My Garden Is

I have been listening to a Book on Tape, "Dear Mr. Jefferson" by Laura Simon.

One particular chapter is not about all the work to do, or already finished, or the joys of eating her crops, but just about her garden IS. It is a garden, not a collection of seedlings, or a work in progress, or anything related to work. It just is.

This summer, I have been revelling in the fact that my garden is. Not a place to work. Not a list of things to do. Not a showcase. It is a garden.

And a wonderful place to be :)

Seems it took me a while to come to that conclusion, but now that it has been expressed for me, it is even better.

mmmmm I love that sentiment, Lupy. How perfect. My own garden... is! It's my garden! It's a habitat for living things that range from tiny tree frogs to Canada Geese to mallards to a gazillion chipmunks who have made a home under up-ended aluminum pans used to donate stale food to the critters. It's home to raccoons, four different kinds of squirrel that I have seen, a beautiful hawk that comes daily to sit in the tree and look for - what? a mouse?

There is a tiny mouse family that lives in the leaves under the holly bush and many birds love the shelter of those pointy leaves. There are amazing fungi all over the yard, and a huge ant hill! There is a ground hog hole beside our air conditioner. There is a little toad that lives beside the back steps.

My garden is... filled with gifts from DGers... filled with beautiful flowers and bees and bugs and slugs and even snails.

My garden is... delightfully scented, and full of weeds, and combined flowers and tomatoes and herbs and annuals and perennials and even a voodoo lily that is trying to get bigger and bigger by the day.

My garden is... a constant source of delight and joy.

Yes, yes... my garden... is.

:)

My garden is orderly in a world that isn't..
My garden is full of beauty--both expected and unexpected...
My garden is a place away from phones & Tv & electronic noise...
My garden is an oasis from the pressures of my life...

My garden is- a labor of love that my children and I share.
My garden is- a place my family becomes stronger
My garden is- beauty that we created.

Davena

My garden is color and texture.
My garden is a place I am filled with wonder and awe at so great a Creator.
My garden is my sanity in an insane world.

My garden is a jungle, unkempt, untidy, wild. I love it.

My garden is a work in progress, always

Cheri'

I have loved reading everyone's messages. Makes me really realize again just why people become gardeners.

My garden began as a way to get some gentle exercise. It quickly became an intellectual pursuit.

It became a place filled with lovely blooms. It was a place for wild creatures to live, safely.

It then was a place to show off to friends. Then it became a refuge from the bad parts of life.

My garden is still all of these things. But it is also a place to just, be. And to be happy.

My garden is where I dream and go to quietly figure out the solutions to all my little problems. It's the place I can escape the demands on my time and mind, and just quietly be.

It is many other things, too. All of them wonderful. Mostly, it's the place that I am most comfortably alive, and at peace with myself.

It's also beautiful.

My garden is the only place in my house that doesn't get cluttered with paperwork

My garden is:
disorderly
pretty
weedy
colorful
full of frogs
alive with grasshoppers
still blooming in places
going to sleep in other places
full of surprise volunteers without names
a place where I:
plan
hope
plant
yank out
experiment
transplant
watch nature
observe the changes in seasons
hope for more hummingbirds and butterflies and fewer bugs
and most of all, see God at work

Very beautifully said....DITTO

OH! This should be a book for people who love to garden. Did you notice that none of us said "My garden is way to impress the neighbors"? How many things do we get to do in life just becuase we like it? I enjoy helping new gardeners start so they can find the peace I find in my garden.

We put on the musical "My Secret Garden" at our high school last spring. As I watched it each night, it reminded me of the healing powers & love that go into my garden.

wanda in iowa, the Secret Garden is a fav of mine since childhood,it made a lasting inpression on me.I think I have every DVD and tape.
Shirley in wisconsin ;-)

My garden is named"Chaos". It is random, rambling, busy,contains many rocks we have hand picked, weedy at times, but mostly it is a collection of plants and flowers I love to watch grow and bloom. Not at all landscaped or neat. I walk around each morning before I head to work and enjoy each bloom on it's own merit, not the effect in the garden as a whole. It is just a back yard that turned into a yarden and we enjoy it in spite of the neighbor's comments. LOu

My garden is a living, breathing, blooming being that I share with the earth, and anyone who needs some flowers in their lives. My favorite 'fragrance' is green and my favorite thing to do is to give the love of that fragrance to others. when you touch the earth, you find God, who had the first garden.

Kathleen--lovely!

Ahhhh, Kathleen, I love that!

Kathleen,
......So wonderfuul is the scent of green. I would have never thought of it if asked .
......The smell of cut grass coming through the house windows.....(ahem! DH which 'I' mowed)...natures air freshner.
....Traveling down country roads ,every couple months the fragrance of newly mown alfalfa hay and during mid summer the smell of corn fields in bloom is intoxicatingly sweet.
.....So ,this post kinda' belongs on this thread since I live, breath and garden in the middle of this great green land.
....>^,,^< and /o,o shirley

This message was edited Monday, Sep 8th 10:02 AM

I always say that God must be a Gardener--He made flowers in so many lovely colors & shapes. Plain grey would have probably done the trick of propagation.

I want my gardens to showcase some of the beauty He has rained upon my life. And my troubles show up too in bare spots or plants that just don't grow the way I want. But why did He make so many weeds????

LOL Wanda, they are only weeds if they grow where you don't want them. I firmly believe it's all carefully designed to meet the needs of all the little creatures. And I also believe that there is something growing on the earth that cures every disease known to man. :)

The world is God's garden... mmmm I love that thought.

I find peace & joy in my garden. Peace in the sun & rain. Peace--Nothing electronic beeps or screetches in my dirt. I talk to my flowers & they don't talk back. Blue skies above & rich dirt in my hands. Elemental Peace. What do they say--God is in the details???

Joy in the brilliant colors and shapes of the flowers. Joy in the discovery of a toad hopping under the leaves. Joy in the clouds of butterflies resting ion my garden this weekend on their fall migration. Joy as I watch the birds build nests, raise young & fly about my garden. Joy as I help a little neighbor pick a bouquet for his Mom.

I am truly in awe at some of your descriptions of what your Garden is. I am deeply inspired. I can't wait to have mine own to start, tend, nurture and love. My Garden "will be" full of love, life, adventure, color, variety, a few surprises here and there that lay dormant until the next season, alot of red wiggler worms (ACK!), crickets and frogs. A place to respect each and every plant or flower that will grow there. But I hope to be able to escape from all of life's strife and troubles and be in a world of mine own, lavishing in it's glory and beauty. My Garden "will be" loved & respected.

Annabelle, welcome to Dave's Garden :)

A still-to-be-created garden counts! The one you are planning to make sounds divine. I hope when it is created you will share photos and thoughts with us.

My garden is

becoming filled with sadness as the growing season winds to its inevitable autumn sparsity. Yet as plants are dug up, it is filled with images of friends who will receive parts of it. Not just the plants, but the friendships involved.

Yet my garden is not dying; it is taking a well-deserved rest from its exuberence of the growing year. Even though most of the plants will fall asleep during the coldest part of the winter, others will remain green and growing, and some even blooming through the frigid blasts. My garden provides hope that spring and warmth will return again!

My garden was BLESSED BY RAIN all day yesterday!!!! (7 week drought) My garden is filled with birds that sing and bees that buzz and butterflies that flutter. My garden is my own little bit of therapy....

Thank you Lupinlover :-) You are kind and your garden sounds lovely...Everyones sounds lovely. Hopefully, when I get mine up and going, mine will be as beautiful as all of yours is.

I spent a whole day sunday collecting seed for next years flowers. So I will say...

My garden is full of hope.

My garden is a quiet place where I can think. It's a place where I can enjoy the seasons with senses....

There is a garden that few may know
When day’s end comes that I may go
To rest and work and simply be
Alone with God on bended knee

To dig and plant and weed each day
A labor of love that feels like play
Worries and troubles left far behind
So enter my garden a peace to find

An endless cycle of nature’s delight
Heavenly scented brugs at night
Oh no, what’s that? A slimy slug?
Grab the sprayer, Kill that bug

Frizzy hair, Stained hands and feet
My garage is full of manure and peat.
No time to cook, no time to clean
Too busy working in my garden of green

My garden soothes, makes me complete
I no longer worry if my house is neat
So, come fellow gardeners and join me today
To linger in silence and pick a bouquet.

Nat:)

I really love that Nat; very encompassing. Thanks!

You have inspired me to read the book. Got it from the library today! Thanks.