Garden

Art Cards 2011 – Catching Up

| terriaw

I made a couple sets of art cards lately that I haven’t had a chance to share with you, so I’m going to do a catch-up post.

Almost two weeks ago, we were lucky to get a few warm Spring days. As soon as our weather turns like that, I make a mad dash for the backyard.

I love to sit in my Adirondack chair to feel the sun warming my skin and watch the world turn green again.

You will find me in the backyard as often as possible, watching and listening to the wild outside.

I also made a set of crazy art cards to remember the fabulous 30STM concert I went to last weekend.

Side one is a copy of my ticket bordered by pink fur yarn, which represents the pink furry mittens the lead singer wore at the beginning of the concert. Really, he did!

Side two represents the band’s logo and the red balloons floating over the crowd, with spots of confetti here and there. Good times, man!

Stop by our Flickr group to see what Michelle and Sandra have been doing on their fun art cards.

Fall in Our Gardens

| terriaw

I haven’t shared many pictures of our gardens lately, so I thought today would be a good time, while we still have a little greenery left before winter strikes.

It’s fall around here, so the foliage is changing but not many things are blooming.

We bought a mum to add some color to our patio. I love the warm rich colors of mums.

In my part of the world, the temperatures are getting colder, so plant life is going dormant to survive the winter. I did find a few plants that typically bloom in summer that decided to bloom again this fall.

Up until last weekend, we have had an unusually warm, sunny fall, so I suppose some plants got a second wind.

The sun shining today for the first time in at least four days, so just looking at these colorful pictures is a treat! Hope you enjoyed it too.

Ornamental Grasses

| terriaw

We have been on a mission to plant as many ornamental grasses as we can fit in the empty spots throughout our garden.

We planted these grasses a couple years ago, and now they are as tall as our fence.

These purple fountain grasses have always been my favorite. I was so happy when we finally found some at the garden center earlier this year.

All these grasses are very low maintenance, which is really nice with such a big yard.

They  provide delicate color and texture throughout the summer.

They will get more stunning in fall when other plants are winding down to dormancy for winter. For now, it’s magnificent just to watch them sway in the wind and sparkle in the sun. I hope you all are enjoying your Saturday afternoon too!

Fresh Ingredients

| terriaw

There’s nothing better than fresh salsa, especially with ingredients from my own garden.

I could eat it by the spoonfuls, but it definitely tastes better with chips.

I think these vibrant salsa colors are great inspiration for a patchwork project, so I checked my stash of reds and greens and found more fabrics than I realized I had, especially in my Christmas pile. (don’t you just love these tone-on-tone polka dots on top?!)

Now I just need to figure out what to make. I have faith an idea will come to me.

Underneath

| terriaw

Underneath the ugliness,

there is always hope!

I was lucky enough to spend some time in our gardens today while it was sunny and in the 60s. Lookie the treasures I found underneath all that matted mess!

That’s the best part about Spring,

it always gives you signs of hope, signs that all your hard work is going to pay off.

In My Spring Garden

| terriaw

I have been taking a lot of pictures around our yard and gardens this spring.

flowering crab treeWe have these great flowering crab apple trees that look like giant blossoms in spring.

flowering crab in front yard

The bleeding heart shrub proves to be spectacular every year.

bleeding heart bush

Great close-up subject for drawing practice.

bleeding heart flowersSomehow, we even got white flowers out of the same plant. I think they are so mystical looking, especially with those rain drops on the leaves.

white bleeding heart flowers

We planted more bulbs last fall, which I had forgotten about, so these were a nice surprise.

new pink and white tulips

These tulips are my favorite!

my favorite tulips!

Check out these gorgeous dahlias I found at the farmers market today.

red and white dahliaI wish they were perennials around here, but our climate is a little too cold for them to last past summer.

purple dahlia

Isn’t planting season the best?! Once we get past the last chance for frost, I will be planting the vegetable garden, which will be strictly a salsa garden this year, and annuals in our containers. I can’t wait to get cosmos and zinnias too. I hope it looks as nice around here as a botanical garden by July!

Gardening and Drawing Class

| terriaw

We exhausted ourselves last weekend planting trees and shrubs. Our goal this spring is to fill in our big backyard so it feels more like a park.

We started with a magnolia tree. Isn’t she pretty?

magnolia tree ready to plant

We bought some holly shrubs to have foliage and berries in winter, when everything is dormant and bare.

Holly shrubs

We added a row of willow shrubs to the side of the house, where there is a hodge-p0dge of columbines, lilies of the valley and wood poppies.

willow shrubs

We still have to plant the birch clump, which will replace a dyeing birch in our front yard.

new birch tree

I spent the entire day on Sunday in a drawing class for beginners at the botanical gardens.   We started with the basics, from intuitive drawing to gestural drawing to blind drawing.  Then we progressed to still life, where we focused on measuring and shading.

tomato-onion still life

I’ve never really drawn still life free-hand, so this was exciting to learn how to really look at something and translate it onto paper. 

still life of bottles

I am hoping to combine our growing garden with a budding knack for drawing this summer.  It’s exciting to turn another creative corner in my life!

Lists

| terriaw

I like to write lists. Lately I have been listing the things I want to make for Christmas (it’s a HUGE and overly ambitious list). I also started making my wish list for my birthday and Christmas, which is always helpful to Dave.

Last year I wrote a short story for a graduate class that ended up being full of lists, like the main character was trying to get through a dilemma with lists, as if a boost of confidence. I didn’t intentionally write it to be that way, and for some reason I didn’t like that format, so I ended up hating the story. Oh well, I’m sure there’s a lesson learned in there.


Recently I started writing an email to my husband during the course of the week listing our agenda for the weekend. On the agenda for this weekend:

1. Work on a sewing project (of course!)

2. Plant bulbs

3. Clean up the yard, which includes a sub-list of:

  • Mow the lawn
  • Dig up the vegetable garden that was destroyed by last weekend’s very early first frost, which claimed my last crop of basil and tomatoes
  • Bake something, either apple crisp or pumpkin bread (or both)
  • Spend an hour at the local yarn shop knitting (wanna join me for a coffee?)

My weekend agenda/list is always bigger than I have the free time for, and sometimes I just enjoy being home (and NOT at work), so I don’t get anything done. But that’s okay. I still like to look at the list on Mondays to see if I can cross anything off. And then by about 9:00 on Monday morning, I am ready for the next weekend and I start over again with a new list.

What’s on your list for this weekend?

Getting Ready

| terriaw

We are having a family reunion this weekend for everyone to see my sister and her family before they move to China for three years for a job promotion. So we decided to get the yard ready for guests. Here’s what we have going so far:

We couldn’t find any annuals left at the garden center, so we picked up this pre-planted container to brighten up the front porch.

We planted two new trees in the back. They are hydrangea trees – aren’t they cute?!

Our basil plant is growing like crazy, so I have to make pesto before the party. My sister loves homemade pesto, and I doubt she’s had time to make any this summer.

We found this HUGE zucchini in the vegetable garden already! Can you see it in there? If not, here’s a shot of it before I shredded it for zucchini carrot bread. YUM! (notice the jalapeno peppers we have already too)

The best colors going on in our yard now are these:

I hope they continue to bloom through next week’s party. Now I have to make a shopping list and make some calls for the potluck treats. Hope you are enjoy this last week of July!