Come Into my Parlour

Since I already have the parlour pretty much the way I want it, I like to do small things to make me happy; such as tie a burlap string around a stack of books. I'm easy!
This tea arrangement makes me happy, too. The books I tied up are under the teacart.



I bought two of these needlepoint pheasant pillows on e-bay.

I've posted this photo before but haven't shown it hanging on the wall. It's one of my favorites taken in Stratford-on-Avon. I made it into a black and white photo and then hand-colored it using transparent oil paints. Pretty cool, huh? Excuse the reflections of the curtains in the glass.
A bevy of family portraits on an end table. I threw in the turquoise frame to shake things up a little.
I have matches in this box which hangs to the left of the fireplace. There's a story that goes with this box.
I think I was college age and our family was at this bluegrass/craft festival up in the Smoky Mountains. I saw this box and really liked it. Daddy, being the sweetie he is, said, "I'll buy it for you." I only ever remember him buying two things for me; this box and a Sarah Coventry bracelet that I still wear forty years later. And he's taken my brother and me to the country store for many ice cream cones.
I remember one time he was taking us fishing, and we stopped at this same store for lunch supplies. As a special treat for dessert, he got little cups of pudding but failed to buy any spoons. Of course we didn't discover this until it was time to eat. We didn't know what we were going to do short of sticking our fingers into the pudding, but Daddy being ever resourceful, looked around and saw some reeds on the river bank. Walking over to them, he cut a long one. As he walked back to us he cut it into three pieces, each piece about the length of a straw, and handed one to me and then one to my younger brother.
We looked at each other and then over at Daddy who had stuck his reed into the pudding and was drinking it like a milkshake. We thought he was a genius for being so innovative. He was and is a genius still. He's one of the smartest men I know. And one of the kindest. I love my daddy!

Around the Breakfast Table

One of the highlights of visiting my parents is the country breakfast Mama always cooks; sawmill gravy and biscuits, bacon, sausage, milk, and homemade jams and jellies.
This is us gathered around the table. I had my camera on a tripod with a four second timer. I had to push the button and run sit down before the shutter clicked. Mama leaned back too far, so I didn't get much of her.
We're heading up there tomorrow for one more weekend of rafting. All Darcie's schoolbooks are ordered, so I'm taking a long weekend to relax before school starts. I'll work on scheduling as we drive up. I've also got an Anita Shreve book to finish. I use the five hour trip to read, plan, and sleep.
So, until next week...have a good weekend.

Fire in the woods

British Soldiers (Cladonia cristatella), my favorite lichen.

Two very small salamanders. Either Southern Red-backed (Plethodon serratus), Southern Zigzag (Plethodon ventralis), or Webster’s (Plethodon websteri).
According to Salamanders in Alabama, they're "easily confused".

These tiny... things... were growing on a limb rotting on the ground. I can't even tell if they are a type of mushroom, slime mold, lichen, or what. Possibly an immature version of Peniophora rufa...?
The whole line there was about the width of a blade of grass. I could definitely use a macro lens. And of course that portable DNA analyzer that they are being so slow to invent.

An easy one, finally: Truckus plasticus.
And there's always this:
The muscovy duck who thinks he's my boyfriend.

He follows me into the woods, if I'm moving slowly enough.
I'll be hunkered down, minding my own business, trying to take a photo of something low to the ground, when I hear a coarse hissing from behind.
That's my cue to stand up fast, unless I'm in the mood to be nibbled, stabbed, and pinched by a duck.
I'm not sure how he carries bread crumbs, but he's always there waiting when we get back home.

Love After Love by Derek Walcott

A lovely woman shared this beautiful poem with
me. It brought tears to my eyes. Now I want to share it with you, my friends
and followers... enjoy!




Love After Love



The
time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.
~ Derek Walcott ~

Natural Antibiotics

Adventures in Agriculture

Okay, y'all! I'm teaching the Introduction to Sustainable Agriculture program in the spring so I'd love a full class. If you are interested, more information is on my website.

McClellan Butte ..

Yet another time on McClellan Butte, and another time not making the summit. The first time I had been there, Jennifer and I hiked up the first summer we were in Seattle. In the last 500' or so before the summit it was snowing. When we arrived at the final summit scramble, it was too wet and slick for us to attempt.
This time the goal was to do the North Gully or North Couloir route. Avy conditions had been low and Steve, Julie and I were going to give it a try before more snow fell. However, we were thwarted by another individual that was in our vicinity. We were heading up the correct gully, and saw him heading farther west. Since none of us knew the route, we started heading west. After wandering around, we came back east, and eventually climbed the north west gully.
The climb was enjoyable, and had a very different flavor than what I would expect a spring ascent to have. From the parking area, the snow was bulletproof. No need to snow shoes. Almost a need for crampons. We hiked up the trail and veered off around 2800' heading directly toward the couloir. We found the abandoned road and continued up in the snow field below the gully. (Later, on descent, we would notice that we could have taken the trail all the way to the clearings below the gully.)
This is where we saw some woods above us. According to our pictures, the gully should be continuous, and this is also when we witnessed the lone individual heading farther west. We started going into the next gully, and then the next after that. We realized we were too far west, and headed back one gully and started up. This wasted some time, and it was around 11am when we stopped part way up the gully to have lunch. (There was a reasonably flat area, which we weren't sure we'd see too much more of.) With crampons and ax, we all soloed up to the top of the gully where the angle reached about 45° or more.
Steve then led out belayed up a short 3rd class rock step and more gentle snow. Things still looked promising for us to be summiting. Although where we were didn't look exactly like pictures we had. We took our crampons off and Steve led a belayed rock climb through snow and 5th class rock to a sub-summit of McClellan Butte. We could see the true summit and the correct gully. Which is much steeper for the last 200' or so. (Perhaps 60°) After Julie and I arrived on top it was close to 2pm, and we needed to get down. There were flurries in the air, and we weren't sure about the best way down. After a bit of down climbing on the hard steep snow, we rappelled a rope length, and more down climbing got us back into the gully we ascended. From there it was a slow climb down the gully, and a moderate hike out on the trail. We left the crampons on all the way to the car.
The correct gully
Overall, it was a fun time. I don't feel I climbed all that well, but I have been getting sick as Jennifer was sick most of the week. I haven't felt particularly strong because of it. Also, I was still recovering from last week's blisters. (I did a lot of work to the right foot, but none to the left foot before the climb. The left foot wound hurts more than it did this morning, while the right foot does not.) Also the McClellan Butte trail has some of the largest Douglas Firs I've seen in the I90 corridor. We saw some mountain lion tracks in the snow on the way down as well.
My pics are here.
Julie's pics are here.

Gratitude and a Dog Pile

I was overwhelmed to receive a couple of very lovely awards from some furry cool friends and feel unbelievably grateful. For a lot of last week, we've were inundated with storms and our 'puter has not worked for much of the time. We had a couple of power outages and apologize for not visiting as much as we like to. It was drying out until a few minutes ago and now is raining. Again. So I'll start dictating (Mom: THAT'S fur shore!) to get this post out! I found this amazing "Shining Star" award in my email box today and am almost blushing, as those Zoolatry girls (http://zoolatry.blogspot.com/) have gifted me with so many beautiful pressies lately, including the incredible banner I've installed up top today. I can't know how to woof out enough thank yous. There are no rules for this award, but I'd love all my wonderful furfriends to have it if you don't already.
Dearest Coco (http://lovebeingachihuahua.blogspot.com/) gave me this cool, pawsome "Director's Choice" award and I am so furry grateful to you, Cocorue! I would like to paw this award forward to three new blog pals - if you don't know these pups, go meow or woof hello! They lead furry interesting lives in equally cool places!
1. To Sierradog (http://sierradogblog.blogspot.com/)2. To Tanuki Maxx (http://sibemaxx.blogspot.com/)3. To Mimi and Cabana (http://oursforayear.blogspot.com/) You bet I look concerned! When Mom brought out the toy basket, my ears pricked up! Playtime! But no. She put me in a downstay and began arranging all my personal stuff onto my own personal hair on my own personal body. Imagine. She got 12 things on my actual body and 2 more kinda leaning on it, resting on my back paw... so 14, if that's not cheating. She also got out Ozzie's basket of toys, hoping to place a mouse or two in between my ears, but I was having none of it. So if you'd like to enter Biggie's Mango Minster Sanctioned Talent Event called DOG PILE, visit Biggie at http://biggiezblog.blogspot.com/! Have a good Sunday!

Early snow

Nothing like a little snow, to bring one out of a blog slump.

Every channel forecast snow, but I didn't pay much attention to their percentage predictions. My belief that it would actually snow, in Alabama, in early December, was exactly 0%.

But it did snow, a little.

Jasmine romped. She adores cold weather.

The chickens were wary. It might have been some evil plot, after all.

I don't remember the trees ever looking so nice, after such a light snow.

I hope the rosemary didn't get too frizzen.

Shovel Pruning the Vignettes

This post, "Shovel Pruning the Vignettes", was written for my blogspot blog called The Transplantable Rose by Annie in Austin.

The Garden Bloggers arrive in Austin in a few days and we who live here will no longer be photos on a page but living, breathing human beings with gardens that are actual, not virtual. You've seen Pam/Digging's photos and the garden she designed and built from below the ground up, yet Pam has confessed to some pre-Fling jitters! MSStevens just posted about her mixed up, exuberant, wild at heart meadow garden , complete with poetry she wrote as a 17-year old prodigy. The also jittery MSS says she wrote this post to set expectations for visitors to her garden and the laid-back, artistic neighborhood around her. Dawn's garden blog is just fine but her real garden is on hold. She must wait for long-planned construction to be completed before she begins to turn her dreams into reality. While she waits, she takes us on tour around the Austin area and shows us places we might otherwise miss.
I don't have much to be nervous about - only a few bloggers are intending to trek northwest to my bits-and-pieces garden, full of passalongs and plants I grow just to see what will happen. There's a hint of Lady Bird Johnson in the front yard and a lot of plants beloved by Mrs. Whaley in the back yard. And one rather cranky, gettin' older lady trying to keep the plants in control.
Last fall I planted ranunculus bulbs after reading a post about them by the wonderful Julie of the Human Flower Project. I gave them a good spot in the long fence border.

This spring the ranunculus opened their delightfully rolled flowers. What fun to see a chrome yellow followed by an orange - the flowers were more vivid than I'd prefer, but they seemed to blend with the lighter yellows, purples and silvers already blooming in this border.
Then number three opened deep fuchsia pink and I couldn't stand it. For nearly thirty years I've made one garden after another with layers of small trees, shrubs, perennials, annuals and bulbs to form vignettes - small pleasing scenes with the center focused and the edges blurred.

On my series of small small suburban lots I used these vignettes to draw the eye to a defined area of horticultural interest, away from neighboring house roofs, TV antennae, garage walls, basketball hoops and backboards, pool slides, sports banners, trash containers, compost heaps, oversize vehicles, boats under blue tarps, power and electric lines and dead trees.

You'll find every color of the rainbow somewhere in my yard and in a large sweeping meadow I'd love them all swirled together, but vignettes are small. Certain areas have limited palettes - this secluded corner is mainly corals and lavenders -

The hummingbird bed is predominantly red and the pink border near the gate is the spot for pinks, magentas, whites and burgundies. Those ranunculus bloomed in a bed of yellows, blues & silvers along the fence.
A few days ago Pam/Digging told us one of her bluebonnets bloomed pink instead of blue and she wavered between moving it and letting it bloom. Most of her commenters told her to let it be. I said to move it. I follow my own advice.
I used the garden fork to lift the deep pink ranunculus with a nice chunk of soil, relocating it to the bulb bed near the anemones. Two days later the flower doesn't seem to have noticed that it's on the opposite side of the yard. Julie says these bulbs usually bloom once without returning, but if it does decide to act like a perennial, it will be in the right place.
This way I can enjoy both the deep pink ranunculus and the more coherent long border without being annoyed each time I looked at that 'riot of color'.
More shovel pruning was needed in the front yard. When we worked on the Pink Entrance Garden, last spring, I planted a bareroot rose labeled 'Therese Bugnet' toward the middle of the bed, a good spot for this pink shrub rose. When the rose bloomed dark red I was surprised but decided to keep it since the flower was lovely, nice for cutting and the color looked okay with the pinks and burgundies.

But in the last few months our 'Not-Therese' Rose started making long, wandlike canes... not only was it not pink... it was also not a shrub! When the Divas of the Dirt came here a few weeks ago, DivaMattie volunteered to adopt the unmasked red climber and took it home.

The Pink Garden still needed a Pink Shrub Rose. Instead of taking a chance on another bareroot rose, I bought a shrub rose in a container that was already blooming pink ... it's supposed to be the Texas-tough 'Belinda's Dream' and this time the girl looks like her photos.

The styles of M.S.Stevens' garden, Pam's garden, Dawn's garden and my garden are as different as the style of our garden blogs and our styles of writing. I think these differences are something to celebrate - if you'd like to read more on the topic of rejoicing in the differences among bloggers , please see Kate's thoughful ode to individuality, "A Gentle Plea for Chaos" at her KateSmudges blog.

This post, "Shovel Pruning the Vignettes", was written for my blogspot blog called The Transplantable Rose by Annie in Austin.

Wondrous Wollumbin

For sometime I'd been lining up another ride on the Tweed Valley. It involved taking Swifts Road from Tyalgum, then Tyalgum Ridge Road - becoming Brummies road before linking up with the old Tweed Valley ride. It all seemed simple enough, and yesterday seemed to turn on the perfect day, so it was time to do it.
Even before I had crossed the Macpherson Range, Tomewin was turning on a spectacular day.


After descending into the Tweed Valley, I followed the familiar route toward Tyalgum. The two climbs here often show spectacular views on days like this, and yesterday was no exception. I've watched clouds settle on those mountains in moonlight before, but seeing it during the day is also special.

After Tyalgum it was time. Swifts road doesn't mess around in getting into the climb. This climb becomes a little more challenging as it's on loose dirt. A sign advises "4wd road, dry weather road only". I had neither. I chose to press on, just watching the views open up. At one stage it looked like the road would peter out into a dead-end at a farmhouse, but it continued -- albeit on a slightly rougher surface.

Now I was into the forest, and an extremely beautiful one at that. This is actually Australia's most recently declared National Park. You can still find some of the campaign websites calling for Wollumbin State Forest to be declared a National Park. I have to say I agree with them whole-heartedly.

It started raining at the top of the climb, as if the "road" wasn't boggy enough already. It didn't really worry me too much, although I did put off the visit to Brummies Lookout for another day. After winding around on Condowie Road for a while, reaching a height of 470 metres at one point, it was then left to a steep descent back to Brays Creek Road and the old Tweed Valley ride. I didn't have any traction problems descending in the rain, but I did keep the speed down and concentrate on picking the less slippery parts of the surface.

After this, of course, it was just a simple ride back to Tyalgum, then the "main road" to Murwillumbah before returning through Urliup, Bilambil and catching the tailwind back up the coast. I finished the day with 165km and around 1,840 metres of climbing -- not quite the ASH Dash, but a decent amount of today's climbing was on dirt, which made it a little more interesting.
This now effectively gives me two of these circuits in the Tweed Valley to play with. The other one is, of course, the old ride through Mebbin National Park to the south. Maybe I'll take that one next week.

Flooding Overview

Yesterday I got up to Lewis & Clark Monument to view the flooding from that vantage point. In the middle of a Monday morning, there were not too may folks up there. The view sure illustrates the extent of the flooding.
I am trying to find a photo I have of Big Lake in its normal state. The river has swallowed the lake. You can see I-29 disappearing into the water. On the way back into town, I was going to take photos of the flood waters under the railroad trestle. Lots of "No Parking" signs there. Guess I will ride the bike one day up there for the photos.
National Guard troops are paroling the levee. I sure hope the levees hold. The river is expected to be this high until well into August. Don't think levees were expected to hold the river that long.