30 March: On land and water

Sunday, 30 March 2014

We could have worked on yet another beautiful day.  However, I am trying to take some nice days off so that Allan can enjoy his new little boat (and of course, I can weed my garden).  Life is exceedingly short and fragile and can change or end at pretty much any moment, I fear, and at the risk of disappointing our clients, I’m determined to take some more time for ourselves.

early afternoon: Allan lashes his boat onto the trailer

While I did accomplish several oyster baskets (bushel basket sized) and one wheelbarrow full of weeding and clipping, I did go in and out of the house quite a lot.  Not my most productive day.  My best idea was to put an old crab pot in place as part of a future fence, whose purpose will be just to keep dogs out of the front garden.  I love dogs, especially Gracie across the street, but am not thrilled when she runs through the garden beds.  I also want to protect any cat sleeping in the garden from a dog who may not be friendly.

I posted on Facebook about finding one or two more old crab pots and it seems I might be able to acquire a couple from the port tomorrow.

I was too busy when outside to take more than a few garden photos.

Pulmonaria, less blue than the one I photographed yesterday

Fritillaria meleagris (guinea hen flower, checkered lily)

I planted some small (I hope) columnar evergreens from Back Alley Gardens in the west and east beds in the back garden.  The east bed has no great view because of the gear shed.  The west bed is where I don’t want to lose a view.  It will be years before said little evergreens are big enough to steal any view, and I suppose I can always cut them down later if they turn out to not be the sort that takes to pruning.  (I left the tags out in the greenhouse so can’t tell you what they are yet.)

back garden, east side

back garden, center and west beds

Meanwhile, Allan took some photos while boating on Ilwaco’s Black Lake.

From our home on Lake Street, it’s a short drive.

 

Pleasant viewing benches are placed along the lake.

Black Lake dock

 

Allan’s boat

This time, the sail worked!

At one point, it sailed him right into the shoreline.

view from north end of Black Lake

Just north of the lake is Ilwaco’s cranberry farm.

CranMac

CranMac farm

cranberry bogs

From the excellent book Legendary Locals of the Long Beach Peninsula by Oysterville author and blogger Sydney Stevens:

Next:  Back to work on Monday.

 

 

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29 March: High and Dry day

Saturday, 29 March 2014

No, not that kind of high.

I was expecting rain all weekend and was so looking forward to reading. At 6 AM Saturday morning, thunder and a startlingly torrential downpour promised a great day. When I awoke again midmorning on Saturday, the weather still looked ideal.

south window view

north window view…bliss

indoor flowers

begonia flower

Yes, it looked like I could have one ideal day of rain and not even leave the house. I just craved ONE more day like that before buckling down to work for the next eight months. And yet, before I had even finished my coffee, out came the sun. I would have to weed instead, preceded by taking some photos of lovely backlit flowers. First, the gardens in front of the house and the workshop:

tulips in the front garden

Pulmonaria in Allan’s garden

Arisarum proboscideum (mouseplant) in Allan’s garden

Can you see how much the flowers look like little mice diving into the ground?

“black” hellebore

Ribes sanguineum ‘King Edward VII’

That barberry that I got from Cistus Nursery

If only I could remember the name.

Edited to add: Not a barberry! Alison of the Bonney Lassie blog has enlightened me that it is Ribes speciosum. Googling informs me that Ribes speciosum is a gooseberry with small fruits. I will have to watch for then.

Tulips and Dicentra spectabilis

My so fragrant gift Daphne from Charlene

more tulips in front garden

Then, into the back garden:

the center bed with Geranium ‘Rozanne’

sweet peas in containers protected from sitting cats

the garden boat…with less sunshine!

south end of garden under a darkening sky

Oh joy, the sun had gone, the wind had kicked up, and I could go back in and read!

In my comfy chair, all ready to read High and Dry at last!

I had recently acquired this out of print book about gardening in Colorado. It’s by the author of one of my two favourite blogs, The Miserable Gardener. (The other is, of course, the Tootlepedal blog.) I had been waiting for over a week for a rainy day at home to read High and Dry from cover to cover. I delved with a feeling of great satisfaction into the introduction by Panayoti Kelaidis.

from the introduction

As he suggests, I was sure I would get some new ideas for planting the summer dry gardens along the Howerton Way at the Port of Ilwaco (a block south of our house). However, the biggest reason I had sought out the book was because Robert Nold’s sense of humour has often made me chortle as I read his blog.

Smokey decided that he simply must join me as I read.

slowing me down

After we had negotiated that he could not sit right on the book, I began the first chapter and was most pleased to read that my expectation of pleasant reading were sure to be fulfilled:

I was lost in pure delight….And then….I saw a horrible sight from the corner of my left eye. Sunshine outside the windows.

Noooooo!!!!

Thoroughly disheartened, I had to put the book down and go outside.

Three dutiful hours and several bushel baskets of weeds later, the cold south wind finally picked up and at three thirty I permitted myself to return to the house and the book day that I had planned. I’ll share with you some of my very favourite parts, and urge you to find the book for yourself. The paperback cost me $30; I wish I had known that in it, the illustrations and photos by Cindy Nold-Nelson are black and white. Bob Nold tells me that they are in colour in the hardcover version, which seems more difficult to find (and of course more expensive). She was such a good photographer and illustrator that even in black and white, the art is interesting and informative.

would be more magnificent in colour

front and back cover in colour

Robert Nold’s writing was my main reason for seeking out the book, though, so I was well satisfied. Here, he says what I also feel about designing gardens.

on designing gardens

 

Just the other day at the Boreas Inn, a friend of the owner asked me if I could help her design her front garden and I had to say no. I am out of ideas for gardens other than my own, and I think of ideas for my own garden almost only while I am actively working in it. As Nold says above, “I start digging and see what happens.”

This made me chortle.

I was pleased to read his thoughts about trees:

I wanted only a very few favourite trees in my new garden and then succumbed to two apples (Cox’s Orange Pippen and Pink Lady) and one pear tree (in memory of my grandma’s garden, and now I may need a second pear for pollenation) and am already worried that I will lose too much light.

a book recommendation

Now I must get the shade book by George Schenk, an author whose book Gardening on Pavement, Tables and Hard Surfaces gave me all sorts of good ideas.

I got two spectacularly exciting tips from High and Dry, both of which made me exclaim “Why didn’t I think of that??!” First, Nold writes about raised beds, and how they always sink:

Brilliant!! If only I had thought to make a “spine” (as he recently described the concept in his blog) of rubble and junk under raised beds I’ve created.

I was even more excited about a new to me method of planting.

remove the soilless mix!!!

Of course! We always “burble” plants in a bucket of water before planting but have always done so with the pot on. What an amazing idea to do it with the pot already removed. I tried it the very next day, in fact, and the roots sighed with relief. So many plants that we’ve planted end up looking like this after awhile:

a hebe in my garden with its “shoulders” showing above the ground

I think I finally can stop this from happening, thanks to High and Dry.

The other suggestion that thrilled me was in a passage about how the latest most favoured method of planting pots is to not fill the bottoms with crocking or gravel. His simple suggestion to place a paper towel over the drainage hole flabbergasted me with its elegant simplicity.

perfection!

(I don’t paint the wounds on pruned tree branches, though.)

His passage on botanical names was useful, succinct, and informative:

And I thought, What?? He does not recommend Agastaches, one of my favourite plants? Which brings us to the plant chapters. (Turns out Agastaches need more water than provided in his almost completely unsupplemented gardens.)

I have to admit I lightly skimmed the chapters on Cacti and Agaves and Yuccas as they would just look silly in my lush gardens. Reading about all the other plants rewarded me with the sort of drollery that is my favourite sort of humour.

I don’t know about you, but the dry humour in the descriptions above made me almost want to laugh out loud.

When I read a comment on Nold’s blog that someone had read High and Dry because he could not resist a gardening book with the word “despair” in the index, I knew I simply had to own it.

And here is the paragraph to which “despair” refers:

the definition of despair

Even here in the Pacific Northwest, we can learn from the plant descriptions in High and Dry what plants might work well on our hell strips (parking strip garden beds). I hope I’ve inspired you to seek out this book. I can’t imagine why such a helpful resource has gone out of print.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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26-28 March: not so glorious rain (with perks)

Wednesday, 26 March 2014

Today’s rain lacked gloriousness because we chose to work in it.  We thought, when we woke to light drizzle, that we would enjoy the accomplishment of checking a couple of hauling jobs off of our list.  We grabbed the opportunity to chop down a couple of plants in our front garden and divest ourselves of the resulting debris.  My Rubus lineatus may not even return after this past winter’s hard freezes, and the Australian mint shrub in the foreground had a tattered look and had also got bigger than I thought it would.

before

after…much better view of the Hellebores

Off we drove in a light drizzle to the Depot Restaurant in Seaview, the next beach town north.  We had two piles of debris there from previous work days to pick up, and I went along because I had three more pruning tasks in mind there.

at the Depot: forgot to take a before

during…native Spiraea douglasii

after….old stems removed to encourage new growth

I tackled the Escallonia that had caught my attention a few days earlier.  Not only did it have a bald top, but it is so much the wrong plant for that spot.  It would like to get huge and block the window entirely.  Now, my plan is that it will come back from the base and will then be easier to keep low.

Escallonia before

and after!

You may observe that as I pruned, the skies opened and heavy rain began to fall.  It was not pleasant.

with debris loaded and ready to go

Our plan was to pick up the pile we had left after pruning a tree at The Anchorage Cottages.  We swung by Garden Tour Nancy’s on the way to leave a container of mixed sweet pea seeds on her porch, a trade for some purple podded edible peas that she’d dropped off on my porch.  She saw us and beckoned us in.  I left my dripping raincoat and wet shoes on her porch, although my hair was streaming water as I can’t bear to wear a hat while working.  That’s when the day turned better.  Not only did we have a good visit with Nancy and Phil; we were invited to a delicious impromptu lunch!

a tableau in Nancy and Phil’s new powder room

view from the east window

view from the south window

and a wonderful lunch with Nancy’s homemade pasta sauce, freshly grated Parmesan, and basil

After lunch and garden talk, the rain had stopped so we had a quick tour of the garden.

a chicken coop from a kit; soon to be occupied

garlic rows

the flower border we made a year and a half ago

Muscari ‘Ocean Magic’

In the lack of rain, we continued our work day by collecting our branch pile from the Anchorage Cottages just north of Long Beach.

The Anchorage

Sunday’s pruning job looks more defined with the branches removed from behind the tree.

On the way to the transfer station (AKA the dump), we stopped at Dennis Company so I could buy more sweet pea seeds.  The tulips in the planter just north of the store looked promising.  A sharp eye can see chickweed underneath them.  We did not have time to deal with it because the local dump closes at four thirty.

city planter: to be weeded later

The dump is located east of Sandridge Road.  We could have taken to debris to Peninsula Landscape Supply but I thought they might have closed their gates in discouragement over the torrential rain.  On the way to the dump, we drove past cranberry bogs and saw we were not the only ones working in bad weather.

digging out a bog

entering the transfer station road

up and over a little hill

and here we are; we dump yard waste behind the big blue building.

4:25 PM: On the way back home down Sandridge Road, we were cheered by the sight of our client Diane’s nice display of Narcissi.

heading south past Diane’s garden

Oddly, when we got home the weather had almost completely cleared and yet…the power was out.  Our plans to have dinner with visiting friend Kathleen Shaw looked perilous, as we learned that the power had gone out all the way to Klipsan Beach, encompassing every dinner restaurant that we like.  Even stranger, our telephone internet (4G) also disappeared just after I’d managed to learn from the local Facebookers how widespread the outage was.

I’m so happy to tell you that the power returned at 5:45 PM, just in time to fulfil our plan to dine at Mexican Fiesta night at the Lightship Restaurant in Long Beach…the last fiesta night of the winter.

at the Lightship: Guacamole made tableside

We were joined by local artists Don Nisbett and Jenna (Queen LaDeDa) and their son Joe for an even more festive fiesta night.

Kathleen and Jenna

I had a feeling that the next day would turn out to be another work day.  I’m still hoping for a storm this weekend that will permit me to read High and Dry!

Thursday, 27 March 2014

Still with the halfway decent weather and no rainy reading day!  (Does all this wanting to stay home and read mean I want to retire?  Maybe.  I spend some time at work these days wondering why we are working so hard when we could afford to partially retire.  The problem is, we really like all of our jobs.)

So we began at the Port, weeding a bit and planting some assorted California poppy seeds in the Howerton Street gardens.

West end of Howerton, looking east

detail

While Allan weeded the Howerton Way beds on the north side of the Port Office, I weeded the little bed on the south side.

Port Office, south side

Muscari and Anemone blanda along Howerton

Muscari ‘Ocean Magic’ backed with tulips

early tulips

I had hoped to have a rainy day get together at Olde Towne Café with our friend Kathleen before she drove back north.  The good weather intervened.  We finally made it there, after Judy (four doors down) had been and gone and Kathleen was done with her lunch.  A half an hour did pass before we got back to work.

the view from our Olde Towne table; I was very taken with that brown coffeepot even though brown is “not my colour”.

other patrons at Olde Towne

one of our city planters right outside Olde Towne Café

To further our mission of getting sweet pea and poppy seeds planted, we went to the next (and last!) sweet pea job, the Boreas Inn in Long Beach.  I was pleased to see some of my mom’s dogtooth violets coming up….  I had transplanted them here and there when my mother left her garden.

Erythronium at Boreas Inn garden

Because grass always creeps under the fence from the neighbour’s lawn into the area where Susie likes to plant sweet peas, I had decided to try a new method: planting them in long, narrow containers.

project, before

And then I began to plant poppy seeds and noticed that the hole where Ed Strange had removed a Phormium a few weeks before still had no new soil added.  I decided that we should go get a yard of soil as I knew Ed was running behind in his landscape and mowing business because of rain.  Part of what he does so excellently is mowing lawns, and that’s not a job that can wait for very long.  So off we went.  As we departed the Boreas property, a heavy rain began to fall and I felt sunk in gloom, being determined to do the soil job but expecting to be thoroughly and miserably drenched.

On the way to Peninsula Landscape Supply, we stopped at The Basket Case Greenhouse to pick up a few more santolinas and an Eryngium ‘Jade Frost’.

Eryngium’ Jade Frost’…I love it so much I always want more.

By then, I could see a lighter cast to the southwest sky and got some hope that the rain might stop.

still raining at Peninsula Landscape Supply while our soil was being loaded into the trailer

While sitting in the van hoping for the rain to stop, I realized I needed MORE Eryngium ‘Jade Frost’ and a few other cool perennials for a long bed next to the squirting clam in Fifth Street Park.  Fred and Nancy were not terribly surprised when we pulled back into the Basket Case parking lot and bought another two trays of perennials.

at the Basket Case

the perennial and herb greenhouse

On the way back to Boreas, we swung by Long Beach City Hall to drop off a plant bill.  The north side display of mostly white flowers is looking even better than last week.  And the rain had stopped!

Long Beach City Hall

With our yard of soil, Allan fluffed up the Boreas’ Garden Suite bed where he had positioned the new sweet pea planters.

after

We added soil to various spots in the lawn beds and, at Susie’s request, used to rest to level out some dips in the lawn itself.

looking west

It looks rather odd now.

Brown sand might have been better; I’m wondering if the lawn will now have areas that are too happy because of being in better soil.  However, it needed to be done, and now it’s done, and Ed is happy that he does not have to find time to do it.

looking east toward the inn and the hot tub gazebo

As we drove off, Susie herself was happily broadcasting some lawn seed.

Susie seeding

I had high hopes for a big storm coming in the next day so that I would have time to sit down and read High and Dry.

Friday, 28 March 2014

At last…after a good long sleep, I awoke to the sound of pelting rain.  I celebrated with rain photos from every window.

Allan took this photo, from his window, of a robin on the wheelbarrow.

from the kitchen window

delicious rain

rain to the east

and to the south

The work board was peacefully almost empty of first time garden clean ups.

soon the next round of work will be added…but for now there is little guilt.

While breakfasting, before settling down to read High and Dry, I checked my Facebook feed on my phone.  There, I saw that it was Olde Towne Café owner Luanne’s birthday.  That changed the day’s plan.

Allan and I went to the new fiber arts shop at the Port, Purly Shell, to get her a gift certificate for yarn.

Purly Shell, right next to Time Enough Books, with art by Don Nisbett

inside Purly Shell

a cosy place for knitting and crocheting

We popped next door to Time Enough Books.  I had a certain kind of book in mind for Luanne, one that speaks to the joys and strengths of solitude and self discovery.  I was thinking SARK or May Sarton (Plant Dreaming Deep).  Although bookshop owner Karla did not have those on such short notice, she knew exactly what I meant and picked up a copy of Survival Lessons by Alice Hoffman.  I had read it oh so recently on a rainy day and it was the perfect choice.

I also quite liked the “I dress this way…” magnet as it reminded me of the passage I had read just yesterday (in Sing Them Home) about a woman, new to a small town, being critiqued for the way she dressed.

On the board where customers can recommend a good book, I added Mister Owita’s Guide to Gardening, another wonderful recent read.

book recommendations

And then…Olde Towne Café.  At first, Luanne was too busy cooking and serving to join her own birthday party!

Luanne on the move at Olde Towne

After we sat visiting with Jenna, Cat, and Rosemary for awhile, the lunch crowd thinned and Luanne’s son and coworker Michael took over so she could relax for a bit.

Luanne with a bouquet sent by her daughter back east

Luanne opens some tiny buttons from Cat.

Cat’s gift: inspirational mug and buttons

“Wild and beautiful heart”, ‘Soul sisters teach us how to fly”, “Put on your brave girl boots”.

birthday book and cards

Just as the party was almost ending, our friend J9 arrived to get a cup of coffee.

J9 and Luanne

Meanwhile, in the background, Allan talked with Chris about the new Black Lake Yacht Club, which apparently is a real plan (for really small boats), not just a joke.  If Allan’s going to join a “yacht club”, we really will have to find a way to cut back on work.

By the time we got home, the rain had stopped and instead of reading, I had to go out and plant my own damn sweet peas, which led to some weeding, and to another day gone without reading.  Rain is predicted for tomorrow.  Could I possibly be so lucky?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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25 March: glorious rain

Tuesday, 25 March 2014

from east living room window

This is the kind of day I like best these days, as I have a strong craving to just read while cold rain sluices down outside and the wind blows so intensely that there can be no idea of working. I even prefer such days to a day off in my own garden. I think winter staycation was not long enough.

east window

north window

I even had flowers inside; the Clivia that once was my mother’s had bloomed.

Clivia

I’m surprised because I did not think the northern exposure would give it enough light to bloom.

Instead of immediately returning to the reading of my novel, I accomplished the amazing task of cleaning off the dining table; the birthday mirror from friend J9 had inspired me to get a better reflection.

 

From my reading chair, the view is better than a mound of papers, newspapers and magazines. Will it last? Indoor tidiness is not in my nature.

a better view from the reading chair

My mood, even about reading, was procrastinatory. I had made myself a note, after reading a biography of Nick Drake, to listen to some songs of his that had faded from my memory. Somewhere I have a boxed vinyl set of all his records. So I listened to a few on Vimeo on my iPhone, leading to a melancholy mood, as was to be expected.

It’s “Black Eyed Dog”.

Pink, pink, pink, pink moon….

Mary slept….on the back of my reading chair.

Smokey and Frosty watched the rainy windows.

Finally I settled down to attempt to finish the very long novel Sing Them Home, whose author, Stephanie Kallos, had written one of my very favourite novels, Broken for You. The latter book was set in Seattle and I expected more of that setting, so was surprised to find myself in Nebraska and even more surprised as a “Wales-o-phile” to learn that small town Nebraska has a strong Welsh tradition, with residents speaking Welsh, singing Welsh hymns, replicating Welsh festivals and funerals. I was delighted.

 

While I read, Allan ran his own errands and also switched compost buckets at Olde Towne Café. There he found the local window washing crew being far more industrious than we were, working in the rain.

Café window cleaning

He also brought back some photos of our volunteer garden at the Ilwaco post office.

Meanwhile, I came across a charming passage about birdsong.

 

 

Allan returned and puttered in his shop. He later commented that he had built something for himself for a change instead of for me or J9. Hmm. Something to do with his little boat, I’ll wager. Meanwhile, I ran across a passage in Sing Them Home that deeply reminded me of my own experience with a former resident of our small town. I felt relieved that it was not an experience unique to me being a fashion misfit!

Moral: Be kind to people!

I read on till dinner time (ten-ish for us; we’re very European according to our well traveled friend Lisa) and still did not finish the novel, for which I blame the long session of procrastination in the morning and early afternoon. Perhaps the next day I would finally get to my new garden book, High and Dry.

 

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24 March: not ideal

Monday, 24 March 2014

After yesterday’s perfect day….Well, it would be rare to get two perfect days in a row.  As we were getting ready to go to work, with a peaceful little plan of spending all day in Ilwaco (first at Ann’s garden and then at the Port if we had extra time), Ed Strange drove by.  He paused and commented about several days of rain being due.  What??  I had neglected to check the weather and had been counting on tomorrow being good for planting sweet peas at Klipsan Beach Cottages.  The previous evening, we had been just 30 blocks away at the end of the day, at J9’s new digs.  If only I could have pulled out one half hour more of energy, we could have gone to KBC and got the sweet peas done.  A glance, after Ed drove off, at the forecast of rain and 30 mph winds for days made me realize that I had to totally change the plan and go way up north just to get those sweet peas in.

our front garden: I would rather have stayed home.

First, we’d dug up some plants to share, so we stopped at Larry and Robert’s (where Ed was mowing) and planted a Pulmonaria (white) and a …plant with brown feathery foliage.  I wonder if whacking my head hard on a tree at the end of the day is why I can’t remember the name? (A few minutes later, with a surge of relief:  Anthriscus sylvestris ‘Ravenswing’!!)

Larry and Robert’s garden boat

by the boat: needs weeding!

If our plans had not changed, we could have spent half an hour here weeding (and getting in the way of Ed and his employee as they mowed).

Some dead narcissi flowers in the Ilwaco street planters had been bothering me.  We stopped to pluck them and admired the new display in a downtown window.

Wendi’s window

And then, the long drive north.

eleven miles

We worked for a short time at Golden Sands Assisted Living to make the drive more worthwhile,   weeding and then planting some assorted colours of California poppies (‘Copper Pot’, ‘Tequila Sunrise’ ‘Dusky Rose’, ‘Buttercream’).

The Golden Sands courtyard garden is filled with promise and as I weeded and planted, my thoughts ran like this:  Might it be be garden tour worthy this year after all?

Golden Sands courtyard

If only I can keep other workers from doing any more pruning like this:

Rhodos pruned last fall before I cried “Stop!”

With the sprinkler system working and the dairy manure mulch, the garden could be fabulous this year.  By the end of April, I’ll know if it would be worthy.  It would be fun for the assisted living residents to have the garden on tour, I think.  It would have to be described as a grandma-style cottage flower garden full of passalong plants.  But  wait…We have two out of town garden events to attend in the month before the garden tour and I don’t know if we’ll have time to get a garden ready…

Golden Sands: peacock  tulips

more peacock tulips

The northwest quadrant, a neglected one last year, looking wonderful with mulch.

On we went to Klipsan Beach Cottages to plant sweet peas.  When we pulled into our parking space we saw a glorious sight:  Denny had removed a hideous old Phormium and replaced it with a new length of fence.

Denny’s project: deer fence extension

Last time we worked there I had given the Phormium the evil eye but hadn’t expressed my derision to anyone but Allan.  Now it’s on the debris pile, as if Denny had read my mind.  He had a heck of a time getting it out with a pick and shovel.

good riddance

Considering that he is ten years older than us, it’s a bit embarrassing that lately I’ve been advising people to hire a backhoe to get rid of big old Phormiums.

Bella had been keeping Denny company while he worked.

I planted sweet peas along the fence here (with Denny mowing in background)

more sweet peas went here

Allan did some weeding; I had hoped he would put magnesium sulfate on the roses while I planted sweet peas.  However, it was one of THOSE days and that bucket had been left at home.  And the temperature was 66 degrees and we both found it considerably too hot; even Denny complained about it.

We headed the eleven miles back to Ilwaco with two Long Beach stops on the way.  On the trip north, I’d noticed some dead narcissi flowers in the planter in front of the Cottage Bakery.  This could not stand!

before deadheading: tattered old blooms

We also planted sweet peas around the second of two planter tuteurs, this one by the Paws by the Sea pet supply shop.

The storefront used to be the Liquor Store, which was apparently very important for folks to find, so it got its own special planter tower to help them find it.  Paws by the Sea was lucky to inherit it.

As we passed through Seaview, I made a sudden decision to check the Depot garden for deadheading and indeed, some narcissi needed it.  I would hate for a diner to have to look at dead flowers on the way in.

The Depot Restaurant

Allan checks the kitchen garden.

If the Escallonia at the corner of the building were mine, it would be cut to the ground by now.  The winter hit it hard.

I did not have time to deal with at all as we wanted to get to Ann’s garden.  Later this week, we are taking a friend to the Depot for a celebration and I can then find out if we can cut the escallonia all the way and let it re-sprout.

Finally at last we got to Ann’s garden.  She and Butch had done some good gardening work already this spring; we went over all the beds on the front, west side, and back garden and got more weeds.  I planted starts of Anthriscus and Pulmonaria and some California poppy seeds (‘Dusky Rose’ and ‘Copper Pot’) and two plants from the Basket Case Greenhouse:  Eryngium ‘Jade Frost’ and Gaura ‘Whirling Butterflies’.  I hope all are of no interest to the deer who frequent this garden.

in the midst of weeding the back garden

Ann and Butch do all the work inside the vegetable gardens, fenced with old windows

The weather had turned cold and windy (and we complained a bit about that).  I stood up and slammed my head hard when weeding under the front garden tree.  I always hurt myself on that tree even though I always tell myself I will know better this time.

that mean tree

Being a hypochondriac, I fretted for awhile that I might have a concussion or, far worse, a hematoma.  (The latter recently, shockingly, happened to a friend.)  So far, I’ve survived.

The garden is full of frustrating scilla (bluebells)….and lily of the valley and wild garlic (or some kind of allium) and is very up and down, on a steepish slope, so is quite a challenge.

peonies swamped with scilla

It has made a wonderful difference having most of the beds mulched with dairy manure.  Even the big creeping buttercups sometimes pull out easily as if they were in butter; the base soil is heavy clay.

Ann has a good collection of hellebores.

The cottagey charm of the garden had inspired my admiration for years and keeps drawing me back to work there even th0ugh it is far from the easiest garden t0 tackle.

Ann’s charming front garden

Even though we got a late start, we got enough done so that we can relax and enjoy the rainy days that are said to be just about upon us.  I hope for a few breaks in wind and rain so that I can get my own sweet peas planted.  Other than that, I’ve just purchased a new book and am hoping for a day to sit and read it from cover to cover.

Ironically, hoping for a rainy day to read this!

 

 

 

 

 

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23 March: perfect weather

Sunday, 23 March 2014

back garden, freshly mowed

Fritillaria by our driveway. A day at home was not to be.

Yes, the weather was perfect all day.  Not too warm, not too cold.  54 degrees F with only the lightest of winds, and a slight haze over the sun so no glare.  We started by planting some sweet pea seeds in the northwest quadrant of Fifth Street Park in Long Beach; while I did that, Allan put magnesium sulfate around the roses to encourage basal breaks.  I believe in certain of these early spring fertilizing rituals even if it might be magical thinking.

one corner of Fifth Street Park

Two and three years ago, the sweet peas in this park were glorious.  Last year, they did bupkis.  Cold, wet, or slugs got them.

I am hoping for this again:  glorious sweet peas in 2012

this year’s selection

Streamers mix, Saltwater Taffy Swirls, Zinfandel, Pastel Sunset, Strawberry Fields, Watermelon, Old Spice Blend, Lipstick, Spencer Ruffled Mix, Cupani’s Original, Painted Lady, In the Pink mix

Signs of spring:  The town was full of visitors, with one group after another posing by the frying pan.

The manager of the carousel was just putting on the finishing touches, as it was fully assembled again with children already waiting in line.

Long Beach Carousel

Next to the carousel, a brand new kiosk to replace a weather beaten one. I hope the interesting old photos of beach treasures are returned.

Tulip sylvestris in one of the planters

Narcissi in the frying pan park

We would have liked lunch at Captain Bob’s Chowder, right behind Fifth Street Park…but had to move on.

Having gotten worried about the Gunnera in the southeast quadrant of the park, I gave it a good look.  There are two little leaves coming up…but it sure looks nothing like the good growth on the one we saw in our friend Ed’s garden yesterday.

Gunnera, is there hope?  It would be a bugger to dig out the old one.

The progress of Ed’s Gunnera has made me very worried.

I had decided to plant annual poppy seeds (mostly California poppy) in the big pop out instead of a delightful selection of rock garden plants.  I know that the roots of Rugosa rose and couch grass lurk in wait; it will be easier to maintain if we can clean it all out once or twice a year.

One Stop Poppy Shoppe seeds

I have poppy seeds from Renee’s Garden and from the One Stop Poppy Shoppe.  You can see, above, how small the packets of the sweet One Stop shoppe are; one feels they are home packaged with love and care.  Her selection is the best I’ve seen anywhere.

the world’s tiniest zip lock bags are inside each packet

I find my hands are too clumsy to open those little bags, so I cut them with scissors and then put the unused portions back in the larger packet.

getting ready to plant in the big pop out

California Poppy seeds are easy to broadcast.  Some of the finer Papaver seeds, like Flanders Field Poppy, are so tiny that I use another method.  First, I put the seeds in my palm.

Then I blow, like blowing out a birthday candle.  This broadcasts the seeds over a good arc (provided nature’s wind is not competing with me).

whoosh!

Then we very lightly rake or sometimes even use a broom to even out the soil and get the seeds in good contact without covering them.  I’ve heard of mixing the seeds with granules of this and that to make them show up better, but I haven’t the patience.

I think I spilled part of a packet by holding it upside down over the sidewalk.  Will I never learn?  One of many reasons I don’t especially enjoy seed planting.  (Another reason is that I do not have deep faith that they will come up.  California poppies are almost foolproof.)

I had a few plants for the westernmost planter of the Bolstadt Beach approach.  Each got two Armeria (sea thrift) and two Santolina (lavender cotton).

near the boardwalk

Narcissi against beach grass

Even this close to the shore, we had no appreciable wind today.  Happy tourists used different methods to get around.

bikes and horses

While I checked on all the planters, Allan cut down the few ornamental grasses along the beach approach garden.  We still have to get out here and weed this monster.

grass cutting befores and afters

We did a little more work downtown, planting sweet peas in the planter that has a tuteur in it (displaying signs for shops that are off the main street).  Allan weeded the Veterans Field garden, I chopped some Fuchsias back behind Lewis and Clark Square and then checked Dennis Company’s selection of flower seeds.

Outside Dennis Co: We’ll re-do this planter after bulb time; I’m sick of the vinca.

the tree planter outside Dennis Co

Across the street from Dennis: That’s not a conifer on the right, it’s Hebe ‘Boughton Dome’, several years old.

In a planter one block south, we had cut the Escallonia to the ground.  A volunteer had once planted these shrubs in two of the planters.  They would like to be over ten feet tall.  I am determined this time to keep them well pruned to preserve the traffic sightlines.  Would that I could remove them; I fear we would hit the electrical line for the lamp post if we dug that deep.

Escallonia coming back

A stop at the Cottage Bakery for tiger paws figured into our schedule.  They pastries were eaten in haste on the way to do two short but effective projects at the Anchorage Cottages.

Anchorage courtyard sweet pea trellis

Allan built the string and bamboo sweet pea trellis in the office courtyard.  While he did that, I tackled some pruning.  Manager Beth had spoken of perhaps having a tree removed from the southeast corner of the resort.  I had pointed out that without the tree, the lawn area and cottages would lose a sense of enclosure and we would be able to see right through to cars passing on the main street, a block away.  She agreed (because she is agreeable) to just let me limb it up.

tree before and after, with pile of branches behind

done with these quiet tools (rechargable electric Makita chain saw, very quiet)

It all went well except when the chainsaw got stuck and I needed some help getting it out of a pinching branch. (I had gotten cocky and not cut the branch further out to take the weight off.)

Anchorage: some hosta spears saying “Spring!”

We had to leave the pile of tree boughs behind because our trailer had a large item in it to deliver to our friend J9’s new home.  On the way, we put in a couple of hours of work at Andersen’s RV Park:  planting more sweet peas and weeding couch grass out of a bed so I could plant California poppies.

now weeded and planted with California poppies

looking west to the RV sites (with the ocean just beyond)

Andersen’s: Muscari latifolium

At last, we made our delivery to J9: a rebuilt and strengthened two tiered platform for her cat Buddy to climb to the cat door.  I briefly walked around and further admired her darling new place.

all moved in!

on the back porch

garden relics

J9 and Buddy

We took a different road out of her Tides West neighbourhood.  I made Allan back up after we had driven past a compound (two houses) so cute that I had to have a photo.  He took it from the driver’s seat so it does not show very well the detail of the staggered shakes decorating the top part of the houses.  I will be watching this promising place to see what the garden looks like in summer.

so very cute!

The evening chill had come on at home and I was draggin’ leg so did not plant any more sweet peas.  Maybe tomorrow.

This is about all I saw of my garden at home. Cardamine (from the old Heronswood nursery) and Narcissi, backed with Nora’s house

That cardamine is a delight.  It’s in the same family as shotweed but so much nicer.  You’ll also see much of the irksome shotweed in our garden.

I had one big plan for the evening, if only we had gotten home sooner.  For my birthday, J9 gave me a vintage mirror that she thought I would put in the garden.  I decided it had to go in the house.  It will reflect the dining room table, so if only I could clear all the papers and other detritus and put a nice bouquet of flowers there (and keep it that way!), I’d have a wonderful picture.  Didn’t happen, so here’s a smaller view.

thanks, J9!

In the mail a few days ago, I got another birthday present from my old friend Shaz, who well knows my fondness for Mary Engelbreit and for little boxes.  A former Peninsulite and garden client, Shaz talks of visiting here from her Oregon home this year, and I think of her so often….I hope we don’t let life go by without a visit in either direction.

a little box from a much loved friend

Speaking of birthdays, we want to wish a very happy one to Garden Tour Nancy’s husband Phil, an architect and a food-gatherer extraordinaire.  Nancy texted me this photo of him getting oysters on the shores of Willapa Bay during that cold windy day we had last Friday.

Happy birthday, Phil!

Tomorrow I think we will finally get to that one private garden that has not yet seen a glimpse of us this year.

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22 March: charity and friendship

Saturday, 22 March 2014

This event benefits local soup kitchens.

We just made it to the line for Empty Bowls 2014 in time to hear the end of the drumming performance.

the line at 11 AM

I must remember to go see this garden in summer sometime.

 

inside: the room of bowls

Local potter Karen Brownlee spearheads this event, organizing the creation, firing and glazing. Professional and amateur adult potters and students from local schools make the bowls.

Allan picked the duck bowl.

star bowls

picking a bowl

raffle table. We tried to win the set of three but no luck!

Soup donated by local restaurants. Egg flower was our favourite.

 

volunteer servers

Our bowls (I bought two). I like the grown up bowls because they fit well in the cupboard.

second from left: Pam, activities director from Golden Sands Assisted Living

comparing bowls

our gardening client Cheri of Discovery Coast Real Estate

friend and local artist Joe Chasse

Jamie arrives!

Jamie picking a bowl

We would like to have sat with Jamie for awhile, but we had to go help J9 move into her new rental. She’s an old friend who left the beach for two years, could not bear to be away and recently returned. We met her at the storage unit next door to Larry’s antique store in Ilwaco, and I nipped into the shop for a moment to get some photos for the Antique Gallery Facebook page.

Antique Gallery Too! on Spruce; Larry and Robert’s other shop is on Lake.

in the antique shop

I then joined Allan and J9 in loading. Here, we were almost ready for our first trip, and I’m happy to report that we made it halfway up the Peninsula to J9’s new digs without incident.

 

Between the first and second, smaller load, we stopped at home to pick up a large planter that J9 had left behind when she moved away. It struck me how perfectly springlike our front garden looked at that moment.

looking in from Lake Street

Disporum catoniense ‘Night Heron’ in our garden today

I tore myself away so we could finish with the moving project. J9’s new place is a single wide manufactured home less than half a block from Loomis Lake, in a neighbourhood called Tides West.

Tides West, ocean on one side, Loomis Lake on the other

The long body of Loomis Lake runs up the mid-center of the Peninsula, as do smaller lakes and sloughs.

the wetland center of the ‘Ninsula

Except for the wealthier houses right on the lake and on the ocean side, Tides West is an affordable neighbourhood including many single and double wide manufactured (modular) homes. I remember a local story in which someone asked a city person why in the world she had bought a manufactured home here. Then the questioner visited and said “I understand now,” seeing that in all but the historic districts of the local towns, manufactured homes are common here.

J9’s new abode

J9’s place has a charming yard, not a garden, a simple green landscape with decks and one of my favourite yard accoutrements, rustic outbuildings.

view from east side porch with large evergreen huckleberry

covered west side deck

view from west side porch

garden shack

“Welcome to our nook of the woods.”

Someone loved, enjoyed, and decorated this place and I find it terribly poignant that they’ve had to leave it.

There’s a fireplace and a fire circle.

wood for campfires

porch, chairs, bottle tree, fire circle

Inside, the landlords won’t allow J9 to paint the panelling…

the hallway

The kitchen is painted white and it makes such a huge difference. Painting the panelling was the first thing we did when we moved into our dark old manufactured house. J9 came up with a good solution: She gently affixed white trellises to the walls.

how to brighten up paneling if you can’t paint it.

While Allan installed the cat door he’d made and helped adjust some of the trellis pieces, I took a walk to the lake, less than a minute away. Just at the end of J9’s street sit some modern, boxy lakeside homes that didn’t thrill me as much as her humble single wide did.

Overwhelmingly garage-y

a house much more to my liking

This house has a prime position next to the community park.

J9 can walk here in about one minute.

boats at the ready in the park

community park

community park dock

Loomis Lake looking south

and north to private docks

Magnolia tree on the way back to J9’s

When I got back to our friend’s house, I found Allan very pleased as the cat door he had built fit perfectly. (It’s a purchased cat door fitted into a clear wood framed panel to go into a sliding window space.)

success!

 

cat door

With the move done, we stopped by the home where J9 has been staying. It happens to be right across the street from our friend Ed Strange’s garden. We took ourselves on a tour (with his permission; he was out working.)

Ed’s abode

Ed’s front garden

The progress of Ed’s Gunnera made me suddenly very worried about mine.

Buddy, J9’s cat, walked with us and explored Ed’s front porch.

between house and garage

an excellent company

And then we went home, where I walked straight out to the edge of the bogsy wood to look at my own Gunnera.

Oh dear, I think I need a new one.

I managed to prune the dead tips off of the Leycesteria ‘Golden Lanterns’ and then I felt quite done with gardening for the evening. As usual, Allan had more energy than I and he mowed the lawn.

a bed of gold

Indoors, I examined an intriguing belated birthday present from Lisa and Buzz; Lisa (former client of Crank’s Roost garden, now of the bayside house of 300 hydrangeas) had dropped it off earlier in the day as we were on our way out. (It’s not her fault the present was belated; I was secretive about my birthday this year.)

a package

beautifully wrapped

with a delightful card. The inscription inside was so sweet and flattering that I would seem to be boasting if I shared it 😉

From the shape of the present (which was wrapped in lovely calendar pages), I thought it might be a nice bottle of wine, but LOOK! My very favourite tipple!

happy, and soon to be happier, me!

Tomorrow: back to the planting of sweet peas here and there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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21 March: and the cold wind blew

Friday, 21 March 2014

An icy cold wind made the sunny day a difficult one. I seem to recall it was a north wind. That would have made staying home so nice, as our house and outbuilding block most of the north wind from the back garden. However, we are behind on work and certainly could not take a Friday off when we had not been to Andersen’s RV Park for a week. On the way, we stopped at Long Beach City Hall to pick up our check and admire one of my favourite spring plantings, the mostly white narcissi on the north side.

Long Beach City Hall

Long Beach City Hall

The Trillium was a rescue from road widening near our old house.

Narcissi and Trillium

Then, on to work….

Payson Hall

The clubhouse is not thick with Narcissi; if it were, the dying foliage would make it hard to plant annuals later.

I planted sweet peas all along the picket fence. Some folks must think I find all aspects of gardening equally charming. In fact, I dislike the process of planting seeds. I suppose it would be easier in a fresh new bed with no weeding to do in order to make the perfect seed trench for sweet peas or broadcast area for poppies. I had forgotten to get a bamboo pyramid trellis for an area that used to have one that disintegrated, so sent Allan a few blocks south to The Planter Box to get a new one. While planting, my enjoyment did not increase when I realized that I was holding the envelope full of sweet peas seeds sorted and mixed out of different packets…UPSIDE DOWN. I looked diligently in the area where I had been working and did not see any dumped on the ground but I wonder…

the picket fence garden

Then I began to worry that I would run out of sweet pea seeds, so we stopped by The Planter Box again to buy more so that I could stretch out the special colours (like Saltwater Taffy Swirls) throughout the rest of the gardens. (Sweet peas are supposed to be planted March 17th. I am running late as usual.) I will have to wait to plant the around the bamboo pyramid till we return to Andersen’s next week.

lettuce starts at The Planter Box

My reward was to find that The Planter Box had ‘Streamers’ sweet peas, a colour assortment that I love and that had been sold out from Renee’s and Cook’s online. The errors of the day continued when I almost bought Manganese Sulfate instead of Magnesium Sulfate (for roses) because I did not have me specs on.

Garden Tour Nancy had passed us and chatted for a moment while we were in Long Beach.  She texted me a photo from the Basket Case to let me know their plant shipment had arrived and that she was already shopping.

Nancy’s teaser

Allan dropped me off at The Basket Case (Nancy was already gone) so that I could check out the new order that had just arrived from Blooming Nursery. He drove north a few blocks to pick up a yard of Soil Energy at Peninsula Landscape Supply while I reveled in the wealth of new plants.

To the right, one of my favourites: Eryngium ‘Jade Frost’

Agastache ‘Golden Jubilee’. All of mine came back through the winter.

Santolina: deer resistant, scented foliage, will grow well in ocean wind.

Knautia ‘Thunder and Lightning’…glorious, and came through the winter well for me.

While we were there, another shipment arrived of ferns, perennials, and clematis, passion flower and honeysuckle vines. Allan had returned by then and helped a bit with the unloading. It looks like Fred is living dangerously but the stake was not really about to poke him in the eye.

unloading

Although I had hoped to get to Erin’s with some new plants for her new garden, we were running out of time for other tasks. Poor Allan; we’d brought four half buckets of river rock to add to her garden boatscape and even though he’d had to keep lifting them in and out of the trailer, we would not have time to dump them today.

Back to Long Beach we drove. A planter on the Sid Snyder approach urgently needed to be topped up.

The soil mysteriously sinks in this planter, and only this planter, with one of its original “volunteer” signs, now not applicable as we do them all.

I don’t have an after picture when it looked more like this one, to which I added two Armeria and two Santolina.

I’m so pleased that the Narcissi along this stretch of sidewalk are not getting picked this year. A couple of years ago, every single one did and I pretty much gave up on adding more. The planter above is one we redid last fall so it got fresh bulbs.

We then went to the Big Popout to add soil to the area we’d deeply weeded last week. I walked around and did some deadheading in town. Even though I saw some dramatic sites, like a tree garden infested with huge and shocking chickweeds (which I removed), the cold wind troubled me and I only took one photo.

early tulips and hyacinth in the planter in front of the police station

Allan got a before and after of his soil project.

big pop out before

and after

We had missed fixing the welcome sign garden for all the folks who had arrived in the afternoon. Five o clock found us there removing many the Narcissi deadhead.

not very nice! better now!

One thing stood between me and offloading the rest of the soil into my own garden: an open house. Wanting to show support for Swell CoWork run by our next door neighbours one door east and our favourite bakery, Pink Poppy, we went back into Long Beach to this building by the arch:

Swell Space contains Pink Poppy Bakery and a co-working facility

Our neighbours Jared and Jessika also own Starvation Alley Cranberry Farm. Their organic cranberry juice has been used by the new North Jetty Brewing to make a Cranberry Orange Weissbier. I decided to risk half a glass; perhaps it would help me move the last of the soil by decreasing the pain I’d been in while hobbling around Long Beach. It was delicious.

Thandi (right), owner of the Sou’wester Lodge, talks with the brewery chap.

Jessika had created the opportunity for written interaction by the guests.

My answer was “Staycation and Dining Out”.

My answer: “Saturday Market, Farmer’s Market, supporting local biz, art events, cash mob”

my answer

(Dream on, huh? I can’t even get two of these folks to be my Facebook friends…I won’t say who…not Ann; I don’t think she is on FB.)

inside the co working space

treats for the open house (very tasty)

Oh, I do wish we had not been in such a hurry because those treats were tasty indeed and I’d have like to graze for longer.

We did buy a dessert for later from Pink Poppy.

We could not linger or we’d risk running out of daylight. The trailer had to be emptied of soil; we have promised a friend an afternoon of moving help tomorrow, and in the midmorning we have the Empty Bowls event to attend. At home, we got the leftover soil distributed where we removed the Fuchsias earlier this week.

amended; still would like to add more soil…

Smokey watched while captaining the garden boat.

Now, because it is Montana Mary’s birthday, I can share the beautiful presents I’ve collected for her at various Peninsula events. I started with a small wooden box (with some chocolates inside) inscribed with “I’m building sandcastles in my dreams” (from a cash mob at Home at the Beach gift shop) and added:

fern dish towels from cash mob at The Oysterville Store (and some huckleberry jam)

a pine needle pin cushion from cash mob at M&D Designs

a mug from Columbia Pacific Heritage Museum (and some of the albacore tuna they sell…she loves it)

fabric squares from the Quilt Guild show (we once got to attend it together)

a card by Jean Nitzel of The Picture Attic

Here we are in 1980.

Happy birthday, Mary!

If we both make it to September 2017, we can celebrate 50 years of friendship.

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20 March: Nahcotta views (and work)

Thursday, 20 March 2014

After loading yesterday’s fuchsia trimmings into the trailer, and Allan digging the last two clumps of the ones I wanted to transplant, we were faced with this…

We wisely presevered and drove on to Peninsula Landscape Supply to dump the debris.

Debris pile will be ground for compost.

The rain cleared and left the pile of oversized river rocks gleaming.

It sure would be wonderful to have a dump truck delivered of those huge river rocks.

Our mission of the day was to do a bit of planting in Surfside and Klipsan Beach. On the way we decided a quick check up on the Bailey’s Café garden in Nahcotta was in order.

in front of Bailey’s Café

The garden still looked excellent.

camellia against the café wall

Allan’s photo of fallen blossoms

The Bailey’s rosemary had come through the winter well.

The very low tide gave us an opportunity to walk far out to take photos of the pilings where once upon a time the Clamshell Railroad backed up and reversed its direction.

road to the bay

oyster shells, low tide on Willapa Bay

looking north to Port of Nahcotta

My Canon camera is defunct at the moment and I just had my iPhone, so I called Allan to walk out, partly to see the wonderful views and partly because I knew he would take good photos, as follow:

looking west toward Bailey’s, from the bay road

I believe these are the old railroad dock pilings.

At high tide, the water could be up to that wall.

looking west toward Bailey’s

old oyster baskets

the big pile of shells

Enough of the work intermission; we had not yet begun to apply ourselves, so we drove northwest to get to Marilyn’s garden and plant two big clumps of Fuchsia magellanica. They are naturalized in many unfenced gardens in the Pacific Northwest. I will be interested to see if the deer leave them alone.

at Marilyn’s; by summer the neighbours’ garage will be hidden.

at Marilyn’s: Fritillaria meleagris speared through a leaf.

Next, south and east to the Wiegardt Gallery at the verge of Ocean Park and Nahcotta. Some say it’s in Ocean Park and others say it’s in Nahcotta. The address say Ocean Park, but the mailing address for Surfside also says Ocean Park, so it’s rather confusing.

I think it’s time to put the Peninsula map in here again!

Wiegardt Studio Gallery

The rosemary here has come through the winter well, unlike mine that died.

On the west side of the gallery, Ilex ‘Sky Pencil’ is not making a big impression yet.

We got the front and side garden weeded. The back will have to wait for another time. Once, to save money on materials, I mulched the back beds with free horse manure. Oh how I rue the day, as a horsey grass now infests the beds, just as it did my own (former) garden when I made the same mistake in the same year.

Washed dairy manure does not create weed grass.

Today, we needed to get on down the road to do more jobs. We stopped at Oman Builder’s Supply to trim a lavender that we had not gotten to last time. Just a few blocks north, we paused to admire the narcissi behind Jack’s Country Store. You would think people would know to not pick the flowers. Apparently not.

an all too familiar problem

Here’s our little garden at Oman Builder’s Supply

with some two or three year old tulips returning, with smaller flowers than the first year.

Our last job was at Klipsan Beach Cottages where Allan planted more Fuchsia starts in the A Frame garden and a line of Hellebores in the lawn border. I completely forgot to photograph the Hellebores once they were planted.

wheelbarrow of Hellebores and Fuchsia starts

The Fuchsias went in this area.

I spent my time pruning the old stalks of the hardy Fuchsias here and there, quite a lot of them, and as I did I happily realized that several large Fuchsias grew outside the deer fence garden and have not been bothered.

at Klipsan Beach Cottages

Pulmonaria, one of my favourite early spring bloomers

Ann’s garden should have some of these, as clearly they are deer proof!

Pulmonaria backed with Euphorbia

Ribes sanguineum (flowering currant), also deer resistant

inside the fenced garden

Euphorbia characias wulfenii is safe from deer outside the fence.

in the fenced garden

a quick solution for an empty pot from which a Phormium was removed

Here once stood a might Phlomis fruticosa (Jerusalem sage)

vanquished by our cold winter

Mary and Denny gave me the most charming birthday present:

We are not working till sundown these days; the air gets quite cold by 5 PM. I thought how nice it would be to go to Mexican Fiesta Night at the Lightship Restaurant and get the guacamole that is made at tableside. The realization that is was Thursday, not Wednesday, sent us straight home. I made one quick venture into the back garden to show you the tulips that are starting to bloom next to the garden boat.

The west bed where I chopped and removed some big Fuchsia clumps now needs a yard of soil.

west bed

The middle beds Geranium ‘Rozanne’ river has begun to emerge.

It will bloom from June to October.

In the east bed, Leycesteria ‘Golden Lanterns’ and Euphorbia glow in the evening sunshine.

I would like to have clipped the dead ends off of the Leycesteria but was just too tired.

I forgot to share one birthday present from Allan in my show and tell so am adding it here. I’d found these two most darling pictures at the Ilwaco Antique Gallery and had hinted about them quite well. Here they are back then in the Gallery, soon to be on our wall:

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17-19 March: birthday, rain, not rain

Monday, 17 March 2014

I chose to have a low key birthday, even to the point of hiding it from the Facebook crowd. 59 is not very important; the most significant thing about 59 is that I have now started year 60.

A bit childishly, I will share “what I got for my birthday”, since the prezzies that arrived that day were rather wonderful.

It turns out that when Allan cleaned up the garden at The Picture Attic last week, he was also arranging to have the garden tour poster from 2012 framed by Jean Nitzel. She says that the gold was his idea and that he has a good eye.

poster from our day of glory

Allan also found me a copy of the collection of Dulcy Mahar columns; it has already gone out of print. Dulcy, the beloved garden writer for the Oregonian newspaper, died not long ago and I lay down on the bed and wept as I loved her column so much. I had the good fortune to have toured her beautiful Portland garden twice. (Both times were before I began to devote entire blog entries to single gardens.)

I had not opened my present from my best friend since age 12, Montana Mary, even though it had arrived several days before. It turned out to be an excellent theme present (with the bonus of having a Hello Kitty item and a cat lady card)!

a chocolate theme from Montana Mary

I can already testify that the chocolate in the small orange label box is excellent.

My dear new friend Kathleen Shaw pays very good attention to what her friends like. She has figured out that Earl Grey is my favourite tea (and this is a special cream kind), that I like lemon curd, and that a LARGE forest green mug is just the perfect size and colour.

Thanks, Kathleen!

While a cold mid to late morning rain fell, Allan worked on a cat door for J9’s new residence. I thought he did such an excellent job that I should share it. The framed clear acrylic will slip into her kitchen window.

cat door

And then the sun emerged. That meant I could acquire the most perfect birthday present, from me to me (with Allan driving to get it): a yard of Soil Energy from Peninsula Landscape Supply.

a magical scoop

luscious stuff

I wanted some in the center of this garden bed:

I will plant a narrow, columnar evergreen in there to make Pam Fleming proud.

And along the edges of the beds I enlarged a couple of weeks ago. Allan helped me load the soil into wheelbarrows, my least favourite part of a soil moving job. (After all, it was my birthday!)

before

after

before

after

before: danger tree bed

after

admiring a stunning ornamental rhubarb

I would like to get more soil for the west side bed. Under the soil and compost is newspaper, too close to the surface….and a huge sweep of wild impatiens seedlings that must be removed.

west side, project for next soil day

I am good at organizing work days, the acquisition of plants and soil amendments for jobs, cash mobs, and coffee klatsches, but am terrible at organizing a birthday for myself. Party arranging is not one of Allan’s skills, either. Next year, when I am 60, I will have to do better. Today, I finally got around to texting two friends to join us at the Depot Restaurant. Then it turned out the Depot was closed so I picked another favourite, the 42nd Street. Of the two friends, local gardener Ed Strange was able to come on a last minute invitation. He spilled the beans to the restaurant owner, so I got a birthday sparkler in my wee chocolate sorbet dessert.

Allan with the birthday sparkler

I love the way that Betty, the waitperson, takes the longest route possible around the restaurant with the sparkler. Later, the woman in green by the window (background, above) got a sparkler as well…another St Paddy’s birthday girl.

I cautiously admire the impressive show. One is instructed not to touch it or blow it out.

For their desserts, Allan and Ed dug into root beer floats.

This coming weekend, we and Ed will be helping J9 move to a place on the same street as Ed’s home, so you can expect a blog tour of his excellent garden. He’s the one we recommend for every job that we ourselves cannot take on: Strange Landscaping Services.

As we left, I was very amused by this sticker on the vehicle next to ours. Reminded me of when Robert and I used to go to Seattle in our old VW bus and he would say in his perfect Scotty accent, “I’m given her all she’s got, Captain; she can’t take any more!” as the van juddered and shook at freeway speeds.

Tuesday, 18 March 2014

The weather did this:

south window

The cats did this:

Mary and Smokey

And I read this:

and this, on Allan’s e-reader (it’s not available on paper):

Some of you know that Chris is a former spouse who now has a brilliant writing career (no exaggeration). In his Seattle based mystery, book one of a series, I recognized his old apartment, many former hang outs of mine and ours, and a leather jacket I used to wear.

And then I read this:

Awhile back, we went to a talk by the author at Time Enough Books. I finally got through my library pile and was able to read this, which I had purchased. It is a five star read of interwoven short stories.

Speaking of Time Enough Books, awhile back its owner, Karla, gave me an advance copy of a novel which was due to be published March 4th. After an odd television combo of an episode each of Glee and The Walking Dead, I started it for bed time reading and I could barely put it down.

I predict a rave review.

Wednesday, 19 March 2014

I thought the rain would continue and looked forward to reading more of Mr Owita. First, we had our late morning tax appointment with our accountant.

in Jennifer Hopkins accounting office four blocks down in Ilwaco

Jennifer’s darling dog, Helen, was there.

Helen

With the appointment done, I was pleased that the rain still fell and wind still blew. Allan decided to go shopping overseas (northern Oregon coast). Just as I sat down and reached for my book, out came the bright sunshine. Blast!

I had to go outside and do some gardening. A task I had thought I would need help with was the transplanting of three large Fuchsia magellanica, planted in a bed that once got shade from a large rhododendron that we later removed to get a view toward the ocean. The fuchsias were taller than me but had died to the base from last winter’s cold. I cut them with little loppers because the big ones had gone to Oregon with the van. I used a flimsy pick because the big one was also in the van. This led to some internal whining and a long break in mid afternoon and the decision to leave all the branch clippings on the lawn to deal with tomorrow.

I managed to get two of the three Fuchsias moved as well as three of the four plants from my Forest Farm order into the ground (Descaisnea fargesii, and a golden columnar Ilex, and (in a big pot) a double flowered salmonberry. Hydrangea ‘Ryan Gainey’ is still looking for a destination spot. Sadly, the Azara serrata around which I had based this order had expired and was not available after all. The Descaisnea was also much desired, though, and it arrived just fine.

from Forest Farm

Tomorrow, day one of spring. I felt sad for my friend Sheila when she told me that the temperature in her mid-Oregon garden is supposed to get below 20 tonight. That does not seem fair at all.

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