May the Roses Keep Blooming

Roses

                                               and foxglove and strawberries....

These are a few of the roses in my garden .  Roses are blooming all over town and up and down the country roads.  You can click on any of these photos for a larger view...

In the neighboring town of Petaluma, I saw a tree that had such lovely flowers that it distracted me from

looking at its leaves which would have told me instantly it was a  buckeye tree.  The clue of five palmate leaves finally broke through to me. However, in my defense, this is not the native California buckeye that I  have known all my life, but a bright multi-colored showy flowering cultivar.  Once these bright flowers  had my attention I began seeing these trees all over Petaluma.   It might just have been me a having a "frequency illusion" or it may be that once someone sees these trees blooming they have to plant one too.

                                                                     Later that day a quieter smaller flower got my attention...hey look down here at your feet...watch where you are walking.   A friend had thrown open her new rental house to celebrate earning her teaching credential. The landlord mows the grasses, but it isn't exactly a lawn and there they were. Several people asked me if I knew what they were.     Brodiaea came to my mind but not quite to my tongue. The flowers were so close to the ground I wasn't sure.  So I  snapped their picture and later scoured through my wildflower books...and I think that is indeed what they are..a form of Brodiaea, little wild lilies...that can vary  from a few inches in height to sixteen inches depending on conditions.  They tend to bloom as the grasses begin drying...and you know that is what will happen next...the green grasses are going to dry.  Here in California we have had an early fast spring, very little rain, and now  lots of roses and  soon the green rolling hills of the Redwood Empire will turn golden.

There  once was a wild flower of a woman, a local musician named Kate Wolf, who sang sweetly of the golden hills of California; if you like, you could take a listen here:   the Golden Rollin' Hills of California. 

May the roses keep blooming...

~~~

Driven to the Coast by April's Wave of Heat

April 30th I saw in the sunrise what the weather watchers had predicted, it was going to be hot. The morning cool passed quickly under pulsing sun rays. The mercury was headed for 90.  

We don't live far from the western edge of the continent and, in an automobile, a car, we can be at the coast in 20 to 25 minutes.

 I say "in a car" because I am grateful and self conscious about the privilege of being able to travel with the ease we do.  I am reading What I Saw in California,  a journal of an 1846 journey west across the continent from what was then the United States.  Edwin Byrant, a news reporter from Kentucky, described the step by step progress in a daily journal, often closing each day's entry with the number of miles traversed.  It wasn't unusual for a whole day's travel to be no more than the distance from  my town to Bodega Bay:  15.6 miles, as I said,  achievable for us in twenty minutes. 

          Looking  toward the bay and the Pacific Ocean beyond

 from Bay Hill Road

The Point Reyes Peninsula is visible in the distance. It was one of those days when the off shore winds made it  almost as warm at the coast as inland.

                  This photo, taken from the driver's seat  through the skylight gives a little prospective to these Tower of Jewels, flowers that are growing wildly along a road above Highway 1.  The bees and butterflies like them ever so much.

               Native Cow Parsnip about to open in bloom in a valley just inland.

                                            Cow Parsnip Heracleum maximum is also known as Indian Celery or Pushk and it is important not to confuse it with the dangerous giant hogweed.  Cow Parsnip is a native of most of North America and was used by early inhabitants in multiple ways.  Here is the best link I found for distinguishing it from dangerous look a-likes.

                                 

                          Willow Creek waters making their way to sea...

               Looking north...some of the northern coastline has but little beach,

                                       especially when the tide is high and in.

            About four miles inland on a road that no longer allows full access, this barn is still being used.

                             When I see relics of farms now gone,  I think of some of my dear friends who would love an old shed or barn in which to set up an art studio or raise donkeys or goats. These buildings have been unused for many years now, but they belong ever more deeply to where there are, just as they are.

                     
                                              Was this once a  Home Sweet Home ?

     
                                              A long shot from high up on Coleman Valley...

                       and a close shot at the beauty at my feet...  Blue Eyed Grass
                                                       

                                               Almost time to head back to the barn...

                 
                                            traveling east again now through the lovely hills.

As I  suspected the heat of this last day of April opened many of the roses in my gardens.

    At this rate, What might  May bring?

~Shared with thoughts of friends in climes not quite yet warmed up~
with best wishes,  Jeannette

               

Spring Garden Trail of Blooms mid April

 Creating this  trail of posts on early spring blooms which grace us for such brief time,  I have had to look up the spelling of more than one flower.

Tuesday, April 15th, the Delphinium was  just about to open.

  I learned that it's named  from the Greek word for dolphin
and my Delphinium being still in the bud, I was able to see why this is so.

By the 18th of  April,    

 the little dolphins were already transformed.

The Cecil Brunner is climbing onto the new gazebo 

where its small pink roses burst open this week as well.

                                                   This showy volunteer bloomed when I wasn't looking.  Digitalis purpurea  or foxglove is not  native to California and is considered a wild land invasive.  They grow readily from the seeds they cast and bloom their second year.  If  left to their own devices, they can, in the right conditions, crowd out native flora.  I've left  a few of those I found in my garden, but have curtailed them against a wall.  The bees like them, they fly right into the spotted chambers. A prescription heart medicine is made from a chemical removed from the plant.  Be aware, if you have animals or children, that every part of the plant is poisonous.  

On a rotting stump amidst a variety of more green and growing volunteers, 

this mushroom shone like gold in the morning sun. There are many treasures in life that I don't know near enough about and fungi are one of them. I learned a little about mushrooms in the last few years and  know enough to approach each one with wonder and let them be for the various kinds of good they can do.

More rain would of course be appreciated here in "Zone 14,  Northern California inland with some ocean influence" as it would across the rest of the state.   As the days continue to warm and the spring flowers pass one by one, I know I'll want to visit the ocean blue and feel its cooling influence more directly, but for now the weather is warm and gentle and much appreciated. 

April In The Redwood Empire Early Flowerings Continue

                                           Posting  photos and sprinkling a few descriptions  down the page reminds me of those packet postcards  that unfold like an accordion.    This one is for you.

Sun starts showing up sometime after 6 am these days.  This was about 6:30  Monday morning.

Phoebe wasn't ready to get up yet.

We  met brother Steve at the Point Reyes Station House for breakfast.

 Poppies are in out in abundance in the coastal range and the green hills in the morning light  are a feast for the eyes.  My driver  wasn't stopping for pictures and I couldn't have done the views justice.  Spring has come fast and will likely leave us just as quickly.  I hope there are beautiful vistas greening up in your neighborhood  too.

Back at home not everything is green...check out these new rose thorns!

  

And the iris are bursting open!

The old shed next door is crushed with roses and vines.  The new neighbors will be taking it all down and out eventually but in the meantime I am enjoying its wild abandon.  It is part of my northwest view from the deck and it reminds me of cabins and shed in the valley where I grew up.  My brothers and friends and I had names for all the derelict buildings and stories often sprang from our  fertile  imaginations if not our explorations.

Remember if you click on these photos they will load larger and then use your back arrow to return to the blog.

Grape vines leafing ...we were up in the 80's this week but its cooling down the next few days.

I could have started tomato seedlings, but I haven't  so how could I resist the display at the grocery? I bought  a nice ready to plant specimen called a Brown Sugar Heirloom and maybe if I get it in the ground today I really will have medium sized tomatoes in 75 days.

It will go in a gopher basket of course...

So there it is...you got an accordion  postcard from  the 

with best wishes from,

Jeannette

It's April...Projects Spring Forth and the Blooming Continues

    When a concrete mixer and a pumper truck show up an hour early it gets your attention. Fortunately, Mark knows to be ready sooner than you think you'll need to be and so he was prepared for them.


And that has been an underlying theme for me of late, "being ready."  The various transitions in my life present an opportunity, the freedom of making new choices.  While it  would be easy, on some levels, to reconstitute the work and other situations I had in place before the seven year work jaunt we did in a different locale and while there is the risk of stalling and stagnation, I want to be careful what I engender.    

I find the garden, down on my knees or when it is a bit too wet, on my haunches, a good place to ponder.    

When the trucks and men showed up, I retreated to the back of the garden under the sprays of Bridal Wreath Spirea.

These bushes remind me, I was perhaps 6 years old, of an unsupervised  learning by doing experience I had.  My family's home had a long hedge of Bridal Wreath along the driveway. These bushes can send out rather unruly shoots and  I thought  I could shape them up a bit.  I  began cutting and trimming and stepping back to view my work the way I had seen others do, but  every cut I made created a new problem. I didn't understand the structure of the bush and didn't anticipate what would be revealed as I cut away. By the time I was discovered devotedly trying to fix my mistakes, one of bushes in the middle of the row  was "pruned" just about down to the nubs. 

Poor shrub, it was a  long time in coming back to the size and majesty of its  neighbors.  My father made some incremental adjustments to the blooms on either side to blend in my handiwork as much as possible. 

While  I have learned quite a bit since then, about plants and pruning, they still seem to be always teaching me about love and life. There is much to learn in the garden...  analogies, metaphors, cautions and encouragements...they all seem so  available and I need them for every other realm of life.

I let these do pretty much what they want...

This little bush is Breath of Heaven, I have to be careful pruning it too.

Brushing against it release a gentle fragrance.

I let the poppies decide where and how to grow as well.  If they pop up in the middle of a path or snuggle around the kale, I just can't get myself to pull them.  It is against the law to pick the state flower out in the wild, so why not in my garden?  

                                        
These blooming onions have some young poppies to tangle with and they should get along fine.  I don't want to disturb either one of them until it's time to thin or harvest.

                                     It's hard to sit for more than a minute this time of year...the weeds are lush and launching seeds and the cycles of sun and rain are what every little green plant has been waiting for. My intention is often to get the garden pulled together, after all I do need to get on to other things, but the weeds are laughing at me and asking, "Who are you trying to kid?"

The concrete truck can't keep any of the load...so Mark made a skirt for the back side of a shed to use  any "extra."  You don't want extra but it is often inevitable because you really don't want to run short on your project.  His calculations of the slab he needed were pretty close and so our prepared "extra" place didn't receive anymore than 2 hops of a hop scotch. Now we wish there had been a little more extra. But it's a  project for another day, an old fashioned project. No big pumper truck will come, he'll mix up the bags in the wheelbarrow and shovel it out.  

As I was saying, I'm trying to pick up on these lessons to pay attention, be ready in advance and be careful of what I engender.  I see that one project does seem to beget another.  

It's April...no joke!

More March Flowers In Northern California and a Little Rain!

 Happily, these last days of March have brought us some rain in the Redwood Empire. I watched these clouds float over the neighbors' trees and off to the east after one of our showers and was sorry to see them go, but we've had more rain since then and the ground is soaking it up.

This is a young New Zealand Tea Tree that I planted in the front  garden a few months ago.  Its blooms  are smaller than a dime.

 My next door neighbor of many years moved back to Montana while we were living down in  Carmel. She left a row of Iris on the edge of the street in front of her house. Here are two of her  blooms. 

My iris  haven't quite opened...but soon.

                                         

                                           

 Some of the  neighborhood oak trees reminded me that not just brightly colored soft petals are beautiful...and I agreed.

California Wild Lilac ...Ceanothus 

Yellow Lady Banks Rose

This is thornless and will climb a tree, drape a roof or trimmed up, behave itself and simply grace the neighbor's white picket fence.

               The yellow glow beyond the field of green is wild mustard which is blooming all over the county.

                         
                                            Some of the trees are just beginning to leaf...

See how the tiny, but oh so many, mustard flowers glow from afar?

Purple  Vetch  of which there are many varieties.

A sampling of Sonoma County March flowers wouldn't be complete, especially in west county, without some apple blossoms.

                               On an unpaved alley in town, backed into a tangle of last year's black berries and vines of green ivy, sits this rusty truck.  I had just tucked my camera back into my pocket and almost didn't see old Tom napping.  He, like the bark of the oak trees, reminded me that beauty isn't all about the first blush of blooming.  And I agreed, but I sure am enjoying the flowers that have popped out this March.

                Some bulbs I brought home from Carmel have finally made their name known to me and are multiplying and blooming in a pot on my deck. They are Wand Flowers ( and yes there are other flowers also called this..hence my confusion...) botanical name Sparaxis.  I can see them from the kitchen table and they look so bright on the grey rainy days we have so badly needed.

So...spring is coming...it gets to some corners sooner than others, 

but I suspect it can't be too far away for any of the continent now.

After all, a few more days and it will be April.

Happy springtime.

Jeannette