The Japanese Holiday Tree

With dewdrops.

More Shiny Baubles

I ran into a chandelier on its way to the dump and grabbed a big bunch of shiny baubles to add to the Japanese Holiday Tree. I will be needing the ladder. My tree is getting tall. I am just waiting for it to get naked.

 

Fly Away

You never know when your own moment of rapture will occur. One thing is certain, that day is getting closer.

How big will the heiau get before no more rocks are added to the pile?

What will become of the meadow as I tinker? This year I moved starts of Rodgersia and Syneilesis down to more sun. Some Ligularia fell out of the ground and followed me home. Everything is doing well in the wet bottom sunshine.

The meadows are constantly changing. I tinker. Nature provides reality.

Miss Collar is going back to the vet tomorrow. She is not well. I need to know if it is her time.

Reason.

I had a free-range childhood.

I found reason outside in the wild places.

Mr. Magoo Walks Into A Drizzle

When the clouds are not so dark to slow the shutter speed, when my hands are being relatively steady and when the camera actually focuses closeup, I can download a picture to the computer and actually see the Witch Hazels blooms in some detail. Everything needs to be just right.

The mulching of the roadside vegetable garden is underway. I am trying to outsmart the raccoons by getting a very early start. Wish me luck.

Fresh mulch attracts earthworms big time. Earthworms set the raccoons and who know what else to pecking holes all over the vegetable garden. I hope to get all the digging and pecking over with before planting time.

There were plans for another garden chore, but a cold drizzle commenced before I could get to that. Mud was going to be involved and dry mud is better than wet mud. I wandered off in the drizzle before the rain started again. The winter view from the scenic byway grows more garden like by the year.

In this light and eyesight, the individual plants don't matter as much as the form, color and texture they bring to the garden in the big picture, of the ambiance and feeling that creates. Something is happening here.

I see crocus as pops of color. They are best planted in mass quantity.

One eyeball at a time, easy office visit laser fix. Two weeks to partial vision and another month of Mr. Magoo wandering out there in the drizzle.

Along The Scenic Byway

There is even more inside.

More Better

This was never quite right. The lines were off.

More better. I had to embrace the crooked. The begonias? They have been repotted, fertilized, given a light trim and are headed back to The Inn for the final season. They will not be returning.

Squash of the Spaghetti kind.

Enter the Crooked Shed.

The Shiny Objet Of The Day

It was sitting outside the dumpster at the trash drop off site which is a free sign by protocol. It said groovy to me and fell in my truck.

I sat it on the front porch and understood why it ended up beside the dumpster.

It is a framed metal cutout with embedded glass crystals made to hang on a wall. So I hung it.

It had to be in a place where you wouldn't look at it for too long. Because.

The Crooked Shed loves to play dress up.

 

Voodoo Rising

The hot is here. Now mind you my hot is 80 degrees, 85 down lower. It's not okra hot. The sweat and sticky still takes some getting used to. I've been acclimated to mountain air. It is good enough to make the voodoo lilies rise. A tropical bulb is waking up at the end of June.

On the Shores of Turd Blossom Lake.

I got a new metal bench a while back, one that won't rot. It needs a cushion. All of mine is gone.

The Lush is in full swing and the big bold foliage is having a hail-less year. So far.

Our hot brings regular afternoon thunderstorms. Some off them can be real gully washers. Drifts of the native Hydrangea arborescens are in full bloom

I wander out there.

In the hot

With iris that came from the swamps.

When a big crack caught my eye

The glass is half broken. Again.

The Doghobble, Leucothoe, seems to like it up here. The lower hedge that began as sprigs is close to filling in and closing off access. You can't walk through Doghobble.

Voodoo keeps rising.

Niwaki Year Four

It was on the list, the annual niwaki, cloud pruning of the 'Gold Mop' chamaecyparis. That is what I did yesterday after work and a few more snips this morning before heading over to the Turnips Fields next door.

This is training session #4. I only do it once a year in late winter.

My clouds are coming along nicely. The branches and trunks are getting fat and sturdy. I'm not liking the still overall conical shape and outline, but a time will come when that change is ready to happen. Right now I don't want to over cut. I want the tree to tell me who it wants to be.

Tomorrow morning there will be a considered attempt at more forceful bondage. I will begin to unbend that conical shape. Golden clouds will float above because I can in this garden.

Niwaki

Before The Christmas Eve Storm

The Under Garden was looking quite fetching in the overcast light yesterday afternoon before the Christmas Eve Storm. Tomorrow I will wake up to snow and 14 degrees.

 

I wandered up to the byway to have a look from above.

There is indeed growing color and greenery for the rubberneckers in the Barren Time.

Uncle Ernie is pleased.

So wander. Today is heavy rain then snow.