It's become clear to me through posts and PMs that there are some gardeners here just waiting for the chance to discuss gardening!
So, I was thinking... how do you use gardening, or how does it affect you if you need a break, need some respite, need to relax, need inspiration....how do you use it as a therapy tool in caregiving?
What are your activities: Do you go out and pull weeds, read a magazine, design new beds? Look through garden catalogues? Go to garden stores?
And what interests have you added to your gardening? Visit estate or garden displays? Do you go to garden shows?
Does anyone design and plant Knot Gardens? Raised bed planters? Assistive gardens? Pollinator gardens (and have you thought of ways to help the bees and butterflies?)
Are your gardens primarily for pleasure or food, or a mix of both? Do you grow plants for medicinal purposes? Which ones, how do you harvest and process them? Any suggestions?
Do you grow plants that can be used in crafts, such as grapevines for wreaths and lavender for lavender wands? Do you make herbal products such as creams, lotions, chapstick?
What else can you share about gardening and the means in which it nurtures your soul?
I will plant a specialty butterfly plant (a weed) in May. Or maybe just a hummingbird plant like the neighbors have, the one butterfly we did have liked that red flower.
Dear Vincent,
I am feeling pretty sad, because it looks like I won’t be able to plant my tomato garden this year. I’m just getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. I know if you were here my troubles would be over.. I know you would be happy to dig the plot for me, like in the old days.
Love, Papa
A few days later he received a letter from his son.
Dear Pop,
Don’t dig up that garden. That’s where the bodies are buried.
Love,
Vinnie
At 4 a.m. the next morning, FBI agents and local police arrived and dug up the entire area without finding any bodies. They apologized to the old man and left. That same day the old man received another letter from his son.
Dear Pop,
Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That’s the best I could do under the circumstances.
Love you,
Vinnie....
I've noticed that the trees were really battered by winds today; some of them are almost bare. By the time the wind and rain are through tomorrow, I don't think there will be much left.
Too bad it's dark now - you could run out and cover your bushes with something to protect at least some of the lovely color. I think the system tomorrow is really going to strip a lot of the trees and leaves of color and it will really look like November before it even arrives.
"All the leaves are brown and the sky is gray"....
Alas, the good lord failed to gift me with a green thumb. I can't even keep an air plant alive.
But I do make use of a form of garden therapy! When I have one of those rough days when I come home from my stressful 9 hour work day, find that my dear father has cranked the furnace to a tropical 78 degrees in the house, discover that Dad's companion dog has left a little "oopsie" inside the toe of my best leather high heels sometime this afternoon, burn the meatloaf I planned to feed us for 2 meals because I was trying to unload the dishwasher & load the clothes washer at the same time, realize that in my haste to get my afternoon cup of coffee that I failed to actually turn the coffeemaker on 45 minutes ago, my youngest daughter texts me with a request that I crochet another baby gift for her to take to a shower (only in 4 days, Mom),,,,AND THEN my sweet & wonderful better half skips through the door and asks why dinner isn't ready.......
......I lean back, close my eyes and envision a large and lushly green 5x7 tomato patch in my back yard that my husband's body is busily fertilizing from 6 feet underneath.
It's a garden and it's therapy, right?
LOL - thank goodness every day isn't as charming as the one I've described above.
I'm going to PM some links to beautiful sites that I find so relaxing, especially when the upkeep for them is more than I could ever handle. It's kind of nice to enjoy such elaborate gardens when someone else is doing all the work.
But please, no husband's body fertilizing the tomato patch! Compost works great instead!
And honestly, I don't know how you manage to do all you do.
I do have those days - but as my British friend used to say: "sometimes chicken....sometimes feathers." - I try to take a deep breath and plan how I'm gonna fry it up when I get a chicken day!
I like the chicken analogy, but now I'm getting a hankering for chicken and it's too late to start cooking one. Umm....chicken with dressing complemented by freshly picked home grown sage and red onions, white and sweet potatoes just freshly harvested from the rapidly growing colder earth, eggs from perhaps a neighbor who raises his or her own, salad of romaine, spinach and parsley just freshly picked before the November winds render the garden bare and ready for its winter nap. And of course pumpkin pie from the smaller pie pumpkins...or maybe pumpkin cheesecake. yummmm.
And you know you can use the feathers in wreaths? Add a few pine cones, sprigs of arborvitae or juniper, a few berries from yews, perhaps some oregano flower heads, and you have a nice fall to winter wreath.
Good news on the burning bushes....was out right before it got dark when the wind was (finally) starting to die down....they are in tact and have almost completely turned that magnificent cherry red. Kinda glad they are "late bloomers" because you are so right about most of the other leaves being almost totally gone now.....so, at least I still have some lovely late color. Thanks for thinking of me and my bushes!
So much stuff missing and broken!
Glad your burning bushes survived the winds!
Sharyn: 120 irises? I am in a serious state of iris envy! Names, colors, please....let me dream vicariously!
Crepe myrtle isn't meant for my zone, but it is so pretty I'd still like to try it. Guess I'll have to wait until I get my Victorian conservatory built so I have a place to over winter it!
Can anyone imagine having that kind of greenhouse attached to one's Victorian mansion? That must have been a gardener's lifelong dream come true.
Anyone grow elephant ears (colocasia or alocasia?) If you're in a Northern climate, how do you overwinter them? I generally lose everything I try to overwinter in the basement b/c of the high humidity.
Glad, I've seen the much smaller bulb planters that look like a trowel but have a curved, more roundish blade. I'm wondering if what you have is a "dibble"? It can be short like the bulb planters I've seen or it can be as you describe - looking something like a pogo stick.
I think that's quite a find. Some gardeners I know make their own, but one from the 1950's is a real treasure.
As to those broken things...are any of them clay pots? If you want a creative project, you can make your own stepping stones and embed broken clay in them to create your own designs. Are you familiar with hypertufa? It can be hazardous to your health though if you don't wear proper respiratory protection.
Pfontes, I just remembered that the slogan of a long time gardener I met on another forum is something to the effect that the sign of a good gardener isn't a green thumb; it's brown knees. I would add sore back and legs, stiff hands...but of course it's all for a good cause.
I think I've missed responding to some posts so please don't think your contributions have been ignored. I need to set aside some time to go back and reread what I might have missed.
GA-they are Dutch iris blue magic with yellow throats.
Years ago when I started ordering irises from Schreiner's, I would get a free iris with every order. One was Indigo Princess, a magnificent deep lilac/purple one with ruffles like a can-can skirt. It was just so beautiful.
Sharyn, I have a hard time with the shovel action too!