philosophy 101

I had a real break through moment years ago. I was a definate perfectionist, in my artwork, in my style, in the colour of the walls of our house (I drove the paint mix chap absolutely bonkers! - I was literally getting him to add red to the grey one drop at a time, then drying the paint with a hairdryer and deciding if it needed another drip. I'm sure he changed jobs ) - we were giving a dinner party, all going swimmingly, perfect evening, guests all of it - but we had not redone the kitchen yet. I was cooking with the old french oven that the previous owners had for the previous umpteen years. Went down to check on the food, and the cooker had died. Not going to relight, not going to do anything. Went up stairs, smiled, poured more wine and said "I'm just going to drink this glass, and then I'm going next door to see if I can borrow their oven". We ate at midnight, all happy as Larry, and I finally learned perfection is a movable feast.

I still get anxiously energetic about getting it right, and then I find I do reach a happy point of 'enough, done, no more, enjoy'.

Every moment comes together for me just like I dreamed and hope summerkid. O wait ... I live in a fugue state.

I just got back from a luvly travelabout which included parts of WA. Just keeps getting prettier and prettier and prettier every time I'm there. First time in the high desert on the way to MT this trip. What a beautiful contrast to the coast!

So most of you have settled down after the roundup, and I for one really appreciate all the photos and comments. I especially like photos of all of you so now I can put faces to the names.

Were any of you surprised by your fellow DGers or their gardens? Do you think the gardens reflect the personalities of their keepers? Some said they would like to present their gardens as they see them in their dreams, in their most perfect state. What is it about us nature loving gardeners that always want things neater, better, bigger? I wish two escalonia in my front garden would grow faster - and the winterberry would fill out more quickly. Why is it so difficult to enjoy the process, however slow it may be? I'm trying to be more conscious of the natural rhythm of each plant, but it's hard.

Wait a while and you will wish they hadnt grown so fast.

Judi- If you are anything like me you wonder what you were thinking when you planted that small shrub years ago and now it is taking up more room than anticipated. I've been gardening for 30 years and I am still making that miscalculation. Gees when will I get it....I guess I'm perpetually new!

I have enjoyed my garden for over 5 years. I like it just the way it is each day and love to show it. It took about 5 years to get it somewhat developed but each day I go out I love the change it has taken. I prune and move and build and change some of it but only when I haven't anything else to do. Of course my DW Karen is out there all day and night vacuuming the rocks, polishing the leaves, talking to the bugs, and eating all of my sweet tomatoes. Tomorrow I get up and get them first. LOL

Steve - nobody can beat those rocks!!

Steve, please load up a truck with Montana rocks just like those, and bring them to me. Now would be a good time. ;p

It's going to be a long time until I'm truly happy with my garden. Starting from scratch is even more time consuming than I had anticipated. Not to mention very hard work. But I reckon I'll get there eventually.

Hey I had my garden on the personal site that I could go back to and show people. Now it is gone. Is there another site for garden photos of our gardens?
I have other things besides rocks. Thank you though.

These are just a smidgen of the thousands of colorful rocks that I am starting to sand-blast to get them to shine permanently. The roses are now hiding all of them.

Aw Steve... your plants are gorgeous too. But good rocks are hard to get around here. hehe.

I use Flickr for my photos.

Is that a vine maple in the center of that photo? I'm lousy at identifying things.

Nice . . . you can use Picasa (through Google) or Photobucket. They're both free and you can make your albums private or public.

Steve, my theory is that you just haven't planted enough tomatoes! Rarejem and I have a dozen plants at the house in EWA and there is NEVER a dispute as to who gets to eat them.
On DG. PNW, there are some picture sites, but I do believe you are talking about something more like photobucket. No idea how long those are available for.....Speaking of photobucket, have you been successful at posting all of your roundup photos there.? We certainly would like them there so we can download them w/o the trademark on them.

By the way, way back when i drooled over one of you pics of your DW's rock creatiions....I plan to do something similar (i.e. copy) back in my meadow. Could you spare a little time to come dress up my rocks for me? I already have them as I am a rockhound as well as a bunch of other malodies.............

The sand blaster is 7' high and 8' wide and weighs over 800lbs. So you are welcome to come here and blast away.
Oh we have 15 different tomatoes and somehow with my traveling I don't get any sweet 100ereds. My favorite. The sweet orange ones I don't like as much so they are available by the hundreds.

Ah, yes, our favorite, too. And the seeds seem to be harder to get each year. (Don't settle for the sweet millions. No comparison.)

Oh, my! Weak little me, sandblasting????????

Yes I was at an auction that nobody was bidding on the blaster and so I did. I plan on blasting my rocks to shine them up and then they will remain shiny. We have a winter garden need here to have beauty in our rocks because Montana will let you see the ground but not grow any evergreens but trees.

Funny. I still like the Sweet Millions best -- I haven't found anything to compare -- not Sungold, not Sweet 100's. To each his own . . .

How can you get sweeter than sweet 100s? Cane Sugar?

Steve, have you actually done the sandblasting on the rocks? I know a coat of lacquer will do good, but how does that actually turn out? Rarejem's DH has a sandblaster. (AH AH)

I think Sungold, Sweet 100 & Sweet millions all have a different taste, but all are sweet.
Sungold has the thinnest skins by far and best eaten fresh - did not saute' well.
So grow all 3.

No I have been waiting for the rain to start. Too hot to sit in a sandblaster room and stare into a glass window. The garden beckons. I have had to pull out many Acer glabrums to let the sunlight hit my now mature Korean and Japanese Maples to contunue to grow. And put compost into areas of need soil amendments. Oh yes and to gather fire wood.
Mine never make it to the house. Food for gardening.

This message was edited Sep 13, 2009 10:06 PM

Mmmmmm, compost. I was thinking of you and your compost today, Steve, when I was wishing I had more compost for my beds. But the neighbors delivered a truckload of nice, cooked horse manure the day I was at the Roundup. Can't find better neighbors than that. I just wish their horses would poop more and faster.

I have only used 1/5 of my compost and I have no place to put the other 4 yards. I guess I will just keep it until winter sets in and use it to warm my difficult plant roots.

Ahem I just dug out today.150 lbs is not enough. Feel like a road trip mon ami kiss, kiss ^_^

I was looking through the RU photos - Pix's garden is just what I would expect, judging from her posts. I love it!

"I saw him first!" :-D

Really? In what way, Portland?
I'll take a chance on my impressions of the gardens on the tour. Here are my reflections on the gardens I saw.

I had seen Lynn's garden in the spring and then when I saw it again at the roundup I realized that this woman works harder than I do! And that's saying something! Her garden shows that when she gets interested in something, she really goes for it and puts a great deal of energy into it. She likes color, and it's possible she will become addicted to propagating her plants. She is also a high achiever and bites off life in big hunks rather than small pieces. She has a generous spirit and that shows in her garden. If I had to guess, I would guess that her mind is always working on what she wants to do next in the garden, as though she has no time to waste getting started. There is a level of excitement evident in the garden and one can see that she is working on connecting the 'dots' so that the spaces flow together naturally. It is a garden of action and movement, full of life.

I had never seen Julie or Sharon's gardens before, and had only met them briefly in the past so it will be interesting to see if my impressions of them are accurate.

Sharon's garden shows her to be a romantic person at heart. It is the garden of someone who is sensitive to the world and likes a private retreat. I believe she probably tends to live 'up in the clouds' a bit and probably needs help grounding herself, thus her love of gardening. I think her garden is a spiritual place for her and that interacting with the plants is soothing to her. It also shows her to be a person who likes to have different places for different activities as it is divided into spaces that create different feels and have different purposes. Her use of water features and her koi pond also speak to her sensitive and spiritual nature. She appreciates form and elegance and her choices of artwork in the garden reflect this. My impression is that she does much for others, sometimes putting her own needs last.

Julie's garden shows her to be someone who tries to create sunshine wherever she goes. She has broad sweeps of perennial beds that glow in the sun. It seems she is also a 'live and let live' kind of person who is fairly relaxed about things and enjoys the process as much as the product of gardening. Her creative nature is evident in her daylily breeding program, as is her need to manifest beauty in her world on her own terms. She is sensitive to the spirits of the earth, plants, and animals and it's my guess that she has always felt an affinity with nature and wild things. Like her mother, she is sensitive to the world, but in a different way. She has created a retreat from the world, but she enjoys open space more than her mother does. I think the term 'bloom where you are planted' suits her and I notice that she has allowed certain flowers to do just that. The effect is lovely and engaging. There is a playful quality in her garden, evident in the use of statuary and in the special fairy garden under the trees.


okay, time for bed!

Pixy, you are right on, at least in your interpretation of my garden and my personality (disorder? LOL). And I am already hooked on propagation.

Ever since I can remember, anything that I was interested in, I had to over do, over achieve, and try to be the best. That goes for every aspect in my life, including club activities (had to be the chairwoman or president), professional ( had to be top salesman or manager), sewing (made everything, and was always planning the next project before I finished the current one). Gosh, too bad I wasn't interested in politics. Or, if I would have been a street hooker, I would have ended up being the madam of the Bestest House! LOL... Oh well, in my next life......

That is my interpretation of Julie and Sharon's gardens and personalities as well.
They are both beautiful, inside and out.
Darn, I want to give my thoughts about your garden and more about Julie and Sharon's, but DH needs me to go with him.
I will finish later tonight.

I think this is a good tread to share this.
As fate and dreams do come true.
I got a call late last night from my niece who is on My-Space. About a 17 year old girl that has are last name.
I was overcome with a trill that I can not explain. Her name was my granddaughter's which 13 years ago was taken away by her mother and her BF to live in Montana. Then I heard shortly after that they where both Killed in a car acct.
Then I was told the horror of what really happened and it was to late for me to step in and take her. I thought I would never see her again.

But to find out that she has been adopted and living in Kingston for the last 5 years.
Her stepparents gave her, her Dad's last name (my son)

This is where fate happens, and it is a small world after all LOL
Her BF has a friend that recognized the name, (which also is my niece's last name) and the friend is the brother of my niece's BF. How this came about??

Anyway we where up till 3am, I was on the phone with my niece and she was on FB with my GD. How weird is that LOL

We all met today, I have not seen her since she was 3 years old. What a joy
She does not remember much of us, she recalls my name and what she used to call my DH as GrandpaBoots. Which Boots was my horse's name. I showed her the pic's I had of her riding boot's, I thought she was going to cry. She remembered Boots, and laugh at one of a haircut she didn't like and fixed it her self LOL that was not good. Funny

I always new some day she would come back into my life. I am still in aw over it.
^_^ ^_^ ^_^

That's a tear-jerker Tils. I'm so happy for you. What a blessing for you.

Willow, I still think I am dreaming all this

That's such a great story, Mary. Congratulations. It does sound the Universe was conspiring to get you two back together.

I am still, in shock LOL I almost raised her at least the 3 years we where together.
How do you make up all those years lost?

You can only be grateful for the years ahead. It's a dream come true with huge possibilities.

Omigosh, tilly, I'm crying so hard right now! HOW ABSOLUTELY THRILLING! And the missing years are NOTHING because now you will all be bending over backward to fill the present with love!!!

Oh, this just makes my day.

Congratulation for joy to enter your life Tills. I hope she too knows how much you feel for her. Nice story

This came out of the blue LOL I was so happy that I had today off. If I didn't I would have call out sick, but she skipped school to meet us and her step parents don't know yet. How is this going to work LOL It gets better by the min.

And the bad thing is I get a bad cold at the worst time. can tell fall is here, happens every year at this time.

Thanks Steve, I can not find the words to tell you how I feel right now, I do not have that poetic voice you have LOL All I can say is God Loves me ^_^

That's so cool, Tills. I'm so happy for you! :)