happy birthday my sweetie pie!

the cookies are from our local bakery that is always an inspiration for cookie decorating. they are the masters of cookies!

Grafting

4-H is cool not only for kids but for adults too. Last night at our monthly club meeting the Peninsula Fruit Growers Association came by with root stock and scion wood to demonstrate how to graft fruit trees. I think it was pretty boring for most of the kids but the adults were enraptured.
We have a monster pear tree in our back yard that is a remnant of the old strawberry farm days. It seeded a baby pear nearby and that was the tree of choice to sandwich my four pieces of scion wood. Apparently there is one type of apple, Winter Banana, that can be grafted onto pear trees, so I grabbed one of those branches from the pile that the fruit guys/gals brought. The others were pears: Orcas, Concord, and something Angeline (I'll have to go check the name again). This morning off I went with my fishing knife, some electrical tape, a knife guard I made out of cardboard (so I wouldn't slice up my hand during the whittling process) to the little pear seedling by the fence.
In the past half dozen years I have been using that little tree as a source for chew branches for the bunnies. I was never intending for the tree to be anything more ornamental or structured. So today I had to look at the tree anew and prune it to a somewhat fruit tree shape before I started the grafting process.
Taking the scion wood out of my hunting jacket pocket I scanned the tree branches for the right diameter that would match that of the scion pieces. Finding pretty good matches I started the whittling on the scion and the tree branches (after trimming the tree branches back quite a ways). The cardboard guard was utilized once I needed to make that crucial slice partway through each branch and scion piece. Then these pieces slide together like a dovetail joint (not exactly, but more like puzzle pieces) so the layers of exposed biological matter lined up and became a new branch.
To seal the wound electrical tape was wrapped tight around the joint. Apparently in July I am supposed to slice through the tape and let it fall off on its own, assuming that the graft takes and the branch starts to grow. We'll see.
It should be fun to see if any of the grafts succeed. Then I will have lots of new varieties of fruit in a few years. That's nice, especially since I chopped down my huge Gravenstein apple tree last week. So sorry tree, but it was getting so huge, and I planted it in the wrong spot, where I needed easier access to the gate in the fence. The wood from that lovely tree is so buttery beautiful. It will be used to flavor barbecues this summer.

Acupuncture

Thank goodness for acupuncture!!!
Pain that can't be reeled in by conventional medication is tamed with slender needles placed in the most unusual multiple locations. Sometimes it hurts and sometimes I can't feel a thing as the needles slip into contorted muscle structures. Today I was desperate for my appointment and it did not disappoint. It is a life altering hour from constant pain to a release from pain's grip. Medication is useless, ineffectual, causes horrid side effects for this patient and yet prescribed with abandon by doctors. No MD prescribed acupuncture to me. My physical therapist convinced me to give it a try, and thank you to her!

Doodling with Petals

These are fallen petals of Viburnum bodnantense 'Dawn' from a recent bouquet on the kitchen table.
On a visit to one of my favorite nurseries today I ran across a plant that seemed too good to be true. It is a climbing butter yellow bleeding heart called Dicentra scandens. It grows up to seven feet tall and blooms during the summer. I love bleeding hearts. I have a white one and used to have a pink one. Their delicate blooms are so charming in early spring but to find one that blooms in the summer on a climber, wow! This will be fun to try out, maybe climbing up my snowbell tree. Oh, the image conjured up is dreamy!

bloomerific

a couple of my lovelies
that bring such happiness
corelopsis pauciflora

ribes sanguineum

New Toys

Flower Paper Punches!
Fun!
What will come of these new toys?

The song Anyone Else But You from Juno makes me long for my old guitar (that I gave away years ago...what an idiot!). I'll have to restring my son's guitar and give it a try. Only two chords, C + G, for the whole song so I think I can handle that.
I was so excited when Diablo Cody won for best screenplay for Juno. I loved the wildly original dialog.
Here's the song:


later...
left hand nails clipped. right hand nails long. guitar restrung and tuned. wrote down the lyrics. now i'm strumming away. it's the antidote to news of death threats to Wangari Maathai, Bush's threat of vetoing a water-boarding torture bill passed by the Senate, news of high concentrations of mercury and flame retardant chemicals in fish in the most isolated reaches of National Parks, record profits for Exxon as they whine about a settlement for Prince William Sound at the Supreme Court, and much much more. a sweet song goes a long way to soothe an otherwise crazy world.

A New Apron for Spring

My old apron was getting pretty tired looking so it was time

to infuse the kitchen with some new vitality.
The old one made for a good pattern to cut out the new one.
I just looooovvvvve crocus,
and this one has to be one of my favorites.

New Sheets

I love new sheets!
Here are the latest,
after their first bath,
in front of one of my oil paintings
in the fading afternoon light.

bursting

My sweet plants are emerging from their winter rest with color, texture and fragrance. I love the just emerging buds of the Cornus mas. Such delicate bloom has to be appreciated up close with the blue sky of a crisp cool day as the backdrop. These beauties (Viburnum bodnantense Dawn, Crocus, Cornus mas, Hamamelis Arnold's Promise) exhilarate me to no end.
Thank you lovely beauties for the happiness you exude.

xo

Bias Tape

With ready made bias tape in short supply this handy tool makes bias tape construction a breeze. Yards and yards of tape used up a bit of that fabric stash that i am trying to whittle away. I'll show you what i used it for later.

pam

© All rights reserved
my own pattern
cotton crochet, needlefelting + couching
lining from an outgrown oilily dress
dedicated to a friend that was a crochet expert

Latest Birdie Basket

When it's cold outside the sweet little birdies are hunting all over for bits to keep them going. I like to see them close-up, so I put up my wire birdie baskets, full of black oil sunflower seed, to keep them happy. This birdie basket took all day to make. But it is a very meditative process to make a basket. In my father's opinion the lowest occupation on the totem pole was the basket-maker, and there were threats that if we didn't do well in school we would turn into a basket-maker. I however think it is a beautiful avocation to sink hours into, and wouldn't he laugh to see me now enjoying it so much.

Yesterday there was a line-up on the tree branches while each birdie took their turn in the basket. Spotted towhees, house finches, Oregon juncos, chickadees, nuthatches and sparrows take to the queue. Some days the nasties come by: pine siskins. They are meanies. They fight with each other and scare the other birds away. But none clear the basket faster than the stellars jays. With their size and squawk all others scramble to get out of their way.

Today marked a new level I will go to to try and rid myself of pain: acupuncture. Only one of the needles hurt (in my neck) going in. I was surprised that the one right into my forehead didn't hurt. Towards the end of the season the bottom of my feet felt all tingly like they were electrified. Maybe it was the chi flowing through my body at last. It seems that acupuncture allows your body's energy flow to be restored. When I lived in San Francisco I always wanted to join in on the early morning tai chi that was practiced by the dozens in many city parks each day. But off to work I would go watching the rhythmic flow of synchronized bodies from my seat on the Muni bus. After my kids were born I did enroll in a tai chi class for a year and felt great after each session. I should have kept with it. But there was something fundamentally genuine about those groups in the park, back in San Francisco, through the fog or drizzle, no matter what, those older people, wrapped in black Mandarin jackets, would get themselves out and together each and every day, as opposed to a second story community center room under florescent lighting in Oregon.

Tussie Mussie

Just a tiny bouquet to say thank you.
I just love finding little jewels in the garden this time of the year.
The witchhazel smells sooooo good.
And what a happy yellow it is!

Sun Seeker

No matter how small the space, if there is sun to soak up then that is the place to be.

Watching the Snow Melt

I love having a bit of springtime inside this time of the year.
The forced narcissus bring a sweet air to the kitchen.
They seem to be looking out the window thinking,
"I'm glad I'm inside today!"

Decorated

Of the 243 rabbits entered at the 4-H show today who would have ever guessed
that the little visitor to our garden, that we nourished back to health would, in just one month from when he was found him in our vegetable garden as simply skin + bones, would today win Best of Breed (receiving lots of praise from the judge!) and be in the final 15 rabbits in the Best in Show. Our sweetie deserves lots of cheers for visiting us that fateful day knowing full well of his potential in our loving embrace.

Free Rice

While exploring on my son's computer I ran across a cool site that he had bookmarked. It's called Free Rice. It's a vocabulary game that earns donations of rice to the United Nations World Food Program. Take a look and expand your vocabulary through various difficulty levels and help others at the same time. Sounds almost too good to be true.

Happy New Year!

Still Blooming

After hard freezes, snow, pounding rain and wind these tough gals just want to keep blooming at the end of the year: camellia sasanqua 'setsugekka', viburnum bodnantense 'dawn', kerria japonica, rosa 'the fairy', jasminum nudifolium, prunus 'accolade'. They're inspiring for their fortitude, and a welcome foreshadowing of spring.