September 5, 2014 by Born To Organize

Tomato Swan Song

This weeks tomato harvest

The heirloom tomato plants pumped out fruit all summer long. We ate them raw and in salads, sliced between sandwiches and Mike made the surplus into salsa. Oh yum.

Alas, tomatoes are a summer annual and they’ve come to an end. Here in the Northern Hemisphere, fall is just a couple of weeks away. It’s time for the tomato swan song.

The plant is still pumping out fruit, but the lower leaves are browning and the fruit isn’t nearly as sweet.

Ripening vignette

Tomato plant in decline

I collected a huge bowl earlier this week, washed them and popped them in the freezer. We’ll be able to enjoy them in another salsa or sauce. I harvested some green tomatoes as well, and put them in a paper bag. If green tomatoes have released a gas called ethylene then they’ll continue to turn red. Otherwise they’ll remain green. The bag simply traps the gas and allows nature to follow its course.

Here’s an excerpt from Garden Know How:

The main determiner in how fast a tomato turns red is the variety. It will determine how long it takes for a tomato to reach the mature green stage. Tomatoes cannot turn red, even forced by modern technology, unless it has reached the mature green stage.

Another factor is the outside temperature. Tomatoes will only produce lycopene and carotene, two substances that help a tomato turn red, between the temperatures of 50 and 85 F. (10-29 C.) If it is any cooler that 50 F./10 C., those tomatoes will stay a stubborn green. Any warmer than 85 F./29 C., and the process that produces lycopene and carotene comes to a screeching halt.

Tomatoes are triggered to turn red by a chemical called ethylene. Ethylene is odorless, tasteless and invisible to the naked eye. When the tomato reaches the proper green mature stage, it starts to produce ethylene. The ethylene then interacts with the tomato fruit to start the ripening process. Consistent winds can carry the ethylene gas away from the fruit and slow the ripening process.

If you find that your tomatoes fall off the vine, either knocked off or due to frost, before they turn red, you can place the unripe tomatoes in a paper bag. Provided that the green tomatoes have reached the mature green stage, the paper bag will trap the ethylene and will help to ripen the tomatoes.

This year’s crop planted themselves. I call them ‘volunteers’, seeds unintentionally planted thanks to the wind or a bird dropping seed. They’re often the healthiest plants in the garden. So while I’ve saved some seeds, I’m also lobbing the occasional tomato back into the veggie box, hoping they’ll plant themselves again next year. Sometimes, a gardener just needs to get out-of-the-way.

Tomato Plants: the long view Dear Reader, I wish you were here! This is a recent shot of my tomato plants. I’ve been harvesting tomatoes all summer long and putting them to good use. If you were here we could make a salad together while we caught up on our news. Until recently, that ugly pipe was hidden with cherry tomatoes. Just behind the tomato plants are the recently pruned raspberry vines. Let’s catch up soon. Cheers, Alys

August 26, 2014 by Born To Organize

Top Ten Reasons to Grow Sunflowers

Sunflowers are a delight in any garden. They do most of their growing up, not out and they don’t require a lot of fuss. They can grow from a seed to as tall as 25 feet (average is six feet) in just ninety days. What’s not to love?

Here are my top ten reasons to grow sunflowers:

1. They’re easy to grow once they germinate. I’ve solved my squirrel-digging problem by covering them with screen savers until the seedlings take root.

Sunflower seeds undercover

2. Sunflowers are bee magnets. We need all the bees we can get. You can read more about Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) here.

Bees grace the garden

Bee in flight

3. Mood enhancers. It’s nearly impossible to stroll past a strong, lemon-yellow flower and not smile.

Joy in every bloom

4. Sunflowers are tall. Growing a flower you can look up to is always fun when you’re 5’10” (177 cm).

Six foot sunflowers

5. Bird watching. Lesser Goldfinches like to eat sunflower leaves. They start low on the plant and move up, so apparently the more established leaves are the delicacy. After a few meals, the leaves look like lace.

Lesser Goldfinch and a well-nibbled sunflower leaf

6. Grow your own privacy screen. What’s not to like about a flowering fence/privacy screen to keep things cozy on the front deck?

Grow a summer privacy screen in no time

7. Self-healing. I came home a month ago and found one of the flower heads in my driveway, ‘harvested’ before its time. The plant generated several new flowers half way down the stalk of the plant. That was a nice surprise.

Sunflowers get a second life

8. Free entertainment outside your kitchen window. I parked my camera on the kitchen counter this weekend, ready for my seed-eating guests. Squirrel antics make me smile.

squirrel snacking on sunflowers front deck

The real reason we grow sunflowers

9. Plenty of seeds to share. Each flower head produces hundreds of seeds, leaving plenty for harvesting and roasting, planting and sharing with the birds and squirrels.

May I offer you some seeds?

10. Planting sunflowers gave me an excuse to publish a top-ten list.

Vintage Postage Give-away

Don’t forget to make your requests. My Vintage Postage Give-away ends this Sunday, August 31st, 2014. You can read all the details here.

On the form below please request your first, second and third country of choice. Include your full name and mailing address. That’s it. Click on the list of postage stamp countries to see what’s available:

List of postage stamp countries

Vintage postage issued mid-1937 to mid-1938.

What can you do with a bunch of old postage stamps?

Use them to make mixed-media art
Make a birthday card for someone special
Laminate them in strips and use them for bookmarks
Add them to a scrapbook page
Give them to a child and make up a story to go with them
Celebrate history
Take part in this gardening nirvana blogging adventure.

Please send your request via the contact form, below. I would love it if you joined in the fun.

← Back

Thank you for your response. ✨

August 25, 2014 by Born To Organize

Butchart Gardens: A Canadian National Treasure

Fuchsia housed in the former aviary

It’s hard to overdo the superlatives when describing Butchart Gardens. Magnificently creative and stunningly beautiful gardens attract a million visitors a year. Spending time among the flora was one of the highlights of my recent trip to Vancouver Island.

I spent the day at the gardens with fellow blogger extraordinaire, Boomdeeadda and her cousin, Sherri, also a blogger at Smackiland . We spent hours wandering the gardens, snapping photos, and laughing like school girls. Laughter is contagious when in the company of good friends. Looking back, it’s hard to say what was so funny, but we belly laughed throughout the day, making the garden experience all the richer. I highly recommend it. Even the bus ride back to our hotel was a hoot, but I’ll leave that story for another day.

Sunken garden and a couple of happy bloggers

According to our brochure

The Butchart Gardens cover more than 22 ha (55 acres) on a 53 ha (130 acre) estate. It began from an idea Jennie Butchart had to beautify the worked-out limestone quarry which had supplied her husband Robert Pim Butchart’s nearby Portland cement plant.
The gardens continually expanded over the years to become the world-famous Sunken, Japanese, Rose, Italian and Mediterranean in existence today.

You can read the full story of Jennie Butchart’s creative vision here.

In addition to the gardens, we enjoyed a high tea in the Butchart’s former residence.

Butchart home, tea room and menu

We rounded out the evening with a magnificent fireworks display viewed from one of the lawns.

Trees on fire? Nope. Just an amazing fireworks show

What a day!

Here are a few additional photos (I took over 100!):

Near the garden entrance

Eryngium (Sea Holly)

One of an extraordinary display of Dahlia

Napa, California Earthquake

As many of you know, Napa, California experienced an Magnitude 6.0 earthquake early Sunday morning. We felt the shaking as far south as San Jose, but the epicenter was 104 miles (167 kilometers) away. One young child was seriously injured, but so far no fatalities. Other reported injuries were minor. I’ve attached a link with earthquake footage, charts, articles, etc. If you watch the first video, may I suggest you do so with the volume on low or off.

Earthquake Report, Napa Valley

August 22, 2014 by Born To Organize

Musings of a Gardener Returning to her Nest

The strangest thing happens when I first return home from a trip. It’s subtle. It doesn’t happen when I’m gone for just a day but if I’m gone a weekend or longer I notice.

If I lived with Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory he could probably sum it up in a sentence or two. In my unscientific mind it feels like my environment shifted. Does this happen to you?

It started at the airport. Mike pulled up to the curb, and the boys spilled out of the car. They didn’t look like the boys at the airport curb just a week before. They’d changed. I studied them closely when we were back in the car. How much could change in eight days? Yet it was there. Palpable. One week older, that much closer to manhood, tousled hair a fraction longer. Strange.

Back home the environment shifted too. The furniture hadn’t been moved, all the kitties were present and accounted for but time moved ahead by a week. I could feel and it smell it in the air.

In the garden, the changes were even more profound. Squash bugs took over the last pumpkin hanging. Pantyhose be damned! I’m glad I harvested the other three early. Tomatoes remain on the vine, but they’ve lost their rosy plumpness. Left unattended the basil flowered along with a few sweet peas, arriving late to the show.

A purple sweet pea…at last. Thanks for the seeds, Boomdee!

Pantyhose fail: Squash bugs, 1, Gardener, 0

Most of the sunflowers are bowing with weighty seeds. One newcomer bloomed in my absence. What a happy surprise. I planted a variety pack, but thought I’d seem them all. This one looks like a bright yellow pom-pom and stands over six feet tall.

Someone’s enjoying the sunflower seeds

My newest sunflower

Another subtle shift happened while I was away: a shift of mind. Rather then trying to break bad habits, I’m focusing on establishing better ones. I’m heading to bed earlier and reading more. I’m rethinking my blog, exploring new ideas and realizing that a vacation is not only time away but a break from doing the same thing.

The trip itself was a treat beyond measure. I got to spend time with my dearest friend, Boomdee, her delightful cousin, another blogger and a woman I’ve never met. We walked, talked, laughed, shopped and carried on like teenagers. It was good for my heart and my soul.

Victoria, BC, 2014

I love traveling and I love coming home. Time away helps me appreciate the value of both.

How about you? Do you arrive home refreshed and ready for a change, or grateful for the return of your routines?

August 13, 2014 by Born To Organize

A Nesting We Will Go

What do garden swing covers and shower curtains have in common?

Give up?

They’re almost exactly the same size. Serendipity!

After a nesting squirrel did this

Squirrel hard at work

and this

The squirrels have a field day

I knew the swing cover I’d sewn was beyond repair. Eventually I brought in the tattered cover, washed it, and put it in a bag in the car. I planned to use it as a pattern when I got around to making a new one.

The soft cord inside the piping of the cover seemed to be the prize. I cut a strand of leftover cording and draped it on the back of the swing to test my theory. Sure enough, I returned home to find it gone. I took the rest of the cord, cut it into strips, and placed it at the scene of the crime.

There the cord sat. It sat and sat. No more squirrels. Perhaps nesting was complete for the season. Eventually I brought in indoors, figuring I would put it out again next spring. I don’t want to put the time and effort into a new swing cover, only to have it shredded once again.

Sigh. I acted too soon.

A few weeks ago, an anonymous squirrel was at it again. The swing looked bad enough without the cover when this happened.

Shredding the original cover

Fluff and stuff

It was demoralizing staring at the swing in its damaged state, but I couldn’t muster the energy to do much about it.

Well, this past weekend the husband of a friend came to call, all the way from Australia. We planned a coffee and catch up in the garden, and I wanted a quick fix for the unsightly swing.

Backing up a bit, three years ago I bought a brightly colored shower curtain to use as a patio tablecloth. I couldn’t find a cheerful tablecloth at the time nor did I have the time to sew one. Twenty-dollars later a tablecloth was born.

Now it’s getting a second life as an impromptu swing cover. Serendipity!

Quick shower curtain fix

Shower curtain, side and back. I eventually added binder clips to hold it in place.

Although I can’t speak with authority, I expect to see a dray of baby squirrels traversing the wires any day now.

August 8, 2014 by Born To Organize

Curb Garden Anniversary

After a few fits and starts last year our curb garden finally took root. It makes me happy.

Clockwise: Snapdragons, Scabiosa going to seed, surprise gladiola, Cosmos, Penstemon, and yarrow

When we bought this house 18 years ago, the sidewalk strip was nothing but lawn. We planted a tree, but otherwise left it as is. We had plenty of projects to keep us busy. Within a few years, we had two boys under the age of five.

About a year ago I considered removing the lawn and planting a vegetable garden in the mostly sunny strip. A handful of friends and readers cautioned against it. A few had bad experiences with people stealing flowers or fruit. Others warned of cats using it as a litter box. Others suggested I plant on the house side of the strip, but my husband wasn’t ready to remove all of the lawn. Removing the grassy strip was a two-fold experiment: could he tolerate less grass, and would my garden thrive and survive. The answer to both is yes.

Sidewalk strip before and after

I posed the question to my readers via a blog poll and the results were split down the middle: plant the strip and you’ll regret it or go for it! My friend Liz suggested a raised bed and that made the most sense.

I’m happy to say that nothing but positives emerged from my curb garden. Here are just a few:

I ordered potting mix from a supplier but they delivered topsoil by mistake. I didn’t realize the significance but the garden failed to thrive. They apologized and offered a refund, but said they couldn’t take it back. Once sorted out, I had to figure out a way to get rid of 1 cubic feet of topsoil and begin again. I joined a Freecycle network in our community, and made a new friend in the process. Serendipity!
My friend and neighbor’s daycare children planted carrots in the curb garden last fall. She made labels for each of the carrots and we all had fun watching the wee gardeners grow and harvest carrots.
I grew a beautiful crop of garden peas. Though cut short by an early and particularly harsh frost, they were beautiful and sweet in their day.
Late in the year I planted fifty daffodils ‘Narcissus’ broadcast style. They opened up in February and flowered for a month. What a glorious sight.
Most of the perennials did well, and doubled or tripled in size. I scattered a packet of wildflowers seeds to fill in bare spots, and a few of those have come up as well. Two weeks ago I found a single, pink gladiola growing in the corner. I must have found an unidentified bulb in my garden stash and added it to the mix, but I have no memory of doing so. What a fun surprise.

As I’ve educated myself on the pros and cons of different plantings, I’ve learned how little a manicured lawn does for the environment. Lawns require a lot of water, as well as aeration and fertilizer. They have nothing to offer the birds or the bees, so critical to the health of our ecosystem. My husband doesn’t want to let go of the lawn so it’s an ongoing debate. So far the compromise includes replacing the sidewalk strip and cutting back on watering the lawn.

Brown is the New Green’ is the motto of a $500K campaign launched by the Santa Clara Valley District. Water use is typically up to 60% higher during the summer months. Lawns are the worst offenders. Even a small lawn can use more than 18,000 gallons of water per year. We simply can’t waste water. – CBS Local News

Happy anniversary, little curb garden. Here’s to many more.

Removing the lawn

Spring daffodils

Nick takes over, soft gravel and stepping-stones surround the garden

August 7, 2014 by Born To Organize

Here a Squash, There a Squash

Everywhere a squash-squash.

Operation Dill and a Harvest Quandary sparked lots of great suggestions. A quick read of the comments section here and you’ll be up to date.

The onslaught of squash bugs continues unabated, but now I have a plan.

Squash bugs wait in line to audition for the next horror movie

I guess I should specify another plan since the first three failed.

In Plan A I would stealthily plant pumpkins in the garden in front of the house, far away from last year’s buggy fiasco. I would smugly dust my hands together, sit back, and wait for my glorious harvest. Those squash bugs have excellent radar and within a month, they found the plants and started their own little family. Plan B kicked in when I found the offending eggs on the backs of the vines. It required handpicking eggs and bugs from leaves and stems and sending them away on the weekly yard waste collection truck. (I wonder if the trash collector saw me smiling and waving in his rear-view mirror as he drove off with the bugs)? Plan C as in “Can’t a gardener Catch a break here?” kicked in this week. Now that the vines are dying back the plants are setting fruit. It was the next logical stop on their squash destroying journey. Before throwing in the towel, I did what any blogger would do: ask the tribe for advice.

Thank you, tribe!

Plan C in 4 Parts:

1. Harvest my trio of pumpkins. I’m leaving for vacation, and I can’t risk the heartbreak of losing my tiny crop. Following advice, I wiped off the outer shell with a bleach and water solution. I set them to dry and warm in the kitchen window with the green sides facing the sun

Harvested Trio

Pumpkins freshen up (1 part bleach, 8 parts water)

2. Wrap the bottom of a pair of pantyhose around the entire (newly discovered) pumpkin. Post a sign, just in case the crafty bugs can read.

Please don’t judge: It’s possible the bugs can read

3. Tiptoe away from the vine growing on the other side of the deck (nothing to see here folks, move along, move along).

M’s pumpkin vine

4. Cross my fingers, stand on my head, rub my lucky kitty and marvel at the tiny seedling breaking ground nearby.

Just getting started

So, there you have it. I know I’ve been boring you silly with pumpkin problems this week. Here are some other garden updates:

The sunflowers enjoyed a glorious run. Plenty of seeds to feed the birds and the squirrels, with leftovers to plant for next year.

Sunflowers bow their heads as the flowers go to seed

This delicate flower appeared last week. It’s from a butterfly and hummingbird seed mix. I don’t know what it is but it sure is pretty.

A new addition to the triangle garden

Two for one: brush the cat, carpet the fairy garden.

Lindy-Lu gets a nice long brushing and the fairy garden acquires a rug

Another late-season arrival from the seed mix.

Dainty little flowers

Please don’t forget to send in your request for free vintage postage stamps. In case you missed the original post, you can read about it here. Then make your request.

Vintage Postage Stamp Giveaway

August 6, 2014 by Born To Organize

Brown is the New Green

“When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.” ~ John Muir
So ends this lovely post by Ogee at Gardens For Goldens. I’ve been meaning to write an update on California’s water woes. Ogee shares my sentiments on the water inequities in our state, while at the same time setting a good example in the memorial garden she tends. Enjoy!

Meanwhile, thank you for all the great advice on my squash bug dilemma. Stay tuned. Alys

Gardens For Goldens

This summer, it seems the weather forecast is always wrong. Friday was 110. This weekend was supposed to hover near the century mark. Instead, someone ordered up a breeze and clouds. Rainless clouds. But clouds, nevertheless. We have been surfing temperature waves all summer. Peaks and dips. They are taking their toll on the garden.

The USDA declared a drought disaster for California, now listed as being in “exceptional drought.” Fires are breaking out everywhere. The forecast calls for a warmer than normal September through November. While our friends in the east endure soggy – we sizzle. And pray for rain.

In my favorite public gardens, you will find casualties of city-imposed water cutbacks.

Brown is the new green.

In our Memorial Garden, we have reduced our water use by nearly half.

We’re fortunate to have established trees to provide more shade…for the plants – and the dogs!

The soil…

View original post 184 more words

August 5, 2014 by Born To Organize

Operation Dill and a Harvesting Quandry

Squash bugs, you’re on notice: Operation Dill is under way.

My lovely little pumpkins are ripening but it’s a race against the clock.

Precious Pumpkin No 1

Precious Pumpkin No 2

Precious Pumpkin No 3

With less and less vine for the squash bugs to eat, my trio of pumpkins remain vulnerable. Last year this happened…

2013: A sad day

I’ve been hand picking squash bug eggs and removing adults from the vines for weeks, but predictably I missed a few. They hatched into destructive nymphs. I just can’t keep up.

Pauline at The Contented Crafter suggested planting dill. Apparently when grown together, pumpkins and dill make excellent companion plants. I raced to the garden center between appointments, but between the heat and my busy schedule, I didn’t plant them right away. I deposited all six pots on top of the EarthBox, leaving them to wilt. Boo!

I eventually gave them a good soak and they recovered. I pulled the three pumpkins together in a group, careful not to break the vines. I surrounded the fruit with dill.

Ripening pumpkins

Curious how they would react, I placed a dill plant near a bug congregation. They scattered! Ha!!!

Then I had a good laugh at myself. Of course they scattered when a bunch of leaves disturbed their reverie.

Would it last?

I checked last night and found an adult intruder sitting on the pumpkin stem. No, no, no!

Next Monday I leave for a much-anticipated, week-long vacation to Victoria, Canada with my bestie Boomdee. Yay, me!

The men of the house will do a cursory check on the plants, but none of them are on board with hand-picking bugs while I’m gone.

So…should I harvest them Sunday morning before leaving town, hoping they’ll continue to color? Or should I leave it up to Operation Dill and take my chances?

What would you do?

Six Ways to Control Squash Bugs in your Garden by Sarah Toney

July 30, 2014 by Born To Organize

Things With Wings

Lift, gravity and thrust. It’s not the latest dance craze, but a short list of what things-with-wings need to fly.

Wouldn’t it be thrilling to have wings? I remember an episode of Gilligan’s Island years ago that always made me chuckle. In one attempt to get off the shipwrecked island, Gilligan donned wings and jumped off a cliff. He momentarily flew until the Skipper shouted “You can’t fly!” Gilligan replied, “Oh’, and only then did he drop to the ground.

I love watching things-with-wings flying in and out of my garden. They move with speed, efficiency and agility like a well-trained gymnast flying over the bars. What a thrill.

Birds

Visiting birds

I worry about the birds as our drought drags on. They’re traveling in circles, searching for food, water and seed. Reservoirs are low and plants are under a lot of stress.

I keep our bird bath topped off so that our visitors can quench their thirst. The garden takes care of the rest. It’s satisfying watching birds sip nectar from a flower or pilfer seeds from the compost bin. They sing, trill, hum and yes shriek but it’s all a reminder of our garden diversity.

According to Discovery.com

{birds} can play any number of roles in a given ecosystem, most of which fall into four main categories: provisioning, regulating, cultural enhancement and supporting services. Supporting services, for example, include tasks such as predation, pollination and seed dispersal.

All that and they’re cute, too.

Bees

Bees pollinating sunflowers, pumpkins and Salvia

Through the camera lens, I’ve witnessed the extraordinary movement of bees gathering pollen. Shiny black bodies lift in and out of the pumpkin flowers, coating themselves a golden-yellow. The buzzing sound stops when they land, and within seconds they lift off again They are all business. If another bee is in the center of the flower, the second bee backs up and continues on. What they accomplish is extraordinary and relevant to our survival.

Butterflies

Butterfly and Statice

This beauty landed in the flower bed sending me racing indoors to grab my camera. Who doesn’t love a butterfly? When my boys were young, we visited the ‘caterpillar tree’ at our local park. One particular tree would be laden with cocoons. It was a yearly treat. After a few years we stopped seeing them.

I’ve since learned that in the United States, Monarch butterflies have declined for the last twenty years. In the UK, certain species of butterflies are down by 50%. From an environmental perspective, butterflies are a bit like the canary in the coal mine. They’re extraordinarily sensitive to environmental changes around them and are apparently the most closely watched insect in the world.

I’m glad this special guest found something to eat in my garden.