Glory Days

 

Early summer is when the garden really starts to show off. Many of the perennials I planted our first spring here (now 4 years ago), have established themselves and gotten a little bossy. I plant herbs for their beauty and usefulness, but really, how would I ever use this many chives? French Tarragon, Sage and Thyme all come back with vigor. The thyme, which I planted by seed, is truly an out-of-control invasive now, but I weed it as I can, cut it back, and love the smell those activities leave lingering.

 The lavender, unlike in Idaho, has had to be replanted every year. I'm not sure why I keep it, since the smell makes me think of old ladies (!), but the idea of lavender shortbread is calling me, and I have the space. The rosemary, of course, has had to be replanted yearly every place I've ever lived (except for that brief stay in California), but It is not an herb I want to live without. I was able to overwinter 2 plants inside, so at least I didn't have to buy them this year.

The Cranesbill, or wild geranium, is in full flower now, and will offer some beauty for the remaining summer and fall. Even when not flowering, the leaves are interesting, and green is my favorite color.

The white bleeding heart plant is continuing to bloom for longer than the pink ones, though the smaller dicentras will bloom for at least 

 

 

 

 

 

 And the primroses self-seeded this year, so they've put on a show that is new to me. another month.

 

Tomato plants are coming along nicely, in spite of some scary cold night temperatures. No frost, though. I've gotten used to not expecting tomato fruit until August, but it's still a long wait, and I'm always hopeful that maybe THIS year they'll come sooner. 

The star of the Green show, though, is the rhubarb. I love how it looks so much like some crazy tropical plant. I've made rhubarb cake (thanks, Rika!), rhubarb pie, and John made a new recipe call Rhubarb bars. They are wonderful. They are a shortbread with a fruit layer.

I also made my first leaf embossed vessel (clay) yesterday, using a smaller rhubarb leaf. Some of these leaves are too big to fit into my kiln, so I have to chose wisely. More on that in a later post.

I know this looks like a weedy bed, but it is a cover crop in the south vegetable bed. It's coming along nicely. My plan is to grow it, cut it before it goes to seed, and then work the organic matter back into the soil. This is often called a Green Manure Crop. Our soil here is a sandy loam, and it can always benefit from increasing the organic matter.

 

 

 

Once again, the Forget-me-nots are showing up everywhere. I mostly love them, especially because they were a gift from a friend (Thanks, Mary!). But like buttercups, they are a plant that you underestimate at your peril. Violets are like that too. Tend them, and discourage them where they'll displace other most favored plants.

 

 

Last in this show are our asparagus. We've had a couple of meals from them, but now they're starting their lovely vegetative show that will last until a heavy frost.

A lot of other plants are Beginning. And I have treated my Copper Beech with a trunk spray that the Forest Pathologist recommends to reduce the infestation of the air-born nematode that causes Beech Leaf Disease, which is killing our local Beech trees. There are always new challenges in the growing of things. Climate change may speed up certain pests and their movement, but change is all but certain in this world. In every aspect of it.

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Catching up

Weeping Crab Apple

Spring has seemed so slow to come, and then suddenly. Two days in the 80's and everyone is singing. The forest went from light-green haze to the dense leaves of privacy. This weeping crab apple was in bud for at least a week, and yesterday she just gave up and let loose. Other things are happening, or being done, as well. 

Weeping Crab blossoms

All of my transplants are now in the ground, though we are threatened with 39F tomorrow night. I'm a little worried, but I think they'll do fine as long as it doesn't frost. They may be insulted, but better that than dead. A healthy life philosophy when you think about it.

Also of note, I finally finished the base for the vase in the previous post. It's ok. Not my favorite, but I'll keep it as an example of the water-etching process. And it's huge, for when the time of the long stems comes on us. . . iris, day lilies. . .there are more.

Also. A big lesson learned. I've had trouble producing decent transplants indoors since we moved here. I finally had a head slap moment when I realized that germination was fine, they were just too leggy. Light! We need more and longer light! After telling John that I needed to get a plant light, HE did a head slap and remembered that we have one. We moved it with us from Rockridge, where the light was particularly stingy in the house. Voila. Just to be sure, I also bought some tomato transplants from our local Agway. To the left is a comparison of my plants on the left, and Agway's plants on the right. I need to start growing more of my own plants, clearly. They are all in the ground now, and we'll see if the smaller, commercially produced, plants catch up. I hope they do. Last year we had too little basil and too few tomatoes. Not acceptable. I'll forgo the potatoes and pumpkins to have an abundance of tomatoes and basil.

Also of note. My friend (Hi, Mary!) sent me this image of a tree. It looks like it must be two trees, but there is only a single trunk. I had no clue, being a pomologist by education, so of course I tried to find information online. I searched extension websites. I know the top was a spruce, but the bottom? Then. I somehow managed to upload the image into an AI platform (no idea how I did this. . .I usually just punch random buttons and see where it takes me), and Darned if AI didn't have the exact right answer. It was a Dwarf Alberta Spruce that had reverted to the original phenotype. Most of me is appalled that AI figured it out before this human with 15 years of education and that much experience didn't, but the other part of me sees the power in it for the first time. To be fair, I had to know enough about how reversion works to know that it was the correct answer, but still. Amazing.

I'll post some images of the garden now. I've blathered on enough!

 

Brunnera (Siberian Bugloss)

Bleeding hears

Herb garden with lovage and enough basil

Blueberries in bloom

Dawn redwood begins

Apple blossoms beginning

Plum blossoms

Peach in full bloom

Rhubarb. Time for cake!

 

Eggplant, Kale, Zuchinni

New Raspberry planting: 'Anne'

Tomatoes begin

Spring work

I made this vase using underglaze (graduated greens) and water etching over commercial stencils to see if I could make the technique work. It's pretty ok, though the base is small, so I'm making a separate base that I'll somehow attach to this fully vitrified piece. Or maybe I won't. We'll see.

This technique is dicey, and works a lot better on this white stoneware than it did on the Very Sad porcelain box featured in an earlier post. The issue is that the clay needs to be cut and prepped and then dried to just-the-right leather hard stage before the surface can be underglazed and etched. THEN, the pieces need to be scored and slipped to put them together while stiff enough to hold their shape, but moist enough to make a good bond. It's a tedious journey of waiting then working quickly. I once heard someone say that war was long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of terror. It's like that.

 

I do love the look of the water etching. The branches are slightly raised, though the final glaze makes the surface smooth, even though it still has a dimensional look.

 

I also made a mug using the same technique, but of a new brown speckled stoneware. I like the look of it, though the stoneware fires to be darker than I had expected. 

 

This mug is a smaller size that John prefers. I made the handle larger than usual so that all of the fingers fit under it, rather than floating the pinkie on the outside of the handle. I'm not sure why I don't absolutely love it. It's ok, though.

 Finally, I had some clay left over from all of the slab building, so I made labels for some new plants in the garden. I used under glaze to color the dark clay, then stamped or scrafito'd (scratched) through the under glaze. The contrast between the color of the clay and the under glaze wasn't as sharp as I would have liked, but these labels will work. And it's a great way to use up bits and pieces of clay.

The red won't get lost in the garden, but the green is harder than I'd like to read.

It remains cool this morning, after weather that was cold-ish and rainy for the past couple of days. I'm ok with all of that, though I would love to get my transplants into soil. We're supposed to reach 60 today, so garden work is imminent. Spring still merely threatens, though. I'm looking forward to seeing her for real.

Elusive spring weather

Scylla in mid-April

 

It's been a very cool few days with rain predicted tonight. I'm ready for warmer weather, but remind myself that some of my former homes have already seen 90F. So patience. And sweaters.

For some reason I forget many of the early spring perennials that grace our land every year. Maybe it's a subconscious desire to be surprised each year? 

We have a carpet of these little blue scylla flowers in the shade garden under our Copper Beech. I love them.They're actually a little on the invasive side, and are currently moving into the lawn with amazing density. "Lawn" being the poly culture that covers what cultivated land isn't in beds or trees.

White Anemone

 

 

 

 

Some other favorites are a white anemone that appears every year. It is not quite open yet, but even the buoy-shaped buds offer interest. 

 

 

Chives, ready to eat

The chives are the earliest starting herbs, though the creeping thyme overwintered well enough that I can use some of it if I need it. 

French Tarragon peeping out

 

 

 

 

And! The French Tarragon is just getting started, but it's always a relief to see that it's made it through the winter.

Bunnera

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Siberian Bugloss (Brunnera) is just starting to show. Her leaves are so lovely, but later in the season she'll also give us little blue flowers reminiscent of Forget-Me-Nots.  I'm really pleased that this one is starting to spread after 2 years in the ground.

Daffodils threatening

Daffodils are well on their way to flowering, and the Hellobore is giving me wonderful flowers in spite of the fact that the turkeys have trampled most of her leaves. We've been having some discussions with the turkeys. I've talked about them before. I do love them, but will do everything I can to hurry them on when they approach this bed.

Lenten Rose (Hellobore)

 

 

 

 

I have a tale of woe regarding the planting of a pear tree. After a lot of research, I found one that is an older cultivar (found as a seedling in a Pennsylvania orchard) called Kieffer. It is attractive to me because I only have room for one tree, and most pears require pollinators.

Kieffer Pear (now potted)

I was excited to find this tree at Fast Growing Trees. I'm not familiar with this nursery, but the reviews were pretty good. What an idiot I can be sometimes. John and I had removed the old apple tree where we were planting this new one, dug a huge hole for it, amended it with half peat moss, and waited for the tree to arrive.

The top of the tree was a little worse for shipping, but I could manage it with a couple of pruning cuts. But the roots. Oh the roots. Bare root trees are just that, but they are supposed to have a root system with a lot of the fine fibrous roots that do all of the heavy lifting for water and nutrients.

When we opened the plastic bag that had mulch and roots in it, the image below is what we found. I told the customer rep at the nursery that it will be a miracle if this tree survives. I took it out of the ground and potted it so I can keep a close eye on it. 

Kieffer Pear "roots"

What are they thinking? 

They are sending me a new plant, but I told them not to if there are no fibrous roots on the plant. It will just be another one that I try to save, and is likely not save-able.

On the other hand, I received my raspberry plants from Nourse Farms. It's a yellow primocane fruiting cultivar called 'Anne'. A colleague of mine developed it at the University of Maryland.

They are beautiful plants, and I got them in the prepared soil a couple of hours after they arrived. Sorry I didn't take a picture. I am grateful that the between a knowledgeable nursery, and a knowledgeable me, these plants will likely survive. 

Studio ups and downs

Snack dish

 I'm sort of fascinated by these little snack dishes that are minimally formed, maximally textured, and glazed with terror in my heart. This one turned out pretty well. These narrow dishes (6" wide at it's widest, about 14" long) are great for displaying alternating slices of pizza. Also good for cheese etc.

Box o' glory and pain

So the above was a success. But the big piece that I took hours and hours to make failed on the last firing. Such a bummer. I missed a class on surface design due to illness, so I did some internet research, and made samples and this large vessel. . .6" wide, 12" tall. The surface pieces are cut and then water-etched over leather hard pieces that have been covered with a colored underglaze. It is such a cool surface. 

Water etching sounds more complicated than it is. The entire surface is painted with an underglaze or 2 or three. Then a stencil (plastic, or stencils you make out of newspaper) is place firmly on the surface of the clay, and the whole mess is wiped over repeatedly with a wet sponge. Rinse, repeat. The result is a raised and colored area where the stencil prevented the wiping away of the color, and the surrounding areas that are washed clean of the color.

So cool. So I dried this piece very slowly and very well. All was good after bisque firing. But the final firing to full vitrification proved to be my/its downfall.

Scene of the crime

 

You can see where the seams cracked, making the lid not fit, and of course compromising the whole of the piece. It is now in the trash, but I needed to emphasize my foolishness (to myself and you, gentle readers), but also to let all gaze upon the glorious-ness of the surface design. The next piece will be smaller and made of stoneware, not porcelain. Yet another lesson in this lesson-filled life.

Test tiles with water etching

 Test tiles illustrate some interesting results using stencils and water etching. I especially like the 2 below. The right tile is just porcelain water etched deeply over a tree branch stencil. No glaze. The left tile gets the "most surprising" award. The raised areas are pieces of newsprint that I randomly cut out (unsurprising that I made leaves and branches), but that thin newsprint made a pretty impressive impression, didn't it!

Left, newsprint stencil, right commercial stencil

Finally, a couple of more pedestrian pieces. Two bowls glazed with Bark and rimmed with Emeraude, and a mug (still trying to make the perfect mug for me) that I used a True Celadon glaze on. Note that the Emeraude rim does run much over the celadon. Yet another lesson.

 

 

Two brown bowls

Another almost perfect mug

 

April Showers

Snowdrops

Snowdrops. I have two blossoms. In Boise, I had an area that was blanketed with them, and they started blooming in February. I do miss that part of Idaho. I planted this guy three years ago, and every spring it gives me one-two blooms. It's in a similar ecological niche as it was in Idaho (partial shade under a dogwood), and both areas have sandy loam soils. It could could be a temperature thing.

 

Pink Hellebore

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of other early emergers are still dipping their toes into the air. Wow. Terrible metaphor. The pink hellebore is stretching a little further out, and the daffodils are going all out with leaves. The plant equivalent of all hat, no cow? It looks like I'll only have a couple of blooms this year, which is fair. They're planted under our amazing Copper Beech, so except for this time of year, they don't get much sun.

One of my favorites, the Bleeding Hearts, are just starting to taste the air. [much better metaphor]

 

Bleeding Hearts

These are glorious every year, even though they're heavily shaded by the previously mentioned Copper Beech. So I look for them early.

I find myself looking forward to any shred of hope these days. The director of the EPA just declared victory for ending the Climate Hoax. Anyone who's paying any attention in the world knows that this is no hoax. I shudder for our children's future. 

Finally, the reason for the title of this entry. I'm posting the snowfall we had 2 days ago. It was about an inch. It was so beautiful, and would have been much enjoyed in November. Still. The snow was beautiful enough to share, and will be a good reminder of cooler weather when the heat is oppressing us in July. . .

 

April Showers