I love the look of snow on branches. These two pigeons are a mated pair; they’ve been hanging about in our garden for about 4 years now.
A pair of pigeons
Below, the giant Fraxis growing in a pot. It will reach 12 feet tall one day.
A pop of colorFront Porch protective Cairn, buried under the snow
Of all the plantings in my garden, the hedges are one of my favorites. I feel like they’re one of my greatest successes, planted as 1/8″ diameter 18″ high twigs in 2007.
I love the hedges, all seasons!
A magical winter wonderland
Blue spruce, north sideA nice 3″ of snow
The wind blew so fierce and cold, at about -10 degrees, that the snow formed into icicles, and froze in place in the direction of the wind in that particular part of the garden.
I began this project in March of 2016. (see post in this blog) I got inspired by a facebook post of a garden sculpture made of willow branches, and immediately enrolled my good husband and my good friends D and Bear into helping me create her.
Willow Woman sculpture, completed summer 2018.
After running out of branches in 2016, I once again harvest the dead branches and trimmed back some more branches from my willows and hauled them out back to dry. I also got my large garden cart and went out back to the reservoir and cut down willows around the pond (leaving plenty behind for the local wildlife).
Waiting for things to dry . . . .
2017 I added another 2′ in height to the Willow woman’s skirt, and then started the whole process of finding, cutting and drying willow branches again.
2018 – Completion! I have finally harvested enough willow branches from the pond and from my own willow stands to finish the willow woman. Thank the Gods! Because I am SO over this project. For 2 years, it looked like a giant pile of brush, the piles got int he way of other yard projects and in the way of mowing, and Brian was complaining about them, and . . .
But I think she turned out lovely. I gave her a heart of pink rose quartz, a magic ball to scry into (it lights up at night), and a beautiful 30″ cast iron cauldron, which was given to me and my husband by his Aunt Judy from Missouri. She stands about 7′ high in the front and 5′ high in the back.
Willow Woman closeupWillow Woman, with her scrying ball and cauldronWillow Woman, from the back.
apricot puntia, screams with color!Giant aliums are the first burst color in the south Willow GardenSpring is so glorious and messy, all at the same time. Everything is bursting from the ground at the same time, including the weeds.My Mom made these for me. (She’s very skilled at ceramics.) I love them soo much.This area was all grass. Hard to mow. I had the grass dug out and new top soil tilled into the clay. The clay is really heavy right here for some reason. So far, I have added iris and several other plants that I divided from other places in the garden: goldenrod, Jupiter’s beard, red day lily, sedum, salvia, shasta daisy, Turkish yellow poppy, and echinacea.
the story pole looks much happier with some color around it.This year I decided to plant the vege garden with annuals instead of vegetables. I canned so much food last year, and worked soo hard in this garden, I decided to just do something beautiful and less labor intensive with the space this year.the tulips brighten up this corner of the garden. After the tulips, the purple alium will come up, and then after that the tiger lililes. This little triangle looks spectacular for 6 solid months. Finally! A plan comes together. Where’s my cigar?I just love how these orange and purple tulips look under the Linden tree.In the background, the fruit trees are blooming. They missed the late spring frost. There WILL be fruit this year!
Looking south, from the gravel walkway, just off the back porch, this is the low water garden. I have cacti, red stone crop, Turkish horned poppy (which is done blooming in this picture, but has a riotous yellow flower), orange oriental poppy, echinacea (which isn’t doing so well), sunset hyssop, white sage, some self- seeded milkweed, red hot poker, and a hairy leaf white sage. The sumacs in the background provide a lot of privacy, and beautiful fall color.
Smart monkey
This little monkey (all 150 pounds of him) loves his little larch tree. But the 6′ x 6′ marshmallow is hogging space. I will need to dig out the marshmallow, harvest the roots, divide and replant next year. I purchased this little monkey sitting on a pile of books, looking very contemplative – – – in Salt Lake when I went to visit my Mom in the spring. As I was having him wheel-barrowed to the checkout, I spied this little larch tree. The two just seemed to go together. And sure enough, the monkey loves the larch tree. I was worried that it wouldn’t be hardy enough, but it pulled through the winter just fine.
North rock berm, viewed from the front porchThe north rock berm is finally filling out. It looked so silly when it was first planted. It really just looked like a pile of rock with a few pathetic little shrubs on it. These dwarf evergreen shrubs are pretty expensive, so I bought them small, like 12″ tall and wide. Time. It’s about time.
Elephants in the meadow
I purchased two baby elephant sculptures from Sante Fe Pottery on south Sante Fe Blvd. They are made of old sheet metal and have a nice rusty patina. They stand about 24″ tall and long. They really look like they belong in the wild flower meadow, it’s a Colorado take on the African Savanah. Their Mother is also available, but i don’t think I can afford her.
Mad Hatter’s patioI picked up this old wooden table and chairs from a friend who no longer wanted them. Repainted them in a baby blue (which isn’t a color I usually go with, but I thought it made a nice contrast), and the chairs in green and purple, to match the house trim. My gardener extraordinaire, Jester, helped me create the patio using 4 different colors of slate which I purchased from Bedrock Materials in Brighton www.bedrocklandscapingmaterial.com/, and edged with red sandstone which I got for free from a friends garden. I’ll be adding some additional whimsical touches as time goes on.
Last fall I decided to add some bulbs to the Dragon Garden. I planted about 150 bulbs in each of the four elemental dragon beds. After the big pampas grass gets cut back in the early spring, nothing is growing out back, and the Dragons look so stark. Each bed has a different variety of short, early blooming bulbs like snow drops or winter aconite. Then the hyacinth should come up next, followed by daffodils, tulips and lastly the Asiatic lilies. I tried to color coordinate the bulbs with the elemental representation of each dragon. Air should be white and yellows. Fire, yellow, orange and reds. Water, white, blues and lavenders. And Earth, a mix of color.
I planted bulbs that would bloom early spring through mid summer. The mid summer lilies did not come up well, maybe they need another year in the ground, we’ll see.
As fate would have it, some of the bulbs I ordered did not look like their picture, or maybe they were mislabeled. Of course, I’m not going to dig them out and send them back – I think the bulb companies are banking on that.
Water Dragon
I used a different on-line company than I have used before, because Breck’s didn’t have all the colors I wanted. Never the less, I think they turned out beautiful.
My Mother LOVES to do ceramics. (All of the above are from Mom’s garden.) she has run out of room to put ceramics in her garden so she is “helping” me decorate mine.
I have ceramic ducks, a turtle, mushrooms and now, I have a fairy garden. I’ve finally had to ask her to check with me first before making me any more ceramics for my garden, or my house for that matter. I am not going to be an outlet for supporting her addiction! (She has run out of room to put more ceramics in her own yard – seriously, it’s scary. My Mom is “that crazy ceramics lady.”
My fairy garden – courtesy my dear Mother
But these little fairy houses are really cute, and they look nice under the willow shrubs in the south/east fountain garden. I have them tucked just beneath the overhang of the willows. Fairies like their privacy you know.
March 12, 2016: Someone posted a beautiful picture of a willow branch sculpture on facebook. I immediately put it into my file cabinet for future must do projects. I saved all the willow branches from last falls pruning and had a ginormous pile behind the storage fence just waiting to start this project.
It’s spring! Time to build the willow woman! My good friends D and Bear were all too happy to help. They love artsy projects, especially D (she’s an artist). Brian and I went outside early and laid out the weed barrier (because I’ll be damned if I end up pulling weeds out of my willow woman’s skirt!) Then we anchored in the basic frame for the structure.
Brian wielding his big hammer
We used tree stakes and rebar to build the shape of what will be her skirt and shoulders. The rear stake will anchor the rear branches so they don’t blow around in the wind.
D and I working on the outside of the skirt. (Bear was being camera shy, I’ll get her next time.)
D and I working on the willow woman
5:30 pm. Filling the center of the skirt. Out of branches, out of energy. Done for now.
