David Austin Rose Queen of Sweden
Taking a little break from showing you my summer sews to share a few images of my other obsession: growing things, bright and colorful or pale and delicate. The weather is cooling, the light is lower already and I can't help but be drawn outside.
Diner plate Dahlias
Growing Calendula in maybe the most crowded place!
My favorite outdoor room.
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(sometimes you take a picture of your house and discover you are in need of a new mailbox and a brick cleaning!)
My favorite blog is a gardening blog, here I said it! Even in the winter I enjoy reading it, dreaming of what is to come. Unfortunately for me, its creator is taking a break from writing, I hope not too long... It's by reading her educational and gorgeous posts that I got the courage to start my own rose collection and ended up completely devoted to seeing them thrive. I went from none to 12 planted and 4 potted shrubs in two years. Most of those David Austin's. So in honor of Hedgerow Rose, I am giving you a little tour of what is blooming in my own garden:
Graham Thomas, Climbing. A David Austin rose planted last summer (2013). This bush has been so easy to grow, it asks very little and loves it's location. I wonder if the canes will ever get tall enough to train on the wall. I think patience is key with climbers. The canes are not woody and robust yet.
Crocus Rose, another David Austin that grows right by Graham Thomas above. It was planted at the same time. This bush shot up this spring. The flowers are adorable and last well in a vase inside.
Lady of Shalott, a David Austin climber. Started small and is growing slowly but surely. The blooms are variegated and a bit too olé olé tequila sunrise for my taste but the scent is unbelievable.
Red Eden syn. Eric Tabarly. A red Pierre de Ronsard climber named for the famed French naval officer and navigator. I purchased this one this year to replace a sickly Heritage. The blooms it came with could be complete false advertising but I was "suckered" into bringing it home when I took a look at the super robust canes they were perched on.
A brand new Gertrude Jekyll, DA that lives in partial shade and a few daisies wrap up this visit. There will be more where these came from as the season progresses. I leave you with another view of the Crocus rose, in a vase on my nighstand, really turning on the charm after a few days in the water.
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Today I turned 36. Yesterday I felt filled with dread at the thought, but it was not necessary as it turns out. One of my dearest friends took me to breakfast and then filled my front seat with flowers from her garden. On my way home their scent completely overwhelmed me and like a rose and peony scented hug they made my heart swell.
It's been a good few weeks recently, we moved in our new bedroom, I now have a place to work and it has made a tremendous difference in my state of mind. Speaking with my friend about growing older this morning I told her how (having been perilously ill before) I do not fear dying but wasting my time most. I don't want to worry about my size, complexion, being too short etc anymore. I want to live the other half of my life for what is important, now and what will become important later. I hope it can be done...
With the flowers I made this very large bouquet, adding a few green from the backyard. It had been so long since I attempted any floral work and my supplies are low. Having no foam or wire on hand, I used a glass frog with very few holes to try and keep it all together. It can be done, as long as you are not going anywhere with this great big peacock!
I knew a woman once who had portraits taken of herself at her birthdays, I am not exactly sure why as we are very different people and I really hate having my pictures taken (in 99% of the shots I look worst than in real life), but Finn took a sneak attack shot of me while I was speaking to my aunt whose birthday is also today. He wanted me to hang up no doubt and was going the road of blatantly using the "big camera" to achieve his goal. I am glad he did, later on I can point at it and think: That is what 36 looked like... but in all honesty I would rather think of Finn or my aunt on that day.
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Since I don't want to run the risk of boring you with even more blocks from my Kaffe Fasset paperpieced marathon, I will wish you all a great weekend with a flower portrait (as the watercolor artists would say) of this new variety of amaryllis I am growing this year. It is called Pink Surprise, and at least on this monitor the picture does it justice!
I ordered 3 bulbs from there in oct-nov.
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I am spending this Christmas day in my pj's, why? Because the French go all out on Christmas eve and then usually spend the next day at grandma's. My grandma is so achingly far away alas so in protest I am staying in my pj's... Last night was beautiful though, here are a few of the images I took before the light went out.
It appears that you can now flip though the pictures directly from the blog, a new Flickr feature I must have missed! or something is wrong and I will need to tinker with this.
Charlotte is my sister-in-law, I liked lettering her name best. It took me so long to find my hand at the uppercase C, it's tragic!
For dessert I made a Chocolate Pavlova following the recipe of Nigella Lawson, it was un delice! We also had a row of parisian Macarons just because. I admit to buying them from Trader Joe's, no secrets there...
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The garden is looking more and more like a winterscape this week, but some roses keep enduring. I stole most of them to bring and enjoy inside. They are wondrously scented. The little myrtlewood vase, thrifted from the DI comes from Oregon. I love the word myrtlewood, it sounds Tolkien/JK Rowlings made up...
The boys gave me 6 bushes of these Moondance floribonda for mother's day this year. They looked so promising on the Lowes parking lot. Later I realized that we should have waited and procured the bushes from Western Gardens, but as luck of the beginner would have it they did very well and bloomed the entire summer. To hoping they make it through the winter!
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Sometimes you find the most gorgeous things in the back of a friend's cupboard. This little tray and cup for example came home with me yesterday after a nice long visit and successful thrift excursion with S.
She was thinking finger foods and dipping sauce, I saw flowers. Too lazy to cook I suppose...
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As Thomas put it on Sunday, we only have another good week of peonies and then it's over...
I am not much of a blogger lately but all is well, I am just taking a break away from the social medias and focusing on the great outdoors aka the cabin/garden.
Recognize the chair? it's finally completed! Hard to believe it looked so rough. The walnut was so well 'aged' that untinted danish oil just enhanced the wood to this rich... well walnut!
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I turned 35 last Monday. It seemed like nothing to write home about when the week was just starting but today I realized that maybe now would be a great time to let go of some childhood insecurities and focus on the present, just saying...
S. gifted me an interesting geranium, a lemon verbena, some spicy popcorn (!) and these gorgeous alliums... I love them so, with their everlasting heads. Did you know that when you cut the stems off they bleed (the water turns red, iron much) ?
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I am easily distracted lately, in the age of Pinterest, as many blogs have seen a fast and steady decline in readership it can be hard to keep that sort of ship going. Especially if like me you become wary of the drain on time ever expending media imposes if you want to keep getting more and more followers. I am not sure what I want if not more time away from the computer. More time to take photographs, to style shots, to snoop around for props, to learn new things. I don't believe it will make me a better person if I can use instagram, if I start tweeting or who knows what else.
For this reason sometimes it seems wise to write a blog, like you might a journal, to keep track of things and moments made and enjoyed. Great finds, beautiful light, good people, documented for the joy of it nothing more.
{flowers brought back from the Kinfolk Dinner}
But writing a journal, be it private or public as this one depends on staying focused and coming back to the beginning, these days I am easily distracted...
I want to do better, to create a portfolio of the better part of my day. Through images sometimes more than words.
{Letterpress gift bag by Print in Cursive}
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