The week of Valentine’s Day makes me think of my garden and springtime.
While not traditional Valentines Day flowers – like Red Roses, I always think of Bleeding Hearts in mid February. They look like what might happen after Cupid shoots its arrow.
This image is from my garden in May 2018. I’m always on a quest to find quotes to match my garden photography – this one seems right. If you have another hearts and flowers quote that you love, please share it via a comment.
Happy Valentines Day!
Gardeners can relate to the euphoria felt when finding seed and gardening catalogs while sifting through a pile of mail – usually holiday bills – as the darkness of winter sets in. The delivery of these catalogs in late December and early January bring excitement akin to the of the arrival of the old-time Sears Wish Book when we were children.
I have several gardening and seed catalogs in the rooms across my house right now, but there are three I keep returning to as I dream about my 2019 garden. In fact, I’ve just set a date to go through these catalogs with my friend Jane later this week. Together, we will make final decisions on what to order and then share the costs and, of course, the work as we look toward spring.
Jane is one of my BFF’s when it comes to gardening (and in everyday life in general, too!) I love it that she is very methodical when it comes to starting her plants from seed. She did this for the first time last year and her results were fantastic, with a variety of eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, and herbs – that she generously shared with me. Jane in the only person I know who has even successfully started rosemary and parsley from seed.
I used to be obsessed with starting my seeds in late winter/early spring. I had all of the shelving and other supplies like grow lights and warming mats. For a gardener, there’s nothing more motivating than the fragrance of soil wafting through the air while starting seeds when there’s still snow on the ground. Our effort of starting seeds indoors was quite successful and we’d end up with hundreds of seedlings – way too many for our small garden, so there were always plenty of unique plants to share with friends across the region.
Over time, the cost and commitment for the small amount of plants I could actually plant in our garden forced the decision to stop this late winter ritual. Now that I have a friend who is eager to start her seeds (she has much more space for a vegetable garden than I do), I’m looking forward to again, digging in to this favorite activity in 2019. I’ll share our progress as we move toward spring.
Meanwhile, an unexpected gift arrived at my doorstep last week – and it ended up being my first batch of seeds for 2019. My friend Maria and her daughter Sophia send me “Garden BonBons”.
I wish I had known about these ‘seed bombs’ when I wrote about great garden gifts for the holidays in late 2018.
Well, with Valentine’s Day right around the corner, these ‘Garden BonBons’ created by Moultonology are beautifully packaged just like fancy, high-end chocolates. But, they are not candy to eat, they are candy (seed bombs) to plant in the garden.
While I haven’t planted these yet (the ground is frozen in New Hampshire until May), I still love the idea and creativity they represent. One box is a mix of seeds for garnishing cocktails. The other is to attract bees and butterflies. I’m already planning document how they grow in a story later in 2019 – so keep an eye out for that update this summer.
As you may have been noticing, the days are getting a little longer now. (In New Hampshire, we can see a little daylight at 5pm!) Are you now inspired to take the step to turn the dreams of your 2019 garden into reality? What are some of your favorite seed and plant sources? And what seeds will you be starting this year? Do you go with the tried and true, or are you an experimenter? I’d love for you to share your thoughts with a comment.
“All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.”
Proverb
With the holiday season upon us, sometimes it’s hard to shop for your favorite gardener who can’t (or just simply won’t) articulate what they have on their secret wish list. And, even when you search online for ideas, the majority of suggested gifts for gardeners are compilations of things that retailers think every gardener will love – based on their need to move inventory.
Look no further, I’ve created a list of nine proven and tested gardening focused gifts – based on my own personal experience as a longtime gardener – to ensure you get at an ‘oooh’ and maybe even an ‘aaah’ when you choose some of them for your favorite gardener – or maybe even yourself.
“A shovel?” you ask. Let me tell you from my personal experience – Absolutely YES! This is by far my all-time favorite gardening tool – EVER. I came across it a few years ago at the Boston Flower & Garden Show. Not your average shovel or spade, the Spear Head Spade claims it was “designed to make your toughest digging 80% easier.” That’s a pretty big promise – and I can attest that it’s absolutely true. This ‘Made in the USA’ tool is light-weight but has a very sturdy construction – the handle and blade never bends, like so many other shovels and spades.
My Spear Head Spade was put to the test this fall in my own garden. Over 25 years ago, about a dozen Japanese Barberry bushes were planted along the perimeter of my front yard, inside the fence. They are beautiful shrubs and their prickly nature tends to keep deer out of the garden. However, now that this shrub is prohibited from being sold since being classified as an invasive species, this summer we decided to remove them all. A dreaded garden chore.
I’ve had my Spear Head Spade for about five years now, and always found it helpful when digging in my root-bound garden, but kept putting off the chore of removing these shrubs. To my surprise, this spade significantly reduced the challenge of this feared gardening project. The sharp edges glided into the soil like a hot knife through butter. Had it not been for a few tap roots that were up to six inches in diameter and needed to be released with a saw, the shrubs would have lifted right out of the ground with just this spade in a matter of minutes.
While it may be difficult to gift wrap, you can be confident that this present for your favorite gardener will be treasured and they’ll thank you for years to come. Heck, you should even pick one up for yourself. Even if you’re not an avid gardener, this will probably be the last spade or shovel you’ll ever need to buy.
Here’s the other tool I’ve included on my list – and it’s something I’ve already been highly recommending to my own friends for the past year. While some people find the act of weeding to be therapeutic (my mom is one of those people), I find it to be one of the most boring of all gardening chores.
The challenge with weeding is that once you let that task fall by the wayside, you’re in trouble and it takes even longer to rectify your situation. Shortly after writing my Weeding Thyme story in 2017, I received a package from the CobraHead company asking me to try their new ‘mini’ tool (I’m a member of the Garden Writers Association and love when gardening focused companies share their product information with me – receiving the actual CobraHead Mini tool to try first-hand was an added bonus!)
I’d always seen the CobraHead in catalogs but never felt compelled to purchase one. Based on my experience with this tool, that was definitely a mistake. I received mine right after I’d already caught up on my biggest weeding project of the year, so it wasn’t until this spring that I was able put the CobraHead Mini to the test. I absolutely LOVE it and have other friends who have purchased their own who, like me, wish they’d had this tool sooner.
Like the Spear Head Spade, the CobraHead weeder is ‘Made in the USA’ and is extremely durable. It keeps its shape, no bending or breaking, even in the toughest of soil conditions. It’s sharp and has cut my weeding time by more than half. This gift is easier to wrap and will fit nicely into your favorite gardener’s stocking.
This product is made in New Hampshire by a very cool company called Talk it Up Tees. I live in the Granite State, and love that it’s from a local company. But, I especially appreciate this shirt because it communicates everything I love about gardening.
Honestly, it’s too nice to wear while working up a sweat in the garden, but I love putting it on at the end of the day when I relax to enjoy the results of my efforts. My friend Jane gave this shirt to my mom and me last summer – she found them at a lovely little shop down the street called Amelia Rose Florist. As a recipient of this gift, I think of Jane whenever I put it on. And I love that it’s a V-neck design, offers a woman fit and is very soft cotton knit.
After the holiday season, as the darkness of winter finally settles in, every gardener looks forward to longer days and the first flowers of spring. While providing longer days are out of your control, you can treat your favorite gardener to an early preview of spring flowers with tickets to this year’s Boston Flower & Garden Show, taking place March 13-17, 2019.
The show features life-sized gardens that are a delight to see just before the calendar transitions to spring. The event also offers an array of lectures and seminars – as well as a gigantic marketplace. (I actually discovered and purchased the Spear Head Spade at this show in 2014.)
According to the show’s website, “This year’s show theme is “The Beauty of Balance” which is a key factor in design decisions, plant and material choices, and in cultivating the right-size garden for our lives and budgets. We explore the harmony we create within our gardens, vases and living spaces.”
While I try to attend the show every few years, I last blogged about the Boston Flower and Garden Show in March 2014 after attending following a very long hiatus. I look forward to attending and writing about it again in 2019.
If Boston is out of your travel zone, search your area for regional flower and garden shows. Most offer tickets in advance and it’s a wonderful, thoughtful gift. Here’s a list of events across the United States. Another option is to tie your visit to a flower and garden show to a travel excursion. I know that one of my bucket list shows is to attend the Chelsea Flower Show in London some day. If you have some frequent flier miles to use up soon, that event takes place in 2019 in late May.
Alfred Austin said, “The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul.” This is so true.
But with your hands (and often feet, too!) in the dirt, a good nail brush is a gardener’s best friend. Seriously, this little self-care item is often overlooked until it’s really needed.
For years, I’d been using small plastic brushes in the shower for my hands and feet after a day of heavy gardening, but love this German-made beechwood brush with natural bristles, recently purchased from Vermont Country Store. It’s another one of those items that a gardener may not splurge on for themselves, but it’s a gift that will be appreciated – especially in the early spring after those first few days of venturing out to finally stick those hands deep into the dirt again after a long, cold winter.
After a scrub down with the Gardener’s Nail Brush from the Vermont Country Store, I treat my overworked hands to Crabtree & Evelyn’s Gardeners Hand Recovery. I first tried another scent of the Hand Recovery almost 20 years ago, thinking it was a lotion. It’s not – it’s a exfoliator and moisturizer filled with shea butter and macadamia nut oils. During gardening season, use this product a few times a week on clean dry hands. After a thorough scrubbing, you simply wash the product off your hands for what seems like a miracle result. Almost better than a professional hand treatment at a spa. (I sometimes use it on my feet, too!)
The scent of this product is clean and fresh, so it’s perfect for both women and men. Even better, it’s created without mineral oil, parabens, or lauryl sulfates. Treat your gardening friends to the gift of hand recovery – it’s easy to wrap or slip into a stocking – and you can make it an even more thoughtful gift by adding a nail brush to go with it.
This is my favorite luxury gift for gardeners. There are several sets of these bells of varying sizes across my garden. The 65″ black bells hang from a tree in the back garden. My mother refers to them as the church bells (the garden is our church). There’s nothing more calming than the soothing sounds of these chimes. Sometimes it’s just a simple plink here and there. On more windy days, the sounds are symphonic.
Don’t settle for just any chime – a little investment in the quality of QMT Windchimes‘ Corinthian Bells – made in Vermont is worth every penny. If you’re not shopping for the holidays, keep this gift in mind for house warming gifts.
If you’ve read my previous posts, you already know that I write a lot about dirt (actually soil). After all, what’s a garden without good soil? I’ve shared my ‘dirt’ experiments where Coast of Maine Organic Products was the undisputed winner. And this past summer, I wrote about this company’s products when they supported a Science Cafe event we put together in Nashua on the Science of Gardening. (I am just a happy customer/fan, and don’t work for the company, so my recommendation here is straight from the heart!)
While bags of soil are difficult to wrap as a gift, you can find a local retailer for this product line to ensure that your favorite gardener is ready to start digging come springtime. They have an excellent seed starter mix, and I swear by two other specific products: 1) the Quoddy Lobster Compost (we dressed all of our beds with this blend this past fall to prepare our garden for 2019.) 2. Stonington Blend (I use this for my herbs and lettuce containers and have had constant success throughout the season.) Their fertilizers are excellent too. Visit my friends at the Nashua Farmer’s Exchange to either pick up a gift certificate for spring time purchases – or go all out and gift wrap your dirt – I dare you!
What’s a garden without seeds? The challenge is to find seeds that match the skill and needs of your gardening recipient. Some seeds, like parsley and rosemary take a long time to get established, which can frustrate a beginning gardener. For gift giving, go that extra step and give seeds that make an impact – and offer something really unique.
I discovered the Hudson Valley Seed Company at the Boston Flower & Garden Show in 2014. (I’m seeing a theme through this story that the Boston show has introduced me to a lot of my favorite gardening products and solutions.) And in 2016 was given an interesting variety of these seeds as a Birthday gift.
Recently, I was thrilled to find them at a great little shop in Merrimack, NH – Barn in Bloom. I picked up some varieties of basil seeds last spring. These seeds are packaged as gorgeous works of art. That to me, is a gift within a gift. Better yet, they have seed selections you won’t find at your typical garden center or big box store. Check out the new releases for 2019 from the Hudson Valley Seed Company – and impress your art loving gardening gift recipients. (I’ll admit, I save the packages from the seeds I receive, as well as buy, and hang them in my gardening shed simply to keep the beautiful artwork.)
So there you go, nine creative, but practical gifts for your favorite gardeners. While this list may not be as popular as the annual release of Oprah’s favorite gifts, I can assure you that any of these gift ideas will be appreciated by gardeners at any level.
I’d love to know about your favorite all-time gardening gifts. Share your thoughts with a comment.
It snowed again in southern New Hampshire over the weekend – about five inches of slushy, heavy snow. The wintry early April day brought a flock of seven Cedar Waxwings to the garden. When they weren’t stripping the few remaining red berries from the holly shrubs, they were huddled in the Weeping Cherry tree.
Today, it’s sunny and 60 degrees (F) at 4pm. The longer days of sunshine are quickly melting the latest – and hopefully last – blanket of snow.
While most of the paths in the garden are still white and slippery, a swath of purple blooms caught my eye when I stepped onto my my front porch to get the mail.
Spring has arrived! The crocus are blooming — just as expected in early April.
I grabbed my camera and walked through the areas of the garden where sun melted the snow from the stone paths. (The ground in these few areas is very soft, almost muddy, so I didn’t venture far.)
It’s always a thrill to find the crocus in bloom. While expected, it always feels like the first flowers are a miracle.
The garden still has a brown dormant winter appearance – from the decaying leaves, pine needles, and sticks that will eventually be picked up either by the birds building their spring nests or during the initial hours of our annual spring cleanup gardening day.
No matter how sleepy the garden appears under the latest blanket of snow, Mother Nature does a spectacular job of waking the flowers that typically appear in late March thru early April. This includes the crocus and scilla. As soon as the purple crocus start to wind down, the bright scilla open to full bloom to bring new life and spectacular streaks of blue to line the garden paths. I don’t even need a calendar to know when Easter is just two weeks away. Seeing these two spring flowers in bloom is always the first indication that the Easter Bunny is expected very soon. (And that it’s time to pick up the ingredients to make the traditional Pickled Beet Eggs for the pending holiday.)
While walking through the garden this afternoon, my soul filled with gratitude. Not just the sights of pops of bright color hear and there, but with the sounds of the songbirds who are out, searching for their spring mates.
I felt caught between two seasons – winter because of the snow cover. And, spring with with the early blooming bulbs. I’d once read a quote about crocus that included the word Grace. That seems like the perfect way to end today’s story.
My Early Gardening Influences
Long before HGTV, the only Gardening program I remember on television was ‘The Victory Garden’ on PBS.
I learned so much in the 1990s from one of the show’s early hosts, Roger Swain. I always trusted his insight about growing vegetable gardens in New England. I also learned just as much from ‘Chef Marian’ (Morash), who shared recipes and tips on how to prepare and cook the vegetables featured during each program.

For over 20 years, Marian Morash’s ‘The Victory Garden Cookbook’ has been my ‘go-to’ guide for various ways to prepare fresh vegetables. It’s one of my all-time favorite cookbooks, originally published by Alfred A Knopf, Inc in 1982 and retailed for $39.95. It’s truly endured the test of time and continues to be worth the initial investment. (By the way, this book was republished in 2010 by Knopf Publishing and can be ordered for $37.95 from my friend Dan’s indie bookstore – Water Street Books – in Exeter, NH. Tell Dan I sent you!)
I also feel the need to mention other gardening influences – since I know my mom is a regular reader of this blog. She and my grandfather will always be noted as my earliest gardening mentors. It was always amazing to me that Mom had as much – if not more – knowledge as Roger Swain — she just didn’t have a TV show to validate her expertise 25+ years ago. Today, she is THE ‘go-to’ woman among our networks of friends to identify just about any plant or flower native to New England – as well as southern Florida. I’ve learned a lot from her, but still need to refer to guides to confirm some plant name suspicions.
Fast Forward to 2017
With a well-established garden, I still read magazines and books, as well as attend events like the annual Boston Flower Show, for new ideas and insight on gardening trends. Two topics have been of special interest to me over the past few years:
1) Saving seeds from year to year; and
2) Dealing with an invasion of weeds, without resorting to the use of harmful herbicides.
It was though the Nashua Public Library knew of my two special focus areas. In early January, I was delighted to read about an upcoming seminar about ‘Seeds and Weeds’ FEATURING Roger Swain! I didn’t think twice about signing up and requested two spaces, so I could bring Mom, too.
Nearly 100 Nashua area gardeners schlepped to the Nashua Public Library on a very cold February night for the free seminar. Honestly, it was such a treat to be out, talking with other like-minded people about the hope of spring and gardening in the middle of winter. The timing was perfect since by February 16 we were just starting to notice the days were growing noticeably longer — darkness had started to set in around 5:30pm instead of 4:30pm,
We arrived at the Library and Swain was already at the front of the room chatting with early arrivals. When the clock struck 7pm, Swain removed his sweater vest to reveal his trademark red suspenders and spent the next hour telling his stories about gardening in New England – with a special emphasis on better understanding weeds and how to control them.
I brought a variety of seeds from perennials and annuals in my own garden including: Zinnias that originally started in the Community Gardens at Greeley Park in Nashua a few years ago; Jewel-toned Morning Glories; Baptisia aka: False Indigo; and Rudbeckia Maxima.
It was a relaxing (and hopeful!) process in early February to separate the seeds and create the packages with photos and information from my own garden. I even felt well-rewarded when I left the Seed Swap part of the evening’s program. I brought home seeds donated for the event by the High-Mowing Seed Company. I look forward to planting them to grow mixed greens and herbs, as well as some interesting varieties of kale starting in mid-May.
While spring arrived on the calendar yesterday, the view of the garden from my office window today (where I write this blog) is telling me Mother Nature has not yet received the ‘2017 Change of Seasons Memo’. We still have a thick, crunchy blanket of snow from last week’s Stella Blizzard – but I do see improvement as the St. Francis statue (on the bottom left) was covered with snow up to just under his chin only a few days ago. I’m so glad to have these little packages of seeds to give me hope and ‘Great Expectations’ on a just another late March day.

“It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.”
~Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
The Japanese Fantail Pussy Willow has a history of over 20 years in our garden. My mom originally received the first cuttings from a work friend who had a connection to one of the Boston Garden Clubs. She was excited to bring home five small rooted branches of this exotic plant for the garden. She even had a few to spare and shared them with a neighbor across the street. Of course, the cuttings that ventured across the street took off and grew into a beautiful tree. The ones my mother planted didn’t make it through the first season.
So the next year, she grabbed a cutting from the neighbor. This exchange took a few seasons for the plant to finally get established in the garden it was originally intended. Eventually, with pruning to remove bottom branches, my mother created a small, beautiful tree.
In late winter the weeping, twisted, burgundy colored branches of the Fantail Pussy Willow are covered with tiny, soft, shimmery silver buds, actually known as catkins. By mid-spring, the branches become covered with gold puffs (I almost wrote ‘Gold Fingers’ in keeping with this story’s title!!) of pollen. By summer it leafs out to create a unique summer /fall ornamental shrub.
Over time, new cuttings from the established Pussy Willow were shared with friends and neighbors, but unfortunately with a less than 50 percent success rate (mostly because non-gardeners wanted to try to plant them and didn’t follow the simple instructions.) The one other place where the cuttings did well was in Hampton Falls, on the New Hampshire seacoast. My friend Bobbi – a true gardener – was able to create a beautiful tree from one of the early cuttings. It eventually reached over 8 feet tall.
Everything changed in 2011 when the now infamous Halloween Nor’Easter hit New England. The heavy, wet snow decimated many of the trees and shrubs across the region – including the Pussy Willows that we worked so hard to propagate in Nashua and Hampton Falls. The weight of the snow and wind split the trees in half, all the way to the ground. (Lilacs and Bradford Pear trees were also hit hard across the area.)
Bobbi chose to simply remove the damaged tree from her Seacoast garden. In Nashua, my neighbor did some pruning and was able to keep most of the height of the tree shape he created. On the other hand, in our garden, a decision was made to cut the damage all the way back to ground level to see what would happen. (We also knew we could start all over again with a cutting from next door!)
While this Pussy Willow grows relatively fast, it took a couple of years for it to eventually fill in the back area of the garden. Since receiving the first cuttings 20 years ago, my mother always called it a ‘Weeping Pussy Willow’ (Fake Gardening News!)
We finally learned this plant’s true name at the annual Boston Flower Show in 2014 – it is a Japanese Fantail Pussy Willow. There was a vendor at the show from the midwest with thousands of cut stems, selling them for about $15/bundle. My mom and I talked to the grower and learned this Pussy Willow is meant to be a shrub and should be cut back hard every year in late winter, just at the silvery catkins start to emerge.
Even with this newfound knowledge, we never got out in time during 2014 to cut the branches back – then in 2015, during our hysterical/historical winter, the deep snow cover through late March made it a challenge to even get to that part of the garden.
Finally, all conditions were perfect in 2016! I went out on a bright late winter afternoon and cut the beautiful branches back by almost half. By the time I was finished, I was worried that I’d cut too much from what suddenly became a bare tree trunk. On the plus side, we now had a huge pile of Pussy Willows branches to use for decoration.
Yes, Pussy Willows Galore!
I used many in my own home and shared even more with friends and neighbors. They could also be enjoyed on Main Street in Downtown Nashua at Scontsas Fine Jewelry & Home Decor. My friends, Philip and Amalia are both gardeners and used many of the Pussy Willows to decorate their beautiful store, inside and out last spring. (If you visit their store, tell them I sent you – they are regular readers of this blog, too!)
Pussy Willows for a Decorative Spring Touch at Scontsas Fine Jewelry & Home Decor
The cut stems, dry and keep their silvery buds when put into dry containers. For people who want to try to grow their own Pussy Willow shrubs, a little bit of water in the container keeps the branches alive, allowing them to root and eventually transplanted. Here are examples of keeping the branches in dry containers in my home (on the left) and also being enjoyed at Liz’s home (right). Liz was highlighted in the Garden with Grace Blog a few years ago when we Gardened at the Gardner Museum in Boston.
Pussy Willows in my home
Pussy Willows in Liz’s home
As March 2017 arrived, I’ve now CAREFULLY followed a full cycle of the Japanese Fantail Pussy Willow. While it was cut back hard last year, there were still some beautiful curvy branches to cut for decoration – but not nearly the bushels we had in 2016! 
I went light on the cutting this year, so that that we can have a larger and more mature bounty in 2018. In late February, I put five branches in water (with a few branches of magnolia and flowering crabapple) to force some early spring flowers in the house. The magnolia bloomed within a week – the crabapple should open within the next few days.
The Japanese Fantail Pussy Willow is already self-rooting and will be planted back into the garden in late May.
The cycle continues.
Special Note: I’ve had this blog – with its clever title – in mind since last spring. But held off on posting because I wanted to highlight a full growing cycle of the gorgeous Japanese Fantail Pussy Willow in our garden. I planned to publish this story in late fall of 2016. Ironically and unfortunately, when I first completed this post, one word in the title was making headlines tied to the US Presidential Election – and honestly, I didn’t want to change it. As a result, I held off to rewrite the ending and finally finished and posted this story in early March 2017! (I’m sure that some Google searches will unexpectedly bring some search results to this blog since this word is still appearing in news feeds today — for those who found my story this way, thank you for reading until the end!)
The post-gardening months of November and December were remarkable as 2015 came to a close. It was unusally warm as autumn transitioned into winter. And, for the first time that I can remember, the outdoor water spigots were still open on December 31st. (I just shut them off this week vs. the standard ritual of this happening by Thanksgiving weekend.)
Either Mother Nature was offering penance for last winter’s historic snowfall in New Hampshire, or she was just resting up for the coming New Year.
Most notable as the year ended, an amazing sight appeared on Christmas Day. Mother Nature offered the gift of a single viola (Johnny Jump Up) blossom in an area of the garden that is literally ‘between a rock and a hard place’. The honeysuckle on the back trellis pushed out a few orange-pink blooms, as well. It was a sunny, warm day on December 25th (the First Day of Christmas!) So warm in fact, the furnace was off for the day and the windows and doors had to be opened…..oh, and yes, the flowers were blooming!
It was so different from Christmas Days past when it was almost impossible to go outside with temperatures in the single digits. But as always in New England, you just need to wait for a moment (or two) and everything changes. Snow and ice finally arrived four days later and the garden is now under a soft white blanket to sleep for the next few weeks.
Don’t let a sleeping garden fool you. Now is the most exciting time of the year for this garden blogger. January is the month when I find that gardening activities are the most focused and important.
I browse the hundreds of photos that I’ve taken over the past season and make notes of what needs to be moved and removed. And this year, I’m adding the best photos from the season to my new Garden with Grace on Instagram page to complement this blog.
I flip through catalogues that still arrive by mail in January and February to see what is marked “NEW!” for 2016.
I read old gardening books and journals that are stored in my potting shed. And this year, I’m reading a new book (a thoughtful Christmas gift from my friend Liz) that is a fascinating guide, called Wicked Plants: The Weed that Killed Lincoln’s Mother & Other Botanical Atrocities
I confer with my mother (my gardening mentor and co-gardener!) about plans for the coming spring. Our discussions over the past few years always involve the same three basic questions:
These questions will no doubt be brought up in the coming weeks (usually during an evening ritual that my grandfather called ‘Coffee Break’. Others call it Cocktail Hour!) No matter the season or time of year, gardening is a 365 day obsession in my home.
So here it is, my 2016 Gardening Epiphany that arrived on January 6, the 12th Day of Christmas: You can take the Gardener of out of the Garden, but you can never take the Garden out of the Gardener.
Two words come to mind when I’m asked to sum up this year’s winter in NH: Historical & Hysterical.
We’ve had record-breaking snowfall and frigid temperatures in January and February. The depth of the snow has reached nearly 80 inches in some areas around my yard — several back-to-back storms with blizzard conditions created drifts, like never seen before. A typical conversation over the past month includes words and phrases like: Roofrakes: Soldout, Snowblowers, Snowplowing, Ice Dam, Damn Ice, Retire to Florida, Too Cold, Frigid, etc.
As I looked out of the window this am, I was greeted by two more inches of snow that fell overnight – definitely no big deal at this point (and, secretly, not necessarily unwanted, as the fresh snow covers the filthy black piles that have been building up all winter!)
Then my thoughts started to spring forward, just as our clocks will spring forward for the start of Daylight Savings Time this weekend.
I imagined the garden underneath all of this snow.
I imagined the garden sleeping under a thick white blanket, being protected from the Polar Vortex winds that have not allowed the temperatures to rise above 20 degrees (until today, March 4th.)
I imagined that the plants, especially the early ones, like the crocus and lilacs are as anxious to see and feel the warmth of the sunshine (just as I am!)
Thankfully, a file filled with garden photos, from over the years, allows me to see some of what I imagined, creating the inspiration to share some views of “What Lies Beneath.”
For me, these photos provide hope for the arrival of spring, as well as context to always remember this historical (and hysterical!) winter, that will soon be only a memory.
View of the back garden on March 4, 2015. Two weeks ago, the snow completely covered the sun and bird garden ornaments.
Nearly same garden view during late June 2014.
Looking down the purple coneflower path. March 3, 2014
Similar view of the purple coneflower path in late July 2014.
View of the back patio – there’s a table and chair set as well as a grill under all of that white! (You can see the remnants of last years pink mandevilla on the far right!)
This is the back patio in mid June 2014. It looks more livable when not buried in snow! Thankfully, spring is just around the corner!
Garden with Grace 