The Best of 2010*

Galanthus elwesii in March 2010

Following the example of  Janus, the two faced Roman god of doorways, I am stopping to take a look back, before I look forward to step into the new year of 2011.

end of winter

Bare Ruined Choirs by Matthew Woodward, one of many gallery in the library shows and receptions

the Chicago Flower and Garden Show

Through the Looking Glass

the herons return


St. Patrick's Day shows and feising

dancers from Trinity Academy of Irish Dance waiting to perform

spring

Hellebormania

Helleborus x hybridus 'Kingston Cardinal'

the freakish

Caulophyllum thalictroides

complete silliness


the sublime

Calycanthus floridus 'Athens' and Crystal Fountain clematis

loving the new camera

Paeonia suffruticosa 'Ofuji-nishiki'

summer

Buffalo

no rain

winged beauty


great performances

the border in August 2010

autumn

the harvest


beautiful edibles


battles with squirrels

finally rain

Rosa 'Carefree Beauty'

plant of the year at Squirrelhaven

Geranium 'Bob's Blunder' in a pink froth

battles with cucumber beetles


a new sculpture

beloved bees

Symphyotrichum laeve 'Bluebird'

fiery foliage

Forsythia 

the garden never stops


winter

the garden in snow


waiting for the birds

It was, on the whole, a good year.  May this new year bring joy and blessings.

*My wildlife year in review is on Beautiful Wildlife Garden

A Really Good Snow Shovel

Suncast shatter-resistant snow shovel

I got a new snow shovel a few weeks ago at Costco.  One of their one-time trial memberships came in the mail, so I gave it a whirl.  I wasn't shopping for a snow shovel, but this Suncast shovel beckoned me, with its pretty ruby glow and the nice cushioning on the handle.  It's wonderfully lightweight, just like it says on the label I can't get off.  I'll admit I was skeptical of the shatter-resistant claim, though.  Then VIS ran over it with the van.  (Don't ask.)  I thought for sure it was ruined, but it emerged from under the wheels with only a few scratches.  Take a closer look.

Too bad I can't go back to Costco for another one.  This is no girly shovel.

This is a completely unsolicited review of a snow shovel.  I paid for the shovel and received no compensation of any kind for this review.

Too Much Christmas Redux

It's happened again, I got finagled into doing a 3-day Christmas marathon.  I swear, never again.  I'm tired, queasy and ready to hide in bed all day, but there's laundry to do, house to clean, and kids to feed and entertain.  (I could be a bad mother, and allow them to sequester themselves in their rooms all day with their new electronic games, but I won't.)

I'm still waiting for the birds to discover my new heated birdbath.

I can't have feeders because the squirrels pull them down and tear them apart, but I'm hoping the birdbath will bring the little feathered visitors within camera range.  As is evident from the photo, we got over three inches of snow on Christmas.  I'd appreciate it more if the weather would let me keep it.  It's supposed to get into the 40s and rain on New Year's Eve.

So while I'm waiting for the birds to show up, I'll be delving into a book a should I have read a long time ago, Amy Stewart's "Wicked Plants."  I couldn't resist peeking at it just after I opened it, and it's already sucked me in.  I hope everyone finds the time this week between Christmas and New Year's to curl up with a good gardening book and dream winter garden dreams.

Christmas Greetings

The gifts are all wrapped and artfully arrayed around the tree by the girl.  Most of the decorations (that I could find) are up, cookies have been baked.  But all those things are merely the trappings, it's the time we spend together that matters.



Wishing you and all of yours a peaceful holiday.

                                                       Barbara

Honoring & Remembering My Garden Inspirations

My first garden success, Lilium longiflorum.

Dee, at Red Dirt Ramblings,  has written about the people who have inspired her to garden, and asked us to do the same.  Now seemed the perfect time for me to do so, as I have just reviewed Colleen Plimpton's Mentors in the Garden of Life, which also addresses the topic of people who have been gardening inspirations.


The first person to inspire me was my mother.  Eight years before I was born, Mom decided to plant a garden in a vacant lot next to her first apartment on the northside of Chicago, just after my parents married.  She recalls that she grew zinnias there.  My grandfather, who owned the 6-flat building was not pleased.  I don't know what got a bee in his bonnet over it; it was just a vacant lot, and my mom was a pioneer urban guerrilla gardener.  When she and Dad moved out to Crystal Lake, Illinois, in the late 1950s, they moved into a new house, in a new subdivision, where there was abundant sunshine for the full-sun flowers that my mom loves.  That's the house where I was born.  I remember the plum tree, the tulips, and my first friend Andy, who ate dirt. We moved when I was three.

Unfortunately, for Mom, the new house was in a former burr oak savanna, which meant shade, shade, shade and more shade.  She struggled against it, planting her beloved flowers on the south side of the house.  When I was 10, she let me plant a scale from an Easter lily on the east side of the house.  I was thrilled when it bloomed.  Sadly, it didn't like the less than ideal light conditions.  From my mom, I learned not to fight the conditions, but I also acquired her optimism about trying to grow full sun plants in less than full sun conditions.  Some times, it pays off.

I remember trying to grow bachelor buttons from seed, and being disappointed when nothing sprouted.  I  still have rotten luck with seeds, but the little violets we brought home from school on May Day thrived in the woodsy soil.

Mom tried to grow vegetables there, but eventually gave in to reality.  One summer, when I was about 13, she rented a plot from a farmer and forced me asked me to help her grow veggies on it.  That's when I learned the value of mulch, and the consequences of its lack.  I also grew corn for the first and last time.  We had plenty of peppers, zucchinis, and tomatoes, but only one melon, and it had a bug in it.  I learned everything I know about growing vegetables from her, even though I grow most of mine in containers on the patio.

Mom never liked living in McHenry, and she finally convinced my dad to move to a suburb closer to Chicago when I was a junior in high school.  Once again, it was a new house, in a new subdivision with no trees.

Mom had her rock moved to the new house in 1983.

She finally got another chance to grow sun-loving plants.  She put in a large garden out back, with roses, peonies, irises, daylilies and daisies.  In this garden, my mom taught me how to prune roses, how to plant and divide bearded irises, and how to deal with the vile iris borer.  She taught me by example why it's best to grow mint in a container.  She also shared a vegetable garden with my late uncle, Tony Esposito (no, not the hockey player), in the lot next door.  I learned from both of them the value of not metaphorically biting off more garden than you can chew.  If you're not selling produce, you really need only one or two tomato plants.

My second garden inspiration was my sister Diane, who died 20 years ago today.  I still miss her.  She was my original garden center hopping buddy.  She moved in with me when I bought a townhouse, after I finished law school.  Diane loved beautiful things, and she had aspirations of being a floral arranger and opening a flower shop.

Taken in my mom's sunny back garden,  3 years before Diane's death: Diane with her Maltese, Primo, and yours truly with my little mutt, Coco.

Diane was so talented at everything artistic, and her touch inspired me to view a garden as a big floral arrangement.

Phlox paniculata 'Red Riding Hood'

She was also very good at crafts, and taught me how to make wreaths and use the fruits of the garden.

My new garden center hopping buddy is my daughter.  Two years in a row, we've stopped at The Flower Factory in Stoughton, Wisconsin, on the way home from Madison, and I've come home with things she insisted that I buy.  It's because of her that I have a rose here at Squirrelhaven.

'Carefree Beauty' rose

I hope to be a gardening inspiration to the girl, who has recently informed me that she wants to be (among other things) a garden designer when she grows up.

The Return of Frigid Friday

Schizachyrium scoparium 'Carousel' and Baptisia 'Midnight Prairie Blues'

I just heard that the normal high for Chicagoland today is 35F/1.7C, making today's forecasted high 16 degrees below normal.  And here I was thinking that a high around 20F/-6.7C sounded warm. That's how cold it's been.

Here's a visual demonstration:

The steam was caused by evaporating hoarfrost in -6F/-21C on Wednesday morning.  According to Wikipedia, radiation frost, or hoarfrost, forms on cold clear nights when radiation cooling causes objects (such as plants) to become colder than the surrounding air.

While snow is a gardener's friend, extreme cold is not.  There hasn't been enough snow here this December, although about an inch of the dry, fluffy stuff fell last night.

Hydrangea macrophylla 'Bailmer' (Endless Summer™)

I decided not to mulch the big-leaf hydrangeas this year because too often the buds that were protected all winter end up getting zapped by a spring freeze.  They're all reblooming cultivars anyway.  I also want the garden to look more attractive in winter, and large areas of shredded leaves enclosed by wire fencing isn't my idea of attractive.  I did make an exception for the tree peony.  It probably doesn't need it, but protecting the graft makes me feel better about things.
Stay warm!

December Bloom Day - Taking It Inside

It's the 15th of the month, Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, the day when Carol, of May Dreams Gardens, asks us to show what we having blooming. She's very lenient, allowing anything flowered related, which is great because there's nothing going on outside in my garden but snow, frost, and cold.  But inside, the picture is improving, now that I am trying to be more attentive to watering.  Even with benign neglect, the purple-leafed oxalis Oxalis regnellii (or is is Oxalis triangularis), looks terrific.  What an obliging little plant.  What started out as an annual purchased for a container in the spring of 2009 has become four good-sized plants.  One is outside in the ground, having survived last winter under snow in a warm microclimate, two are indoors here, and one I gave to my neighbor, who admired a pot of it on my potting bench all summer.  This one has three bloom stalks.  It's grown for the foliage, but I like the sweet simplicity of the pink-blushed flowers.

I was waiting, hoping that the fuschia would be in bloom today.

The fuschia isn't as forgiving of my bad watering practices, and has rallied under the renewed attention.  That bottom bud will probably pop open tomorrow.

Last Night I Dreamed of Daffodils

Narcissus 'Cassata'

There were hundreds of them, yellow and white, and white ones and yellow ones mixed together, all in full bloom.  Maybe it was the two days with highs above freezing, or maybe it was the arrival of the first of the plant catalogues (Bluestone Perennials), that got me dreaming of spring.  So what if last night's rain turned to snow and the roaring winds are blowing it all over the place.

 Dreams of spring are a good way for a Northern gardener to make it through the long, frozen winter.  I know I'm not the only one. Just ask Carol, who named her garden May Dreams Gardens, although my dream was more about April.

Cat and Mouse

cat tracks in the snow

This morning when I went out to get the paper, I found circumstantial evidence of a nocturnal drama on my driveway.  A set of cat tracks crossed the driveway.  At the corners of the garage, the tracks bunched up, indicating the cat had paused there.

Then I spotted these tracks:

the cat was after some small critter. At first I thought they were chipmunk tracks, but on closer examination, I discovered they were made by a mouse.

mouse tracks in the snow

See the impression made by the tail?

It looks like Jerry got away from Tom once again.

An Indoor Gardening Mystery Solved

sad plants, except for the Oxalis and the coleus

I love my husband, he's so smart.  He figured out why I chronically underwater my houseplants, how I can walk past a wilting plant indoors that, if it were outside, I'd water immediately.  It's so simple.  He observed that when I go outside, it's usually to garden or to take photos, so I'm thinking about the plants.  By contrast, indoors I'm usually busy doing something and, when I notice the poor plants, I think to myself that I'll water them later, when I'm done doing whatever it is I'm doing, such as carrying an overflowing laundry basket.  Of course, by the time I finish my task, I've forgotten about the plants and moved on to something else.

The plants have been in the house only since the middle of November, and already there has been a marked decline (compare),  except for the Oxalis and the coleus, although the Fuschia has started to rally and has buds.  Now that I know the reason for my failing, hopefully I can correct it.
How do you keep your tender plants alive over the winter?

A Long Winter's Rest

Mary Ann of Gardens of the Wild, Wild, West, and Gail of Clay and Limestone, have both been feeling a little tired of gardening.  We all agreed that we welcome the break from gardening that winter affords.  It's a good time to stay inside and curl up with a good book.  On Carpe Geum, I have listed my personal picks for the Top 5 gardening books of all time.  Four of the five are still in print, and would make a good gift for any gardener.  (Hint, hint [I already have number 5].)






It's also a good time to curl up with a gardening magazine.  I recommend the current issue of Horticulture.  Not only does it have a bit I wrote about my tree peony (page 69), but it also has pieces by Kylee of Our Little Acre, Carol of May Dreams Gardens, Jean McWeeny of DigGrowCompostBlog, Edmund and Becky Hillick of Stonewall Garden, and Telsing Andrews of The Veggie Patch Re-Imagined.








The temperature has plummeted with a low of 7F/-14C forecast for tonight, so I'm pleased that the garden is covered by an insulating blanket of snow.

Echinacea purpurea seedheads

I never did get around to putting down the shredded leaves to help keep the ground frozen.  There probably will be an opportunity to do so at some point this winter.  For now, I'm just enjoying the winter wonderland look.