Week of March 7th, 2016: Trimmed all the tall grasses on the street side of the north berm, cut down the dead iris leaves and stalks (I found that it’s easier to cut iris with a pair of sharp scissors rather than the hand pruners), trimmed back the perennial wild aster, the marshmallows, shrub roses and hyssop, and oh yes – the north/west daylily bed. That took all week, a few hours a day. Can I just say: “I’m over it!”
Category: 2016
Did I say trimming?
February 28, 2016: We . . . I guess I should say who “we” is. My spiritual community – “we” use my back yard a lot for Sabbats and various community events. So I decided to organize some community “work days” to help get some of the back yard projects done. I was worried that no one would be interested in coming over and sweating in the yard with me – but lo and behold! 5 people showed up and said they would be happy to help with the spring trimming. We got the butterfly garden completely trimmed back, all the Russian sage and rabbit brush on the north berm, the 4 large pampas grasses in the dragon gardens, and all the maximilians. We had a lot of fun and the yard looks all neat and tidy. Yeah team!
Trimming, Red Twig dogwood
More shrub trimming! What? You thought I was done? You haven’t seen this yard. I’m still working on the south berm. I got all the red twig dogwood, on both sides of the berm, thinned out and removed all the dead wood.
Now when you look at the berm all you see is a blaze of red branches. You can’t get more bang for your buck than red twig dogwood. I bought them at Lowes probably 8 years ago in one gallon pots for $2.50 each. Now they’re 5-6′ wide and 3-5′ tall.
Free plants – an experiment
February 5, 2016 – Friday
Puling out the twisted willow branches that I put in the pots in front of the house. I painted them with burgundy, purple and gold glitter paint last fall, so when the eastern sun rises and hits the front of the house, the sticks sparkle in the sunshine. I think they looked pretty good, at least compared to lonely empty pots.
So as I was I was pulling the branches out, one of them wouldn’t come out. I thought it must be frozen so I pulled harder and it finally came out, along with a clump of soil around the bottom with little roots sticking out.
Surprise!
I got 5 well rooted willow shoots out of the three pots, which I then planted together in another pot so their roots will continue to strengthen. Later in the spring I’ll find a good place to use these willows. I love free plants!
UPDATE: they didn’t make it. 🙁
The spark is lit.
February 9, 2016 Wednesday
At Imbolc we kindled the spark deep within us, to awaken our dormant potential. What is it that we want to manifest in 2016? What is it that we want to grow in our lives? These are the questions of Imbolc. Last week the Mother was sleeping beneath 10″ of snow. Yesterday and today the temperatures have been in the high fifties, the snow is almost completely gone. As I started working on the spring pruning, I can see signs of spring. The daffodils are pushing up around the red maples, so are the grape hyacinths (although the rabbits have eaten off all the tops). The Mother’s awake! Spring is on the way.
I started pruning on the south berm because the snow is melted the most there, and the ground is only a little spongy. So far I’ve finished the rabbit brush, the purple smoke bush and the street-facing red twig dogwoods. The Dogwood and the smoke bush branches will go into the shredder, but the rabbit brush goes to the trash. The garbage man is going to love this pile! I was covered head to foot yesterday in rabbit brush fuzz.
My back hurts and my forearms hurt from all the pruning. Already. I had to get the big lopper out. It saves my hands and arms but it takes longer. This year I’ve got to behave myself or I’ll be done gardening by April. Mom is right. She lectures me every time we talk. “You can’t charge around the yard, digging holes, pulling hoses and dragging around heavy pots like you used to do.” Yes, yes I know. But it’s Imbolc, the spark has been lit! The Mother calls . . .
The list of all the things that need to get done is dancing around in front of me;
all my ideas for this year’s gardening projects are spinning in my head.
But it’s a small flame, like a flickering candle flame. And I need to remember to manage the fire in my heart, because that fire roars! But the fire in my body is dimming, except for the fire in my joints. So this year’s theme will be patience, moderation and maintenance. I’m trying to get excited about that. Time to slather on some “medicinal salve” and go to bed.
Holiday Lights
I’ve really been enjoying my free time! Getting lots of other things done around the house. This morning we had a very successful rehearsal for our upcoming Imbolc Ritual. We will be honoring the return of light, the growing and continually rising cycle of the Sun, we will ignite the spark of our creative passions as we look to the future with hope and joy. Sparks, ignition, time to think about projects to come.
Time to get the lights off the trees and shrubs so I can start the winter pruning! So I poked my head outside to see how cold it was. Not too bad, in the 40’s, a lot of the snow has melted and the pathways are passable. No excuses available. I’ll start with the south berm trees and shrubs first, because the south berm has the least amount of snow on it. Two tubs of lights, and one tub for the electrical cords and timers, done. All the tubs are numbered and labeled and they go into storage in the opposite order that they will come out next year when we repeat this holiday light ritual all over again. It’ll take me the rest of next week to get all the lights down.
The fresh crisp air really uplifts my spirits, and all that slogging around in the snow has me peeling layers in fifteen minutes. There’s one little daffodil top poking out, everyone else is still asleep. The birds have wiped out the seed in the feeder again and the bird bath fell over. I can see the rabbits have munched the grape hyacinth and early species tulip tops completely down to the ground again this year. Bastards!
But the Mother always works towards balance. On the way back to the garage with the first full tub of lights – – – bunny parts on the path. Yea! Poor little dead bunny foo foo. Bwhaaaaaahahahahaha.
First official post! January 15, 2016 Friday
I wanted to start this Blog on November 1st, the Witches New Year. Actually, I did – I wrote a bunch of stuff, everyday, in my own computer, just to figure out if I had the stamina. But I couldn’t figure out how to do this blog thing, got roped into a $200 set-up fee, which I had to back out of and got to feel stupid about. So I finally had to hire someone to help me figure it out, and she is awesome and it was WAY inexpensive. So here is my first entry into Wellyssas’s Womb. (Yes, I do know things generally come out of wombs.) So you missed all of November and December, all of my yummy, self-aggrandizing posts of holiday lights, snow fall on this plant and that one . . . yawn. So I’m finally on-line, and hopefully it won’t be a complete bore and waste of time. We shall see.
So today is Friday, it’s been around 50 degrees for the past 2 days, so all the snow is beginning to melt. People are all excited about that, going on and on about summer. What are they yakking about?!? Really?. It’s barely winter.
The trees are still resting, the flowers and still sleeping and thickening their roots, the bulbs are sleeping too, except for maybe the early snow drops and crocus – they might be thinking about a little stretch, maybe. Has everyone forgot about what happened last year? We had -10 at the beginning of January and 75 at the end of the month. The trees pulled up their sap thinking the winter is over, it’s time to wake up, get ready to push out buds, and then blammy! -14 the next week. I lost 3 crab apples and 4 fruit trees, 2 apples, an Italian plum, and a baby peach. And my two dwarf cherries don’t look so good. Devastating. So yes! Let’s all pray for unnaturally warm weather so all the pretty trees can wake up and then get slaughtered when the temperature drops below freezing again, like it’s supposed to do. Woo hoo! No. Shut up. Get over it. It’s winter, and it needs to stay winter for a few more months.
Why can we not enjoy some down time? Are we gardeners completely insane? Don’t you remember being flat on your back with every muscle aching from trying to keep up with the garden last summer when it was so unusually wet? It was like gardening in Florida. EVERYTHING grew, including the weeds. I’ve never had to weed as much as I did last year.
I still have tennis (er uh gardeners) elbow and the beetles on the vege garden – OMG – it was an invasion. So No. Let it snow, and keep on snowing for another couple of months. I’m not ready. It’s the dark time of the year. Time to rest, regenerate, put our roots down, contemplate – but not too hard! I’m enjoying looking outside and knowing that there’s absolutely nothing I can, or should be doing out there right now.