Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garden. Show all posts
Friday, June 13, 2008
Monday, August 6, 2007
Little Sunshine explores my garden treasures
I love overcast mornings so much for photographing items for my shop. It makes such a difference in the photos. I brought my little yellow bird, named Sunshine, out for a photo shoot early this morning. Instead of struggling to get 5 good pictures almost everyone I took was pretty.
Here she is sitting in my hypertufa bowl amongst the moss. I love the rounded stones we collected up along the coast of Maine. I still haven't filled in this bowl with plants yet but the moss is slowly spreading outward.
Here she is exploring my cement cast split leaf philodendron. This leaf was difficult to cast but I gave up on trying to get the slits and cast it as a solid leaf. I love how the green algae is filling in the indentations.
Here she is eying my hypertufa Tibetan stone. I love the rustic carving on this cairn. Eventually I would like to make a larger stone for one of the gardens. The creeping jenny that is dangling down the stone walls are so beautiful too. They are spreading like crazy too!
I think she likes the nasturtium as much as I do! I have them planted in an old metal chicken waterer (that rusted out and leaked). I planted some sedum in the ring at the bottom.
Sunshine has discovered my pitcher plant terrarium. Last fall I scooped up some of the pitcher plants my husband gave me for my birthday and planted them in this terrarium so I could enjoy them during the winter. They needed to be misted regularly (with rain water I collected) but did amazingly well. Collecting rain water during the winter was a little fun though! Of course they are loving the outdoors now and are doing so well that I decided to leave them in the terrarium. Every now and then a big rainstorm drowns them but then I just drain it out with a little tube (siphon).
I love these these bright red Impatiens that brighten up the garden all summer long. Sunshine is sitting in another leaf casting while she admires the garden.
She has found my bright blue glass globe and copper waterer. I love the blue on this copper sculpture. If connected to a hose water will come out the copper ring and everything will rotate as it sprinkles the garden. It was handcrafted by an artist in Maine and we bought it at a town craft fair as we were driving through.
Here she is sitting in my hypertufa bowl amongst the moss. I love the rounded stones we collected up along the coast of Maine. I still haven't filled in this bowl with plants yet but the moss is slowly spreading outward.
Here she is exploring my cement cast split leaf philodendron. This leaf was difficult to cast but I gave up on trying to get the slits and cast it as a solid leaf. I love how the green algae is filling in the indentations.
Here she is eying my hypertufa Tibetan stone. I love the rustic carving on this cairn. Eventually I would like to make a larger stone for one of the gardens. The creeping jenny that is dangling down the stone walls are so beautiful too. They are spreading like crazy too!
I think she likes the nasturtium as much as I do! I have them planted in an old metal chicken waterer (that rusted out and leaked). I planted some sedum in the ring at the bottom.
Sunshine has discovered my pitcher plant terrarium. Last fall I scooped up some of the pitcher plants my husband gave me for my birthday and planted them in this terrarium so I could enjoy them during the winter. They needed to be misted regularly (with rain water I collected) but did amazingly well. Collecting rain water during the winter was a little fun though! Of course they are loving the outdoors now and are doing so well that I decided to leave them in the terrarium. Every now and then a big rainstorm drowns them but then I just drain it out with a little tube (siphon). 
I love these these bright red Impatiens that brighten up the garden all summer long. Sunshine is sitting in another leaf casting while she admires the garden.
She has found my bright blue glass globe and copper waterer. I love the blue on this copper sculpture. If connected to a hose water will come out the copper ring and everything will rotate as it sprinkles the garden. It was handcrafted by an artist in Maine and we bought it at a town craft fair as we were driving through.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Birds, birds, birds
Last week I during my vacation I was busy working on a few custom orders, but I also wanted to work on a few small birds. The firmly felted birds I have been selling take a considerable amount of time to make. These little birds are a lot easier for me and they don't require any wiring, sewing, or bead work. I am going to make a bunch of small ones of various varieties. They would look great wired to a branch or hanging from a string.
The sun came out unexpectedly so I finally had a chance to mow the lawn. I enlisted my daughter to vacuum the pool and she complained excessively. I pointed out that I would rather do that than mow. My morning glories are climbing furiously up their strings now and our vegetable garden is awesome. We are having fresh salads every night and broccoli and Swiss chard. I love the summer! The rest of the year I can barely eat a salad but I could eat fresh greens everyday from our garden!
One of our bunnies died while we were away. A lot of tears were shed over the loss of Bumper when we returned. He was about 11 years old. I did have a good idea and moved our little feathered friends - the 3 bantam chickens - into the little hutch. They have all their feathers now but are still so small. We have a small weasel out there that would love to snack on them. And the added benefit is that the bunny cage has new inhabitants so the kids are happier.
The sun came out unexpectedly so I finally had a chance to mow the lawn. I enlisted my daughter to vacuum the pool and she complained excessively. I pointed out that I would rather do that than mow. My morning glories are climbing furiously up their strings now and our vegetable garden is awesome. We are having fresh salads every night and broccoli and Swiss chard. I love the summer! The rest of the year I can barely eat a salad but I could eat fresh greens everyday from our garden!
One of our bunnies died while we were away. A lot of tears were shed over the loss of Bumper when we returned. He was about 11 years old. I did have a good idea and moved our little feathered friends - the 3 bantam chickens - into the little hutch. They have all their feathers now but are still so small. We have a small weasel out there that would love to snack on them. And the added benefit is that the bunny cage has new inhabitants so the kids are happier.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
How does your garden grow?
I woke up early this morning to get a little time in the garden before everyone woke up. Everything is growing so well with the warmer weather and a bit of rain. I tied up the tomatoes and cleaned up a few weeds. The plants are getting big enough that they are shading out the weeds now. We have been enjoying the lettuce, spinach, arugula, and snow peas so far. The basil and broccoli are coming along nicely too.
Our raspberries are awesome this year. We enjoyed a raspberry pie over the weekend. Berries and cream for dessert every day this week!
The red bee balm is out now and we are enjoying the occasional visit by tiny hummingbirds. The bees love these flowers too. I can't seem to figure out if these plants like sun or shade better. One clump of bee balm was so awesome one year but the next year the plants were tiny.I am sending out my wedding birds today. They look so cute.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Toasting marshmallows
Last night we enjoyed our third Friday night craft get together. I brought a bottle of homemade blackberry/blueberry mead (made by my friend's husband). This was perfect with the chocolate brownies and chocolate covered strawberries that other friends brought.
The cut backs in school funding and the upcoming (next Tuesday) tax override vote was discussed as we worked. None of my children have teacher assignments -- nor will they get them until sometime in August when the final cuts in teachers are made. This whole process is so frustrating. I only hope that the town votes in the override or we will suffer with cuts in the town budget and fire and police. The class sizes are already going to go up and they are losing many teachers.
We spent most of the day outside doing yard work. The weather and the temperature were perfect. I mulched the vegetable garden pathways with relatively fresh stinky chicken manure and covered this with pine needles to hide the smell a bit. Next year when this has aged a bit I will shovel this mulch onto the raised beds as fertilizer. The older girls returned from a sleep over and I gave them some outdoor chores to help with. My sister and her children will visit next weekend and we need to get a so much done before they come. We also set up our replacement pool that my husband brought home from a friend at work. They no longer used this pool so I think this is perfect solution for us this summer. I think the older girls are a bit disappointed because it is only 42 inches deep but I promised them a deeper one next year.
We ended the day with a fire in our little fire ring. We toasted marshmallows and tiny hot dogs on sticks for dinner. Then the girls played a little softball with dad. My youngest was looking out for fireflies but we didn't spot any. I was surprised when she announced that this was our summer solstice party and of course there should be fireflies. It was probably a bit too cool for them yet.
The cut backs in school funding and the upcoming (next Tuesday) tax override vote was discussed as we worked. None of my children have teacher assignments -- nor will they get them until sometime in August when the final cuts in teachers are made. This whole process is so frustrating. I only hope that the town votes in the override or we will suffer with cuts in the town budget and fire and police. The class sizes are already going to go up and they are losing many teachers.
We spent most of the day outside doing yard work. The weather and the temperature were perfect. I mulched the vegetable garden pathways with relatively fresh stinky chicken manure and covered this with pine needles to hide the smell a bit. Next year when this has aged a bit I will shovel this mulch onto the raised beds as fertilizer. The older girls returned from a sleep over and I gave them some outdoor chores to help with. My sister and her children will visit next weekend and we need to get a so much done before they come. We also set up our replacement pool that my husband brought home from a friend at work. They no longer used this pool so I think this is perfect solution for us this summer. I think the older girls are a bit disappointed because it is only 42 inches deep but I promised them a deeper one next year.
We ended the day with a fire in our little fire ring. We toasted marshmallows and tiny hot dogs on sticks for dinner. Then the girls played a little softball with dad. My youngest was looking out for fireflies but we didn't spot any. I was surprised when she announced that this was our summer solstice party and of course there should be fireflies. It was probably a bit too cool for them yet.
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