21-22 June: two rather lazy days

Sunday, 21 June 2015

at home

Smokey

I find it so sweet that Smokey now sits on the chair closest to my new table while I have breakfast; he sat next to the other table when I would dine there.

I could not get going outside today despite big plans. I had so little energy for gardening that I wrote two blog posts instead, feeling a nagging guilt the whole time because the weather was warm and not terribly windy.  I attribute some of the lack of energy to having heard this morning that Long Beach won’t hire an intern to weed the beach approach. I don’t get it as they have to pay someone to do it, right? So it seems like the remaining ten sections are again hanging over my head like the axe of doom. Or…it just won’t get done. Other than that, I suppose we all need a rest sometimes and I had to take one.  Fortunately, it was the longest day of the year and so even though I did not begin to garden till 4:30, I still had time to put in a good four plus hours.

I ate the Pink Poppy Bakery Swedish Traveling Cake, which I’d forgotten about yesterday, for energy.

Allan had already helped me enormously by setting up a sprinkler to water the front garden.

front garden lilies

pale yellow lilies in bud

Scrophularia variegata (figwort) and a variegated Hellebore

Lily ‘Landini’

Lily ‘Landini’

I had been excited after a rain shower late last week to find the new water bin full…until Allan pointed out it also collected roof water from when we run the oscillating sprinkler.  (Our house is short).

I should have dipped water out before today’s sprinkler session.

In the back garden, I found two frogs, not Pacific tree frogs but a larger kind (leopard frogs?) hanging out under a piece of driftwood in one of the water boxes.

I could also see some small tadpoles swimming around, the ones Allan had rescued last weekend.  They are elusive and dive down when observed.

Allan had mowed the lawn earlier in the day.  I watered with the four back garden sprinklers, weeded the former Danger Tree bed and added whatever mulch I had around (not enough!), and then I partially trimmed out the sides of the salmonberry tunnel back in the bogsy woods…

before…forgot to take an after. And the results were just middling because of lack of energy.

Japanese iris by the woodpile at the tunnel entrance

I had company in the garden.

Allan went to water the Ilwaco Community Building.  I observed that he does not mind going to work for a bit on a day off, whereas to me, having to work even a bit makes it completely not count as a day off.

Allan’s photo: flooding the sad horsetail-y soil at the community building.

Allan’s photo: Brodiaea at the community building.

When he returned, he built a campfire.

Allan’s photo

Later in the evening, I got the impulse to completely get rid of that old tricycle piece at the lower right, above; it has slowly disintegrated, and makes it impossible to expand the garden into that area.  It’s gone now.

Near the fire circle: two beloved plants, Sambucus laciniata from Joy Creek Nursery and Rose ‘Radway Sunrise’ from Cistus.

Walking to and from the house to collect campfire food and drink, I noticed that the vine that Nancy gave me, from Annie’s Annuals, is blooming.  I have completely forgotten its name even though it is a vine I have wanted to grow, so I hope someone can help me ID it.

exciting!  Sorry did not get a long shot of the plant.

Paul’s Himalayan Musk rose is still blooming over the big west arbour.

Then, we settled in for our campfire.

view of the Danger Tree bed I had weeded earlier today. I want to build the bed up higher now that the tree is just a snag.

to my left: the bed that I expanded recently. Quite satisfying to see those ladies in waiting planted.

At last, a fire, and no wind.  We had hoped for this last night when Kathleen was available to join us.  It has been a couple of windy weeks waiting for a campfire evening.  Tonight was summer solstice, and even though I knew it was the longest light evening of the year, I totally forgot that we should howl and …recite poetry… and other solstice rituals.  We just quietly sat and toasted sausages and had a hard apple cider with lime each.

lots of wood waiting for future campfires

above: trees with no roaring wind; what a delight

Monday, 22 June 2015

My plan was to title this post “A lazy day and a busy one” or something like that, as I had expected to do a lot of weeding and pruning at home on Monday (while waiting for the plumber).  And then….because the next six days will be tremendously busy…I completely skived off and read the brand new book in a series that I love: The Seaside Knitters.  How could I resist?  It had come from the library, and if I did not read it today I would only have time for small bits of reading later in the week.  That is no way to read a mystery.

ahhhhh…..

Mary immediately saw that it was going to be a good day for her, as well.

She made a good book rest.

I love this series so much that I wrote a special blog post about it, and when I have time I have some new descriptive details about the fictional town of Sea Harbor to add to that post.  Despite an unusual number of murders, the town is idyllic, and even more so is the friendship among the women who comprise the core characters.  It is possible to find friends like that, and rare, and they should be treasured.  (I can guarantee that none of them would tolerate mean girl shenanigans any more than they tolerate unsolved murders.)

During that time, the plumber came and Allan dealt with the whole interlude so that I got to just keep reading.  He was being much more productive than me and had painted some posts and an old door for an upcoming project.

Allan’s photo: He also scraped and repainted an old door that is one of the deer fence gates.

I did not rush through my book despite my usual feelings of garden guilt, so I was not outside until after five.  (A sunny but not too hot day reading indoors is not as purely pleasurable as a winter day….)  In the following three hours, I managed to accomplish some weeding, some watering (including watering can applications from the full rain barrel), picked some strawberries and blueberries, and tied about twenty more tall bamboo stakes to the fence wherever I thought the deer might be jumping over.

bamboo stakes ready to go

evening light

under the rose arbor

deep blue nigella (love in a mist) reseeded from last year

looking south over the water boxes

a pretty yellow annual given to me by Teresa from The Planter Box

more tall bamboo stakes in place

looking south

looking southwest

Cosmos ‘Antiquity’

This daylily is a keeper.

This evening I pulled a lot of bindweed off the backside of this area: East side of bogsy woods.

Salvia ‘Hot Lips’ came back from last year.

Cyperus ‘King Tut’ in the water boxes

While I had a couple of productive hours in the garden, Allan went out to water the Ilwaco planters and street trees, so again it was not a true day off for him.  I find that a shame.  I think it bothers me more than it bothers him to see him have to go to work instead of having a real two day weekend.

We finished the day with the Johnny Cash biopic, Walk the Line.  In one scene, June Carter uses the phrase “a hitch in your giddyup”, which is sort of cosmic because I just heard and adopted “hitch in your getalong” last week.

Tomorrow:  the north end jobs come early this week.  I am hoping, oh so fervently hoping, that the Long Beach planters will hold out till Wednesday and will not need watering tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

 

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