I don’t know about you, but recently I have been feeling befuddled, not knowing what to turn to next to keep from sinking into the well of ennui. I sure do miss knocking around with friends and the freedom for a bit of rack-slapping-at-will, because you never know what sort of bargains you’ll find unless […]
Hasn’t this been a heck of a year? In my own far-off suburban corner of Colorado it hasn’t rained properly in many months. That didn’t prevent me from planting six resilient trees, a clutch of stalwart native shrubs and some 200 bulbs that seem to adore being parched. Hope springs eternal, or so it is […]
‘Laxton’s Orange Pippin’, ‘Worcester Pearmain’, ‘Arthur Turner’, ‘Oxheart’ just a few of the named antique apple varieties that grew in my English garden. A neighbor gave the young trees to me when we arrived in the village; he’d grafted them from his own orchard trees, ones planted by his father when he returned to farming […]
You know those social media postings where a friend invites you to put up one favorite photo a day on some subject, without any label or caption? Just post a pretty picture. It’s harmless fun and you get to see some places and things you wouldn’t otherwise (all in the best possible taste, of course!). […]
A few years ago it was all about Millennials and how they travel to collect experiences, selecting destinations because of the stories they can later tell, and prefer to acquire skills – like gardening — through hands-on learning. Like that’s something new? But if that’s the case, I’ve been a Millennial all my adult (Boomer) […]
“Don’t sweat the small stuff,” but do pay attention to it. In this time of pandemic, when even our commonest gestures must be made with care, my focus has been put into sharp detail on the treasure to be found in the smallest package. I begin with my grandson, turning seven months as I write […]
There was a time when no well-appointed garden was complete without greenhouse, fountain, a tastefully draped sculpture, a gazebo, and a bee bole. A what? A bee bole was a niche in a garden wall where the family bee skep overwintered. A what? A bee skep was a beehive made from straw bundles tied together […]
This Spring of self-isolation has been, for many people, myself included, unnervingly productive. So many missions accomplished: like sorting through old photo albums and hundreds of 35mm slides and waking memories of my first encounter with Hartley Botanic and their sturdy greenhouses. I recall how charmed I was by their display at the Chelsea Flower […]
Whatever the outcome of this current deadly disruption, corona virus has certainly focused many minds on the meaning of life–and on getting stuff done. Without the opportunity to procrastinate, tasks and projects in the Clarke household are being completed in record time; like clearing up the greenhouse, sorting the seed from the dust, the compost […]
The first full moon of 2020 fell on January 10. It was quite spectacular, like every full moon in the Southwest, from low desert to high plains, foothills to mountain tops. Sitting in my sunroom cum conservatory, peering out into the garden on a mild winter night, I was enchanted by the ethereal glow the silvery light […]
At the advent of solstice as I sit in my sunroom/conservatory, staring out over a snowy landscape that’s framed by a sapphire blue sky, with the sun beating down on the Rockies and the neighborhood buried under a foot of white fluffy stuff, thoughts turn to the coming year’s gardening: Will the Woodward junipers that […]
One of the attractions that’s fed the “influencer’s” fiendish passion for promoting houseplants is probably that, in general, it’s hard to kill one – a houseplant that is. Anywhere that you are comfortable, be it conservatory, greenhouse or light-filled room, so will be whatever pet plant(s) you nurture. Three years ago, I acquired a rubber-tree […]
