August 13, 2007
Plenty
We spent our days in floppy hats and gardening shoes and our evenings in the hot tub. We made fresh pasta sauce and mint tea from our own yard, cleaned out the pond(!), lounged on the tire swing, lunched on the patio, sowed more seeds and planted more plants (jasmine and sunflowers and lemon verbena, oh my!) and basically neglected all of our indoor projects because the sun had come out again at last and we wanted to be its most devoted worshippers. Countless hours spent hunched on the gardening stool and I have a strip of sunburn running across my lower back like a tramp stamp.
Simon--a man known for his love of wacky headgear--at last christened his jacuzzi fedora (known formerly as his "cocaine-dealer hat"), and I--a woman known for her incessant photography--took a lot of pictures.
Even Easy-E got in on the outs. (Bad cat! Get in the house!)
Our time indoors consisted of Saturday's midnight hour, during which we retired to the library and played lateral thinking puzzles, I in my bathrobe and Simon in his underwear and an ascot (by request). We drank champagne and toasted California livin'. As Simon said, "The life, this is it."
Our list of house projects grows by ten for every item we cross off, and I'm convinced that the basis of that problem is in the garden being so much damn fun. We go out to quickly water the herbs and before you know it we're building up trellises, digging out trenches, and hacking down overgrown stalks (the celery was six feet tall before it topped under its own weight and became six feet long; I chopped it to a nub). Our green-waste can is overflowing, and so is our compost bin, but both smell like ten pounds of mint, so it could be worse.
One of my favorite things about the garden--something I didn't really understand until I met this particular one--is that it changes constantly. Sometimes I discover a new feature (this weekend's find was an ornamental gourd the size of my fist) and other times the surprise is in the way the plants are morphing through their respective cycles. It's like perpetual Spring here in northern California, and everything seem to have four or five blooming cycles per year. When I pulled up the recently dead cala lilies and cauliflower this weekend, I found new sprouts already shooting out. While we were in Chicago, all of the flowers fell off two of our angel's trumpet trees, but along the driveway there exploded out of nowhere two dozen white roses and a score of orange dahlias as big as dessert plates and tall enough to look you in the eye. In the two weeks since we returned, however, the roses have wilted, the dahlias grew so big they busted their stems, and the angel's trumpets are budding again. For the past week we've been harvesting ten tomatoes every day, we've set a record for collard cultivation, and this morning I was the girl on BART with the sack full with lemons--only about a third of what's ripe this week. It's ridiculous, really. Wonderful and amazing and ridiculous.
All week long I'll be including segments about the gardening, decorating, and other crafty-type projects that have been making home a delightful place to be. For now, you know where to go.
Posted by Leah at August 13, 2007 11:43 AMwow, that back yard looks like a fun playground.
if you have excess mint i'll be happy to take it off your hands. not that i can't get it at the store, but anything to help reduce the compost pile.
am i jealous that you can grow all that? oh yeah. i'm moving in a few weeks, and the porch at my new place gets a few hours of direct sun every day, unlike my balcony now. i think i'll try again to see if i can grow basil, cilantro and mint.
Posted by: this charming man at August 13, 2007 12:49 PMI am a big fan of the hot tub picture, and of the champagne, as it reminded me I have a bottle of my own at home. I may not have a garden (or even much of a backyard) but champagne is a nice consolation prize.
Posted by: Jennie at August 13, 2007 01:01 PMI am so jealous of your garden!! I've been considering starting a garden blog myself.
Can't wait to read your posts this week. The photos are terrific. Especially the ducky one.
Posted by: MammaLoves at August 13, 2007 02:03 PMJust beautiful! I love gardening, too. I wish we could grow citrus, that bowl of lemons made my mouth water.
Posted by: Assertagirl at August 13, 2007 02:46 PM"We spent our days in floppy hats and gardening shoes and our evenings in the hot tub."
- Every time things get tough and you want to say why me...read the sentence above. Life is good.
Posted by: will at August 13, 2007 03:30 PMYour back yard sounds fabulous. If I lived closer I'd totally come over wearing my gardening shoes and floppy hat.
Posted by: chris at August 13, 2007 05:02 PMYour place sounds absolutely fabulous! I love the shots, per usual. I *really* like the one with the reflection in Simon's glasses :)
Posted by: Angella at August 13, 2007 05:26 PMI am utterly and completely stoked to visit right now. You have no idea.
Posted by: Heather B. at August 13, 2007 06:15 PMYay garden! I am very jealous, although perhaps the husband and I should overcome our small problem of killing every basil plant we've ever owned before we're ready for a bona fide garden.
Posted by: watersign at August 13, 2007 09:52 PMKitttttttty!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I love it. Keep sharing house pics/stories, I'm loving it!!
Posted by: Sarah Cool at August 14, 2007 04:14 AMLooks fabulous- what a treasure! We're currently drowning in cucumbers, so I feel your pain.
One hint about the mint - it is invasive w/a capital I. You may not want to put it in your compost pile - if the compost pile doesn't get hot enough (to kill all the seeds and roots), you might wind up w/mint everywhere you spread your compost next year.
Save some of those tomato seeds for next year - they look delish!!
Posted by: mar at August 14, 2007 06:48 AMWow! I am so jealous of your garden.
Posted by: Nicole at August 14, 2007 07:23 AMLooks like a very much enjoyable project. I'm so glad that you are enjoying it, together.
Posted by: Elizabeth at August 14, 2007 08:17 AMOkay, that settles it. I need to find a house with a pre-existing garden so that I get all the veggie/fruit goodness without actually having to dig all the initial holes myself. It's gotta be like Christmas every day out there with new stuff popping up all the time.
Posted by: Holly at August 14, 2007 08:20 AMThank you Mar; great tip about mint in the compost pile. I didn't know that.
Posted by: aliastaken at August 14, 2007 08:26 AMI love that bowl of lemons.
Posted by: chirky at August 14, 2007 10:04 AMYes, thanks Mar. The mint is nice and all, but enough is enough! Now, who wants to go dig it out of the compost bin for me? I'll give you a dollar.
Posted by: Leah at August 14, 2007 10:33 AMEven without a real garden (yikes, another project I need to work on), my home projects continue to grow. Even people who live in new or relatively new homes have things they've got to fix or want to change, but that's part of the fun.
Enjoy your bounty. Your basket runneth over.
Posted by: Texas T-bone at August 14, 2007 10:45 AMWow, you are a fantastic photographer!
Too bad we don't live closer, my kid would clear your compost bin for a dollar. (We live in balmy Michigan. I know, you're jealous.)
Posted by: cardiogirl at August 15, 2007 04:38 AM
