After another long hiatus

I just assumed people would have forgotten all about my blog, but to my surprise it seems there are still visitors. Thank you to all who have been stopping awhile to read my posts. They are almost a year old.

So what have I been up to? Teacher's college, that's what? Why you ask? I have no idea. It has been a hellish ride, but the silver lining in this gray cloud are the people I have met. They are absolutely amazing. After nine long years in this country I have finally met people I can be myself with and enjoy spending time with. I have gone out of my way to socialize with them. By that I mean, I do not like driving on the highways here and I have taken the trouble to battle public transit to make it to dinners/drinks with these lovely ladies and gentlemen. I meet my favorite bunch again tomorrow for dinner. We can't get enough of each other. I know we won't get to meet as often when the degree is done and everyone goes their separate ways, so I am making the most of my time with them. It is all we can really do, about anything.

Again, thank you and don't stop visiting. I will endevour to keep writing.

Embalmed Roses

While at Canada Blooms (yes, I am still on that, it is my usual Spring highlight, just a tad tainted this year) we were negotiating a really crowded aisle with a sleeping child in the giant stroller when I noticed a man holding out a rose. It seemed like he wanted to give it to me, but he seemed very reluctant. Being the cheeky monkey that I can be sometimes I said, "thank you very much, that is so sweet." He quickly pulled back and brought the flower close to my face. I figured he just wanted me to smell it, it was really fragrant, just like my English roses. But they seemed a little worse for the wear. I looked at him as if to ask what the deal was so he started to explain.

"You see, they are like embalmed roses," he said. That is the first time I had ever heard of embalmed flowers. Apparently these guys take out the sap and replace it with something akin to embalming fluid. Fancy that! I have seem human bodies being embalmed but never thought of flowers being embalmed.

They seem like a fairly large organisation and it looks like they came all the way from South Africa to exhibit their work. Iluba has a local operation too. The folks at the stall were lovely, not to mention the accent. I could have stood there listening forever about how they did what they did if it weren't for the fact we were on a short time line (we had to get through what we wanted to while the Offspring napped) and we were being jostled by everyone who passed by. Also the idea of dead flowers posing as live ones did not appeal to me.

I love fresh cut flowers for their short, vibrant and fragrant lives. They don't drag themselves around and stink up like us humans. But embalming them...it is a novel idea, but not one that appeals to me. I think I have made my point. Having said that these guys do some pretty amazing work. Check their South African website. I, in the meantime, will simply wait for my roses to show up sometime in June and enjoy their fragrant and fleeting lives.

My very own David Austin's Golden Celebration

Sustainable practice in my backyard?

Is that even possible? I have, in my efforts to attract local wildlife, tried to find native plants with little luck. Not to mention that anything I do find ends up costing a ridiculous amount of money. But I managed to find some information at Canada Blooms. Perhaps the only useful thing I did while there last weekend.

I attended a talk on sustainable urban gardening. Guess what, the expert tells me not to turn the soil over. We have very hard clay in Toronto, unlike the sandy soil I have seen in Australia or the fabulous soil that is a lovely mixture of just about everything in my country of birth. So splitting perennials or transplanting them can be a back breaking task, not to mention making up a brand new bed. After all the digging I did, this lady says, don't dig! Better late than never I guess. So that is one thing, don't dig, or at least the message was that you don't have to.

The next was to find native plants. I have picked up information on a whole lot of gardening clubs in my area. Now I have to find the time to look them up so I can meet up with like minded people. Here's hoping the colour of my skin or my appearance does not put them off. I am dealing with quite a bit of that lately. It seems South Asians are not considered keen gardeners. Perhaps this whole migrating all over the world is seen as unsustainable? No pun intended. But I will try and find those native plants.

I am also looking forward to exchanging plants and getting some for a fraction of the cost of buying it at a nursery. Most importantly the talk has meant that if my roses die I will let them go to rose heaven and  get a few native plants that my feathered friends would be attracted to. I already have the bees buzzing in the yard.

March 16, 2012 - this picture should not be possible on this date!

Last but not least, she said start by stretching and then begin exercising. Makes sense. There would be no garden if the gardener cannot sustain him or herself. So if you have done no gardening so far it is probably a good thing, temperatures are dipping below zero next week and you have time to loosen those muscles a bit.

Canada Blooms 2012

If there is one event I look forward to each year it is Canada Blooms. I have been to the show twice before and both times I was blown away by the creativity of gardeners, florists, bird watchers, horticulturalists...basically like-minded people. I have had great conversations, taken a lot of pictures and simply had a lovely time. In 2009 I accomplished all this with a two-month-old breastfeeding baby!

Canada Blooms 2009 - feature garden

Last year I missed the show and was really upset. So we planned well ahead for this year, got the tickets and prepared for every kind of scenario with a three-year-old in tow and got to the show just after it had opened. For once I even got an empty SD card in my camera and charged the batteries. However, when I got to the show and walked through the doors I felt this huge sense of disappointment. I just saw stalls everywhere, not an indoor 'field' of tulips or fantastic flower arrangements.

One of many many beautiful flower arrangements

It felt like a humongous, messy marketplace. I did not take my camera out, not once. All I would have likely managed was the backs of people's heads anyway, most of whom seemed to be angry and in a great hurry. In all fairness I think the focus was on the National Home Show this year. But the sheer volume of people coupled with more stalls than the place could have comfortably accommodated did not make for a pleasant time. There was no room to walk let alone with a sleeping child in a stroller.

Canada Blooms 2009 - Another fabulous feature garden

One thing the stalls did accomplish was to get us to part with a sizable amount of money. We now own three steam irons (don't ask!), some fabulous lily bulbs (the Girl would love them), a glorious African violet, some (apparently) fantastic mineral make-up and the Offspring scored a fancy egg shaped night light that changes colours.

It seemed like a show for someone interested in the home show, either looking to renovate, buy or build a house and then contemplate a garden. It was not for the gardener or art lover in me. 

Fabulous sand sculpture, also from 2009

We saw none of this fabulous art work, just tonnes of vendors. Canada Blooms is open for ten days this year, I am not sure having it open longer with fewer attraction is worth it. We figured it all boils down to dollars and cents. I felt sad when it was time to leave, I don't think I will go again next year.

Spring Garden 2011

This was my garden last year, I should say my Spring Garden. I was totally taken my surprise at the lovely salmon (shame I can't find a more floral hue to speak of) tulips. I just put them in the soil after a planter I had bought had gone its merry way. I had forgotten all about them. I also cannot take credit for how all the colours played out. Last Summer we messed with the flower bed a bit with planting annuals etc., so I am not sure how things will turn out this Spring. The tulips are already beginning to work their way out. So here's hoping they put on a show for us again.

The interesting thing about my garden is that it receives varied amount of light and therefore heat (I presume). Notice how things are different from one end of the flower bed to the other? The tulips in the far left of the picture are yet to blossom. The good thing about it is that I have some colour, almost all of the time. If things are so different in one tiny flower bed, how different it must be in this big big world?

So much for the calendar

Last winter I was counting down to Spring, desperate for warmer weather. It had been a nasty one, we had all been ill throughout and it was a trying time in general. As always I waited for the robins, and they finally showed up in mid-March. This year, they arrived in mid-February!

American Robin

For once I was not waiting for the robins, I know not to look for them until the ground is beginning to thaw, but the poor dears are here. I wonder what could have brought them back so early? It is not yet Spring, definitely not. What is making these birds think that Spring will be here soon? They are working with a different calendar to what we have. Humans are so out of sync that I am worried about the planet, the changing climate and what it means for the world my son will live in.

It isn't just the robins, the red-winged black bird is here. I saw an American goldfinch today, not yet quite the fabulous gold, but they are here, still in their shabby winter plumage. I am keeping the feeder filled and hoping they survive the next couple of weeks before the world warms up a tad for us.

American Goldfinch enjoying some catmint

What is even more shocking to me is that my tulips are coming up. The crocuses are pushing through, but to see tulips in March in Toronto is not normal. Ah well, while concerned, my heart did skip a happy beat at the sight of the bulbs pushing through.

First of the crocus in 2011

The last bunch

I have put my garden to bed for another six months. I planted all of my bulbs, raked the leaves and mulched every bed. I like to tidy things up in the Fall so when my little surprises start to show in the Spring I can enjoy them without the rotting foliage all around. There's plenty to do in the Spring anyway. The garden is in for a major overhaul.

I also pruned my roses down quite harshly this time and covered them with just a mound of mulch. They didn't do to well. Caterpillars and every kind of bug got to them, my neighbour's giant tree casting more shade than we had four years ago could be partly to blame. Well, 2012 may bring a new kind of Summer and hopefully be kinder to my Golden Celebration.

The last of my favourite roses

Narcissus, more of them

My very own in mid-Spring, 2011

Anyone who knows me and has been reading this blog will know that I love flowers. Much to my delight I recently discovered that my thumb is more green than black. Although this Summer was not so great for my garden, in general it fared well. I even had some luck with the bulbs I planted last year. So I got a bit bold and decided to buy a few more, well about fifty more, but in my defense I bought only daffodil bulbs. They are more resilient and squirrels are not likely to dig them up. They all went in today, on the second day of November with a maximum high of 18 degrees Celsius!

Glorious Narcissus - not my garden

I thoroughly enjoyed my time outdoors planting the bulbs, and got to thinking about how the flower got its name. And of course I searched the internet and found the story of Narcissus. I know my friend Prashani would know more and tell this hunter's story way better. The simple scientific explanation for the name exists, but I like the story of the narcissus being the first flower to spring from the place where this vain Greek hunter died. Much more exotic. Perhaps I like this story even more because the daffodils come up just when you feel like you might die from the cold and misery all around towards the end of winter. Even before the flowers bloom the tender shoots just barely out of the soil is a promise of sunny days and gentle summer breezes.

More of mine in our tiny backyard

Now I only have to wait six months before the daffodils come up.

The crocus question

Last Autumn, Fall, whatever you want to call it was a difficult one. When I set out prepping my flower beds for the winter I found my price lily bulbs had been eaten by squirrels. The dratted animals had burrowed under the soil and eaten the bulbs while the foliage was still standing. I never thought that they could do that. I am not quite over the disappointment of losing my beautiful yellow lilies. Eventually I will, but not there yet.

Anyways, this is not my story of my lilies, but my crocus bulbs. I was very anxious after planting them because at least on a couple of occasions I noticed the darned squirrels going right to patch I had worked on as soon as I came inside the house. So the entire time I was planting I was looking over my shoulder. Rather sad, don't you think? Perhaps its funnier than it is sad.

 

Fortunately the bulbs had almost all survived the squirrels. I was thrilled to see the first of them come out. But here's what I can't find an answer to - while all the bulbs bloomed purple, just a few turned out striped and only on the one bed. It was not a mix of the striped and purple ones all over the garden. How does that happen? Does the colour of the bloom depend on soil pH, amount of sunlight, or the other bulbs in the same bed?

I have been wondering about this because the gladioli bulbs I put in one year expecting a mix of vibrant colours all turned out yellow. I learned, thankfully before I blamed the vendor, that soil pH is a huge determinant of the colour of the bloom.

It will be interesting to see how the crocuses turn out next year! 

My Summer love

I met this beauty a few years ago. She was behind a house we were inspecting to buy. I really didn't like the house, but Hubby was sold. I knew there was no convincing him otherwise.

This Tree, she drew me in the way only a few other trees have in my lifetime. She's a Pear Tree. I didn't know that at the time. She was just standing there with beautiful drooping branches; a light dusting of snow on her elegant body; she looked simply ravishing.  I figured even if I never grew to like the house I could at least look out the large windows and drift away with this tree. I also resolved to sketch her when we'd moved in (sadly it is something I have not found the time to do yet).

I have to admit she has never disappointed me. As the snow melted and the rain came, her dark branches stood out against the more feeble shrubs and trees. She stood there, majestic and filled the promise of green. But what a pleasant surprise it was when she burst into blossoms, all white with a touch of pink, so subtle you had to feel it. And when the breeze kissed her branches she would laugh her petals all over me. I was falling in love.                                                                                                            

 

Soon bright green leaves took the place of the blossoms. The colour of peace, serenity and warm weather that holds you in an embrace so gentle and firm. I was in love!

Yet again she surprised me with all the fruit she bore. Pears galore! Her beautiful branches were now garlands of fruit. All the pictures in the world cannot do justice to what you feel at her sight. I was not surprised that she was never without visitors.

The Oriole would stop by often for a meal or a snack.
Mrs Racoon was there with her young ones.
The squirrels are almost always there.
And then there were the cardinals, the jays, the sparrows and chickadees and finches and blackbirds...She was never alone. The rare moments I had her all to myself were something special.

And as the warm weather began to recede and the cold Autumn winds set in her leaves turned to gold. She didn't look all that pretty with bare patches and bits of dying leave. It pained me to see her go. But she was there in spirit to remind me of warm weather to come and our secret Summer trysts.

She's back now looking like a young bride ready to walk down the aisle. So I may not spend as much time here as I will with my dear Pear Tree, my Summer love!

Pink and blue

It has been challenging to channel my thoughts into words lately. So here are a few pictures of my garden mid-Spring.

The pink tulips, the darker pink flanking the double petal ones are a total surprise. Last year I bought one of those ready made planters with the tulips just before the end of the season because they were ridiculously cheap. I decided to experiment with them. I took them out of the pot after the leaves had yellowed and stored the tulips in a shoe box over the Summer and planted them in the Fall, mixed in with a some bone meal. From what I had read the bulbs that are forced (like the ones in pots) usually don't flower the first year. Hence the surprise.

And the bleeding hearts - I prefer to refer to them by their botanical name, Dicentra spectabilis - simply because flowers should not have names as tragic as bleeding hearts. I believe flowers mend bleeding or broken hearts. Anyways, the point here is that my garden is all pink and blue thanks to the hardy perennials and bulbs that survived the squirrels.

Salix discolor (The pussy willow)

I love trees and I may have said that on more than one occasion here. But the fact is I do and I can't understand people who cannot stop and admire a beautiful tree. If you listen real careful you will also hear them speak to you. Trust me, you just have to shut up and stop snickering at names like pussy willow, and then you will hear them. And you will learn that there is more substance to what they have to say than all the humans you know. 

The pussy willow in mid-March

The Salix discolor or more commonly known as the American pussy willow is in my neighbours backyard and I mean to take pictures of this tree every Spring but never get around to it. When you see signs of buds on this tree you know it is warming up and we will not be stuck in the deep freeze for long. I am not sure if it is the new camera or the fact that I have had little to do in the last few months than I usually do, but I got out and took some pictures.

A few weeks later I wanted to get some close up shots of the blossoms and was pleasantly surprised by the bees who were busy at work. 

 I must say I am quite pleased with the pictures for a first attempt at bugs, not to mention the sore neck.

And it seems there is more to this tree than I thought. According to Wikipedia the pussy willow is used in cultural and religious festivities that are common around this time of year. I think I like this tree even more now.

And so the garden grows...

The first blooms of the season

It looks like the squirrels didn't devour all my crocus and grape hyacinth bulbs. They are pushing through the soil and mulch. But what seems to be a bit of a pain is this constant show of snow. Fortunately the ground seems to have warmed up enough that the snow doesn't accumulate. But after the dismal Winter I am starting to feel a bit concerned that we might have a chilly Summer too. It is really important the my garden does well this year. Things are not as great as they were when I was thankful for everything in life and the one thing that does cheer me up is the show of colour in the backyard.

Hubby was let go from his job with very little notice three weeks ago. We are creeping up to four weeks now and needless to say we are both getting a little concerned. While life has certainly not been a bed of roses, or crocuses for that matter, it is a little unsettling as we assess spending and make adjustments. This experience is teaching us a few things. But most of all it has taught me that people are not all who they seem to be. I am learning that a reassessment of the people in my life is in order!

But this has not stopped me from digging the mulch out to allow my bulbs to get out of the deep cold. Neither have I put my camera away. Today I took out my old pal Nikon F50's lens and tried a few pictures with the new Nikon D7000. I don't need a new macro lens. I love my old lens on the new guy. They work well together. Also, you can't always trust the 'correct exposure' reading you get on the new guy. You have to shoot and learn.

auto exposure                    manual exposure

A garden for all seasons

Not everyone is born a gardener. But I am testimony to the fact that everyone can become one. What with information on just about anything on google, its easy to learn to garden no matter where on the planet you are now. You just need access to the internet and of course the material. Anyways, I wanted flowers early to lighten the misery of early Spring with the snow having disappeared and time left for warm winds to nudge the flora on.

So I planted some daffodils in a bed with a giant hosta. The good things about daffodils is that they do well in sun or shade. So this is what my 'hosta' bed looked like early Spring.

The flowers were a bit of a dissapointment because I thought I had picked lots of different shades and types of daffodils. Apparently not! But you can't help but be pleased and feel all happy when you see these pretty flowers. So simple, so elegant and fragrant too.

After putting on a beautiful show for us they went their way. And in their place I now have giant hostas. I am not sure exactly what this particular hosta is called, but we love it. They are bright green with the most beautiful leaves. You'd never even know the daffodils were there.

Aren't they regal?

Sweet Surprise

You sometimes put something away and forget all about it, like a few dollars in the secret compartment of your wallet/purse or whatever you call it. Sometimes you wonder if the bulbs that come out of the pots that you are clearing away for the winter will come up the following year and put them away. 

So, while I was looking for something the other day I found some dahlia bulbs that I left in a pot over the winter. I brought it into the house and left it by the back door where all my houseplants reside for the winter, and while giving my babies a drink I just gave the dahlia pot a touch of water too. Well, what do you know, I walk over to say good morning to my flora this morning and lo and behold, my dahlias are coming up! I so love these little surprises, so much better than diamonds or pearls.