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If there is magic
on the planet
it is contained in the water.
~ Loren Eisley
o o o o o
This blogger, like many, loves to acknowledge seasonal firsts-- as in our first rain-- oh how welcome it is.
Here's last year's first-rain post.
I need to take a couple of weeks off from blogging-- I'll miss you!
In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.
~ Kahlil Gibran
The pleasures above are Salvia 'Limlight' and Salvia 'Elegans' growing in the garden of Anita Clevenger. Gardening friends can't help but share the bounty, and Anita was especially generous.
This coleus, Perilla 'Magilla', was so stunning in Anita's garden I had to have a stem, and believe it or not, this is the first coleus I've ever been attracted to. Anita said it would root in water. I look forward to it growing with the red roses next year, and in arrangements it might be wonderful too.
This finely cut pelargonium had to come home with me too– it's a great arranging filler with roses. I decided to look up how best to propagate it in The American Horticultural Society Encyclopedia of Gardening. This book is so thorough, I've had it for years, and never really used it until today.
There is propagation info for each plant listed in the book !
So many times, plants on the great wish list in my head, have pleasantly appeared. I wanted this Japanese Anenome when I saw it in San Francisco recently. Thanks to Anita, it will be swaying in the breezes of my garden a year from now.
This rose is known as both 'Francois Dubrieul' and 'Barcelona', or as one or the other. Yes, it's one of those rose-world-confusions that you can read about here.
There is nothing true anywhere; the true is nowhere to be seen; if you say you see the true, this seeing is not the true one.
~ Abraham Lincoln
My friend, Jean Vieth, gave me this rose, and I've been admiring its gorgeous blooms in my garden since last April. But I'd never snapped a photo until Friday-- in Anita Clevenger's garden. One perfect bloom was all it took for me to "see" and finally click (in more ways than one).
It's also a beautiful memento of a spectacular rose weekend. Our rose arranging seminar, hosted by Anita Clevenger and Barbara Oliva, was "ab fab," as my daughter would say. Gleanings from Anita's garden, the Sacramento Old City Cemetery Rose Garden, the gardens of seminar participants, and from my own garden, made for rich and gorgeous materials to play with. I wish I had photos, or better yet, a movie.
It's always such a pleasure to breath the air of roses and rose lovers. I met so many lovely women-- I want to thank you for your joyful enthusiasm, and your roses!
As far as seeing goes (both internally and externally), I think we all had new vistas to explore.
Thanks again!
In the house of words was a table of colors. They offered themselves in great fountains and each poet took the color he needed: lemon yellow or sun yellow, ocean blue or smoke blue, crimson red, blood red, wine red.
~ Eduardo Galeano
The Book of Embraces
These two shots are outtakes from the last post. The red infusion set them apart, calling for special attention.
The red comes from Oklahoma, the white is R. multiflora.
Ritual is necessary for us to know anything.
~ Ken Kesey
Gathering garden treasures to pass on in poseys or small bouquets has become a rather glorious ritual for me. A well-stocked garden has much to offer-- surprises included.
Roses display especially well when laced and frilled with greenery-- the more herbaceous the better.
1 Do you recognize these leaves? Yes, they belong to aquilegia (columbine)-- a shearing of fresh new leaves only makes the plant stronger, and they are long lasting in a vase.
2 Peppermint-scented and fuzzy-leafed, Pelargonium tomentosum is definitely a favorite. I have two plants that I've been harvesting all through the season. These do best in partial shade.
3 Geranium pyrenaicum 'Bill Wallis', is a surprise filler from Annie's Annuals. The perfectly round leaves on long stems are ideal, and striking with roses.
4 White strawberry leaves have served me well all through the season too. Fall has brought a new crop of berries, which are a particular delight to bouquet recipients.
5 Sweet pea leaves and tendrils are wonderful curling through the roses. In the garden, these have reseeded in unwanted places-- a free October harvest that will probably result in ultra-strong plants.
The featured greens join multi-colored roses in six bouquets. I originally thought to show both images, because the sun played hide and seek while shooting. The different effects don't really show up here though. I'm including both anyway.
I usually end up doing a color story with the available roses. There were just enough for one all white bouquet.
Note for Sacramento Arranging Seminar Participants
I'm looking very forward to our fun with roses this coming Saturday. I'm hoping you might be able to harvest roses from your gardens so we will have lots to work with. Rose stems from 5 to 8-inches would be perfect. (And it would also be fun to see your wares.) If you have interesting greens please bring us a sampling. Oh yes, and be sure and bring your cilppers.
The roses shown in this post were picked in the morning on both Thursday and Friday. I then put them in the fridge (super cold is not good) and arranged them on Saturday.
PS The vases are stuffed green olive jars from Trader Joes.
Anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there.
~ Oscar Wilde
I'm not so sure about that Oscar, but I love quoting you.
And there I was in the country, deep in Eastern Oregon, on the outskirts of the smallest little town, and what do I see-- rose rapture. Any rose lover worth their salt would halt the car and take it all in. A perfect arbor spilling with pale pink roses, picket fence, white lattice, pale yellow shingles, and a tidy climber bursting in bloom. I clicked my new camera, which I didn't really know how to use, and dismally failed to capture the scene. Recently, however, the wonders of PS and textures helped me bring back that moment with satisfaction. I hope you enjoy the image.
Poking around blogdom recently led from one firey leaf to another. I couldn't relate until I saw a bit of a blaze on one of our Japanese maples. Indeed fall is here, but in many ways it's another season of growth, but also one of rememberance, and taking stock of the garden's year. Today, from 9:28 to 9:54 a.m., I recorded pictures and my thought stream:
Gratitude to B. Worl for turning me on to asters-- they will have their say a year from now.
After years of single hollyhocks, a ruffled skirt finally made it into the rose beds.
I'm glad Mary made me buy this agastache-- I hope it takes off.
Darling Chas (chasmanthium latifolium) turns brown.
Tea Roses are finally getting it on.
Mum watch-- will they open by Saturday?
Pennstemon still coming to the party.
Dwarf pommegranate cute quotient.
Move this grey to a better spot.
Some rose canes are already thrusting toward spring.
Glad oregano is back in the garden.
Eleagnus against soon-to-be-gone plum leaves.
Kathleen fresh and glowing.
I could have made this post twice as long, and once-a-day for the next weeeeeek . . .
You don't love someone for their looks, or their clothes, or for their fancy car, but because they sing a song only you can hear.
~ Unknown
Sally sings three different songs when it comes to blooming, and until recently I only heard the first one. Pink petals and fresh stamens were all I cared about, until the image, above, challenged me. How could I not appreciate this second stage? Those graceful turned-in stamens, undulating petals, peachy buds soon to open . . . In the third, fully open stage, she's all white-- also very nice-- especially from a distance.
One rose expert says you can't train Sally. Well I beg to differ. If the laterals are cut off when bloomed out, the rose stays shapely, and new blooming laterals get a quick start.
The laterals, shown above, can be one-foot to much longer. Yesterday, I pruned a Sally, growing in the shade, in a client's garden-- the laterals were four-feet! Sally Holmes does really well in shade and remarkably never has mildew.
As I started this post, I wondered who Sally was named after, since she really is an extraordinary rose, and wonderful landscape presence. Sally was the wife of her hybridizer, Robert A. Holmes, who introduced her in the UK, in 1976. She is a cross between Ballerina and Ivory Fashion. If you know those two roses, the results were definitely spectacualar and, I'd say, surprising.
I've seen a hedge of Sally 10' high x 100' long. She's also a stand-alone shrub pruned to whatever dimensions you desire. From here, controlled-on-the-fence suits Sally and me just fine.
I think Sally must be easy to propagate this is one that I started from an 8"stick that, once rooted, matured very quickly. She's been growing on the fence like this for at least seven years.
Let me know how your Sally Holmes grows.
I think I have something tonight that's not quite correct for evening wear. Blue suede shoes.
~ Elvis Presley
In the world of rose leaves, blue is more than o.k., however only one rose is honored with stunning blue leaves-- Rosa Glauca. In latin, glauca means blue, blue-gray, blue-green.
This rose has many other fabulous traits-- elegant dark buds, unique (amazing to me) fleurs (they are small about an inch + across), extraordinary hips that color from deep maroon to burnished orange.
So why did I pull RG out of my jardin? After a decade or so, it just wasn't happy enough and I lost patience. Observing constant die-back did me in, but I treasure these pictures and I'm glad I know her. When happy this once-blooming shrub can reach 8' x 8' and more.
Rosa glauca fans, tell me how your shrub behaves.
