As promised, brutal honesty is afoot. I've killed the Potager. We're going to have to come up with another name for it. What has, for years, been the place where good ideas and plants go to die, is now a wee vineyard (LOL, dare I call 2 whole grape vines a vineyard?) 2021, while an… Continue reading Ding! Dong! The Potager is Dead!
I'm one of those people who follows rules, usually arbitrary and unnecessary ones I've made up out of whole cloth, and sets stupidly high expectations for myself. Its dumb and probably rooted in those AP and Honors courses and the drive to be considered successful. Oh the Gen X angst of it all! But I… Continue reading Permission to change.
I've long struggled with my desire to write and share and educate with the calculating, droll scheduling of content and mining for topics in the dead of winter. Balancing the action that is necessary in my garden with the quiet, indoor time that writing demands. Consistency, rigor, content. It all feels like a bit of… Continue reading Refresh.
Hello Old Friends. It's been an awful long while! To be totally honest with you, this growing season I've found the garden to be an absolute albatross. This has been a real struggle for me- as one can imagine- the garden has historically been a place of calmness, joy, and a way to relieve stress.… Continue reading On Breaks and Clarity.
Hello! No April Fool's to be found here! Just a very tardy blogger! Instead we are plugging along with preparations for the season. Our weather has been, by and large, warmer than average which has meant a strong boost to those already early growers. Rhubarb, Daffodils, Crocus and Tulips are all obviously peeking out. But… Continue reading April.
We are getting there y'all! February was absolutely brutal here, weeks of temperatures in the negative teens, random unforecasted snow, just general yuck. Cold, gross, worst-part-of-winter yuck. But it is over and we are in March and things can only get sunnier, warmer, less snowy from here. Hooray! Photo by Matheus Bertelli on Pexels.com March… Continue reading March.
So, I was listening to the first episode of the second season of Roots, Wings, and Other Things podcast with Jez Rose and Adam Frost (of Gardener's World fame). Their guest was Frances Tophill (also of Gardener's World fame) and through their chat, Frances said something about guerilla gardening and showing that its okay to… Continue reading Tidy is the Enemy of Good.
Y'all! It was MINUS EIGHTEEN DEGREES Sunday! Yuck! So rather than focus on that, let's get to planning out the Veg Garden for the coming season. Denial isn't just a river in Egypt, am I right? It has already felt like a rushed and frantic process- mostly due to the increased demand for seeds (meaning… Continue reading Veg Plans: 2021 Edition
Yoinks, y'all. I'm not going to link to the chain of articles that got me here, but suffice it to say one of the new authors over at Garden Rant's claim to fame is a scathing critique of the British NGS charity open garden system, which of course, I read. The gist of which is… Continue reading Virtue Signaling In The Garden
Y'all! We are MAKING IT. Through winter I mean. For my part, I have been quite thoroughly enjoying the ever-increasing daylight during my drives home from work. It is the most tangible sign of the move towards Spring, even when the snow is in the forecast and the bottom is dropping out of the thermometer.… Continue reading February.
I think one of the less talked about topics, when it comes to veg gardening, is storing/preserving/putting up said veg. But what a huge part of the equation it is! I often find myself heading to homesteading-type sites to get the information I need. Thankfully, those sites are super helpful and informative, but often the… Continue reading Storing & Preserving Those Veg.
As I was scrolling Instagram a few weekends ago, I came across a post from Niki Jabbour showing beautiful greens she was pulling out of a cold frame in her Nova Scotia garden. In January. I showed it to my husband and started scrolling through her feed- full of envy and wonder. Then I saw… Continue reading Coming Around to Cold Frames
Oh 2021, how we've all been so anxious to meet you! We promise to be good if you promise to be kind... we're all a bit flustered so go easy on us if you can. The run-down on 2020 was a rough one here. We had a dear family friend pass away, my parents both… Continue reading January
We made it everyone! It’s the shortest day of the year and things are quite literally only going to get brighter and sunnier from here! I'll be going quiet here through the remainder of the holidays, we'll be back in 2021. In the meantime, Happiest and Merriest of Christmases and New Years to all of… Continue reading Happy Winter Solstice!
Hoo boy! I got a little tardy this month with posting! Sorry y'all! It is a strange December so far (totally in keeping with the overarching theme of 2020 though)- its been chilly but no snow yet. Its a very tan Christmas season so far... like when we lived in Texas but with less venomous… Continue reading December
Just a quick note to wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving. I'm thankful for all of your, for the community of online gardeners, for your thoughtful comments, and for sticking with me through thick and thin. Wishing you all health, safety, love, laughter, and a good growing season! Photo by Anna Tukhfatullina Food Photographer/Stylist… Continue reading Thankful.
The 2020 gardening season was a strange one... obviously the pandemic pushed much of the year to bollocksy territory, but there was a lot in the veg garden that didn't go as expected. I found that what we got excited about wasn't the same sort of thing we'd been excited about in the past. Things… Continue reading Veg: Thoughts for 2021
Oh, let's throw ourselves into the hedonistic optimism of gardening gear for 2021 and, maybe (just maybe), a return to something resembling normalcy? It is likely? Probably not. But at least gardening is a proven Pandemic Approved Hobby(TM)! Let's get shopping! Opinel Hand Pruners ($59.00) How lovely are these? These feature a Beech wood handle… Continue reading Gift Guide! 2020!
Oh November, The Season of the Haus Panther. Our sweet and weird tortoiseshell cat Audrey is known affectionately as the Haus Panther, a take on this House Panther: https://www.youtube.com/embed/xH_d8ymHwxo She showed up on our doorstep (literally) 3 years ago Thanksgiving weekend. Since she was about 1.5 years old- maybe- when she adopted us, we decided… Continue reading November
Y'all. The snow situation here in northern Wisconsin has been a bit ahead of schedule and a bit too eager/aggressive for my liking recently. Last Wednesday we got a record (for any day in the entire month of October) 6.9" of snow. This afternoon (Sunday) we're hunkered down and watching the flakes fly again (header… Continue reading Early and Often.
Box & Bay 