what i wanted to tell you about is this lovely display of mother of thyme that is now in full bloom .. it grows along a six or seven foot stepping stone pathway, which leads to a larger barbeque area .. the pinkness of the blossoms envelope the roundness of the stepping stones .. the blossoms are about 2 inches tall throughout .. puffs of pink .. as you walk into the barbeque area, the pattern changes ..

in this area, huge rectangular slabs of concrete make up the patio, with about 6 inches of space between the slabs .. and those 6 inches around each slab are planted up with mother of thyme .. again, full of falling, puffs of pink blossoms .. softening the squareness of the concrete .. creating depth in the flatness .. where the sun shines on the thyme the flowers are in full bloom .. where it’s a bit shadier, flowers are yet to come ..

while i stood there, admiring the effect, the most wonderfull part of all was the myriad of bees buzzing about in the lusciousness of the flowers .. big bees .. little bees .. colourfull bees .. black bees .. dozens of them .. as they moved from puff to puff they appeared to be tumbling through them .. it reminded me of children jumping on beds covered in down filled comforters .. and the bees appeared to be having as much fun as children as they bumped around in these cushions of tiny pink flowers .. gathering nectar .. tumbling from flower to flower .. as i watched, they jostled about .. busy as bees .. working as only bees work .. oblivious of my presence .. so intent on the job at hand .. and yet, in their busyness was this element of playfullness and joy surrounding the process of collection .. it was delightfull to see the mother of thyme buzzing with bee activity ..

what i got from watching them .. joy .. joy of bee-ing ..

i just came in from outside .. while i was out there .. wandering around, completely distracted with all that’s happening in the garden .. rain or shine .. i realized that i wanted to get a batch of bread on before i start playing outside .. it feels as if my days are so full, at the moment, that i need to remind myself there are other things to take care of in my world, aside from the gardens .. so, bread’s rising and i have some time to type thoughts ..

i’m in the midst of frustration .. i keep getting this message when i attempt to upload photos:  “unable to create directory /home/.odelia/myname/gardenthoughts.ca/wp-content/uploads/2010/06 .. is its parent directory writable by the server?” .. whatever that means .. right now it means i can’t upload photos .. hmmmm .. this part of the computer thing isn’t my favourite .. i just want it to work .. do what i know it can do .. do it .. not all this mumble jumble in a language foreign to me .. gets my mind in a whirl .. so, until i get this figured, no photos other than what i have in my ‘wordpress library’ .. hmm wondering if it might have to do with having too many photos in that library .. computers .. aaaarrrghhh! .. that said, i love having one .. sigh .. dichotomies ..

i had to leave home for about three weeks recently .. maybe a week or two before that, i’d planted up the square foot garden up  .. the day i was leaving i took some peering time .. didn’t see anything coming up yet .. the braod beans were just starting to make volcanoes in the soil .. the lettuce and green onions i’d planted looked as though they’d taken ahold .. that was about all .. not being one to take much for granted, i was hopefull that by the time i arrived home again the little garden would be chugging along .. well, wasn’t i in for a surprise ..

life had been particularly busy while i was away, and i hadn’t really had time to think about the garden .. except for one night when the deer entered my thoughts .. had i left the spray bottle full, i wondered .. i talked with frank the next day .. interestingly enough, he told me that he’d been thinking about spraying for deer the night before .. i figured about the time i was thinking ‘deer’ he was, too .. well, his thought didn’t make it to the deed .. and i was too far away .. sure enough, next morning he saw the evidence of their presence in the yard .. that is one of the cardinal rules of deer spraying .. ‘don’t rely on the calendar .. rely on your intuition’ .. ah, well .. not a big deal .. i thought the great part of the story was that we’d both thought deer at the same time ..

and .. as usual .. i digress .. back to the square footer .. after three weeks of not being able to peer at those sixteen little square feet, i had no idea what to expect .. i knew it would have grown .. somewhat .. and when i saw it i was delightedl .. something was happening in each of the little squares .. just like a mini garden .. the broad beans, in particular, were astonishing .. they’d only just begun coming through the earth before i left .. now they were over a foot tall .. next i saw the transplants of lettuce and green onions .. for whatever reason, they were smaller than others i’d spread about the yard .. in pots on the deck .. under the blueberries .. these lettuces had thrived .. lush and loose .. the ones in the square foot, though, were stalkier .. not quite as loose as one might imagine a “drunken woman” .. checking out the kale, it was obvious it had had to battle slugs .. and looks like it won .. ragged and torn, but still there .. the chard, on the other hand, didn’t seem to have the same fortitude of the kale .. there were a couple of little red stalks struggling .. and the beets and carrots suffered the same fate .. next to nothing showing there .. however, the other lettuce and radishes were growing beautifully together .. more rows of radishes in another square foot doing well .. the spinach getting off to a slow start .. my mouth waters thinking of making spinach pie .. mmmm .. so all in all, i was delightfully surprised at what this little garden was doing ..

i’ve since replanted the carrots and beets and chard .. i was inspired by karen .. she also has planted up a facsimilie of the square foot garden .. her carrots and beets are already three or four inches tall .. happy .. healthy .. robust .. absolutely beautyfull .. a bit of envy pops into my mind .. “look how well karen’s are doing .. what happened to mine .. whine, whine .. question .. question .. maybe i planted too early .. maybe there was too much rain .. maybe this .. maybe that” .. i don’t know how one ever knows for sure .. there’s always so many factors involved .. soil .. sun .. warmth .. moisture .. things seen .. things unseen .. vibes .. i stop myself before getting embroiled in fantastical imaginings which only carry me away from the present .. in my experience, things grow differently in every different garden .. on our little island alone, i’m sure there are as many eco systems as there are square feet of island .. well .. possibly .. maybe not that many .. at any rate, our garden will, naturally, be different than karen’s .. and while i stand admiring her bounty, i can see a similar picture of our  little square foot garden .. well, once i replant .. one of the wonderfull things about this square foot garden is the patterns that appear .. i missed the initial coming up patterns .. now there are growing patterns developing .. and once all the square start growing .. wow ..  it could be like a patchwork quilt .. one could almost plan their square feet on specific patterns .. well, if one wanted to get really anal about it ..

and i’m thankfull .. the square foot garden is growing .. beautifully .. it will do what it will do .. be what it will be .. and i get to be here to watch .. and peer to my heart’s delight ..

Update: Problem solved. Web host changed servers for me.

well, after a couple of years of using wordpress, yesterday i was babbling away on a post .. finished it .. figured out which photos i wanted to add .. followed the usual procedure to upload .. got this message instead of my photos .. what makes a computer change its mind after two or three years of doing it the same way .. ? .. :

whatever that means .. right now it means i can’t upload photos .. hmmmm .. i did check and see that this directory actually does exist .. why does it say it doesn’t .. this part of the computer thing isn’t my favourite .. i just want it to work .. do what i know it can do .. do it .. not all this mumble jumble in a language foreign to me .. gets my mind in a whirl ..

i don’t know if anyone out there in garden blog cyberspace can help me out of this .. i did go to the wordpress help, but honestly, even those who want to help are eons ahead of my understanding of computers and speak in a lingo that is, to me, the foreign language stumbling block ..

so .. i thought i’d just put it out there and see what might come back ..

thank you