August 6, 2013 by Born To Organize

Tomato Envy

Amy’s bounty

You can’t rush the garden. Not even when you have a case of tomato envy.

You can encourage it, yes. Lots of support…of course. But rushed, never.

I planted several heirloom tomatoes this year, but they had a hard time making a go of it. I bought a few starter plants to fill in, just in case, which in the end was a good idea. I’m not sure any of the seeds were viable.

The plants from the nursery are green and healthy and starting to bend from the weight. I scooted the rolling tomato garden to the back of the patio so I can keep an eye on them. They’re drying out faster now that the plants have taken flight.

City Picker with tomato plants

Any day now…

Meanwhile, I received these lovely tomatoes from Amy’s garden. You’ll hear more about Amy in a future post. Mike paired the tomatoes with basil from our garden and made a delicious caprese salad. It’s one of my favorites and a sure sign that we’re in the heart of summer.

Caprese Salad

August 1, 2013 by Born To Organize

A Room with a View

Kitchen Window: Before and after

The best part of my kitchen is the view. Sure the counter tops are nice and who doesn’t like a dishwasher, but the view out my front window makes the room.

When we remodeled nine years ago, the contractor suggested lowering the window to the height of the counters. Who knew that dropping it just a few inches could make such a difference? The lowered window invites the outdoors in. I have a direct view of the Chinese Pistache, a lovely tree that sheds leaves each fall. It’s one of those trees that’s gorgeous year round, though particularly stunning in the early autumn months.

Pistache in the Fall

Improving on my view, I added a small, triangular flower garden in the corner of the lawn. I knew the flowers would lift my spirits, but didn’t realize the number of birds it would attract. What a treat to hear them singing in nearby trees, then watching them swoop down for seeds.

Flowers near the lawn

Rounding out my extraordinary view are the hummingbirds that visit throughout the day. I found a feeder that suction-cups to the window, and placed it high enough to keep them safe from predators, but low enough for maximum viewing. We worried they would stop coming when we hung the awning in the spring, but they were back within minutes, swooping under the awning for a quick meal. I’ve been known to swoop in for a sugary treat myself, so I should have had more faith.

Picture me on the other side of the glass smiling at this little hummingbird.

Do you have a favorite room with a view?

July 31, 2013 by Born To Organize

Coleus Splendiferous

Potted coleus

Our splashy coleus greets our guests as they cross the deck to our front door. Aren’t the colors amazing? This fast-growing plant seems to double in size, minutes after the summer heat descends. Small purple flowers appeared last week, but they almost seem beside the point. The true beauty of this plant is the leaves. I have three varieties growing on the deck, but this is my favorite.

Spikes of purple flowers

I grew two coleus last year, then tried, unsuccessfully, to keep them alive through the winter. I wrapped then in frost cloth, kept the watering going, but alas one hard frost and that’s all she wrote.

Apparently it’s tasty too.

This year I’m ready. I’ll take cuttings instead. I have rooting compound for the occasion, along with a lightweight planting medium. I even have my eye on a small, portable green house, so that I don’t have to use the always-busy kitchen for my growing pursuits. I’ll keep you posted.

Meanwhile, I’m enjoying my colorful deck.

Do you have a summer favorite?

Stunning colors

July 30, 2013 by Born To Organize

Garden Dahling: New Kid in Town

Dahlia Stella J

Isn’t she a dream?

I brought home my first set of Dahlia tubers in March from
the San Francisco Flower & Garden Show. Grown in Oakville Washington, Dan’s Dahlias boast “We Grow the Best.” I have to say, they’ve definitely lived up to the hype.

I’ve never grown Dahlias before (why I couldn’t tell you) but they’re a new garden favorite. You can order them online for shipping around the world, though I find it great fun buying them at the garden show.

Dahlias grow from tubers, so you can dig them up and divide them year to year. Your flower garden grows and grows. I bought three tubers this year to see how they would fair in my garden soil.

What do you think?

Dahlia joins the family

New This Week!

Dan’s clever logo was born from adversity. According to his site:

Besides their beauty, variety and heartiness, one of the reasons that many gardeners love dahlias is that they are deer-resistant but, an unfortunate incident back in June, 1994 proves they are not cow-resistant. My parents and I headed to California for the weekend as I was a groomsman in my cousin’s wedding. Sometime during the night, 28 of our neighbor’s Holstein heifers broke through their fence and came into the dahlia field; the cows went undetected until morning. I returned to a disaster. The cows ate three acres of dahlias to the ground, they broke the wooden stakes, and ate the plastic identification ribbons. The field looked like it had been rototilled. That year, Dan’s Dahlia’s was almost completely wiped out. Many years later, I could make light of the incident and created a unique business logo, “Cow Eating a Dahlia.” The logo is a symbol of the obstacles that Dan’s Dahlias has had to overcome. But with family support, hard work and determination, it’s a booming, blooming business.

His story certainly puts my sunflower-thieving squirrels in perspective.

July 29, 2013 by Born To Organize

Metaphorical Sunflower

Mouse *insisted* on being in the picture.

I planted an entire packet of sunflower seeds, but only one took hold. I’ve seen several fat and happy squirrels around the ‘hood, so I’ve little doubt where they went. That said, I’m more interested in the lone survivor.

Thinking that the surviving plant needed company, I headed back the to garden center and bought six sunflower starters. For awhile the plants were all the same height, but at the three-foot mark, the starter plants set dozens of blooms. The lone survivor continued to grow.

Metaphorically speaking, I can relate. One summer in my middle-school years, I grew from average to tall and stayed that way. Tall and skinny and very much in my own ‘shell’ I stood apart from the others. My pale English skin, tall carriage and bright hair were the antithesis of the California Girl. I was quiet, bookish, and painfully shy, and the occasional target of mean-spirited girls.

Today the surviving sunflower stands tall and straight. The proverbial late bloomer had her turn in the sun. Large leaves attract birds of all stripes. Blooms attracted bees. Now laden with heavy seeds, those mischievous squirrels will be back, but guess what? Times have changed.

This time, she’s ready.

alys and sunflower collage

July 26, 2013 by Born To Organize

What’s Luck Got To Do With It?

Heart-Shaped Clover

Some people believe in luck; others believe you make your own. Personally I like the idea put forth by Carl Jung that ‘luck’ is synchronicity, the idea that “the experience of two or more events as meaningfully related, whereas they are unlikely to be causally related.”

In other words, through blogging, I’ve discovered a world of interesting and articulate people who might not otherwise have crossed my path. Synchronicity! I look forward to logging on daily to see what fellow bloggers have to say; unique perspectives from around the globe.

Trying to spot a four-leaf clover on the forest floor, I had a paradigm shift. Why search for the elusive four-leaf clover, when there are pretty green hearts right under my nose?

In our not-always-pretty world, I’ve found bloggers with grace, poise, humor, advice, skill, and fascinating points of view. The hearts in the clover. At the risk of sounding pollyannaish, I believe the world is full of good people. My experience in the world of blogging validates that truth.

‘Lucky’ me!

Clover: Forest Floor, Felton, California

July 25, 2013 by Born To Organize

A Pumpkin We Will Grow

First Pumpkin

We’ve grown pumpkins every summer for a decade. Our first crop was a happy accident when my then four-year-old spilled a bag of squirrel food. We swept up most of it, then kicked the rest off the path into the dirt. Before you can say ‘boo!!!’ we ended up with five pumpkins.

To celebrate that tenth anniversary, we’re growing an all-volunteer crop this year too. I feel a bit guilty when I walk by our little patch and realize I had next to nothing to do with it.

Earlier this year I popped the lid off of one of my composting bins and spied a pair of pumpkin seedlings. I smiled, put the lid back on and went about my business. The next time I checked the bin was full of seedlings! Clearly they enjoyed the impromptu greenhouse effect, though the lack of light was a concern. I left the lid ajar and before I could even think of transplanting them, the crop took off.

pumpkin plants in compost 3-15-2013 7-56-04 AM

Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I prepared the garden bed intended for the crop and simply eased the entire contents of the compost bin over on its side, then into the bed. I held my breath for a few days, hoping the trauma of being upended didn’t finish them off. Instead, they continued to grow.

At last count, there are 11 little pumpkins growing on the various vines. I’ve lost a few to snails and a critter with sharp teeth, but the remaining pumpkins look good.

2013, 07-03 4th of july fairy garden2

I’m a huge fan of all things Halloween, so growing pumpkins in the back yard brings me great joy. After all these years I’m still in awe that one little seed can produce a vine that runs half the length of the house in three short months. Beautiful yellow flowers give way to bountiful fruit. Days shorten, vines brown and left standing is a bounty of orange goodness.

Do you have a summer tradition that brings you great joy?

You can check out my page Passionate about Pumpkins to see a decade of growing, displaying and my husband’s awesome carving.

July 24, 2013 by Born To Organize

A Winning Combination

Sunflower

Earlier this year, I dug out a corner of the lawn and replaced it with a variety of flower seeds. The corner faces my kitchen window and sits at the curb, allowing maximum viewing enjoyment.

I started with assorted new and leftover seed packets, then added seeds saved from last summer. Growing from seed is risky business around here, thanks to a healthy population of squirrels. If the seeds manage to stay under wraps long enough for germination, they face the next hurdle: noshing snails. Those mollusks love tender shoots. What’s a gardener to do?

Lacking a greenhouse of my own, I hit upon the idea of ‘tenting’ the corner with a cover I spotted in a garden catalog. Boy, was I feeling smug. I planted my seeds, then erected the barricade. I staked the corners, then added rocks for safe measure. I checked each day and sure enough the barricade remained sound.

Every other day, I unzipped the cover to water the seeds, then stood back, waiting for them to grow. Nothing seemed to be sprouting. I checked with our local nursery, and received sound advice: if the seeds don’t remain moist at the time of germination, they never be viable. In the past I either started seeds indoors or sowed directly without benefit of a cover. My attempt to thwart the squirrels ending up thwarting the germination as well.

I went back to the nursery and bought a few bedding plants instead, so I could get a jump-start on the garden. I bought half a dozen sunflowers, some Alyssum and a couple of small bedding plants. I added a bright pink Cosmo to the center of the triangle and called it a garden.

Then lo and behold, the seeds began to grow! Just as the sunflowers were reaching their full height, lacy green foliage emerged below. Soon blues and pinks joined the yellows. Bachelor Buttons commingled with Cosmos. Forget-me-nots were next on the scene producing a brilliant dark purple flower. My garden corner is now what the garden centers like to call ‘a riot of color.’

Come join me for a walk on the bright side…

Bright Pink Cosmos (bedding plant)

Yellow Sunflower (bedding plant)

Emerging Bachelor Button (from seed)

Bachelor Button (from seed)

Soft Pink Bachelor Button (from seed)

Forget-me-not (from seed)

garden triangle collage

July 23, 2013 by Born To Organize

Muselet Cafe Chairs Fit for a Garden Fairy

I’ve learned all sorts of things this week, including the proper name for the ‘cage’ on champagne bottles: muselet. I’m dusting off my high school French and letting the word roll off my tongue. It’s also been great fun fashioning tiny cafe chairs from what we heretofore referred to as ‘that wire thingy that holds the cork in place.’

Here’s how it all started. I fell in love with the idea of fairy gardens when volunteering at my son’s school. The idea is to fashion a miniature garden using bits of this and that, along with rocks, twigs, flowers and leaves. Originality is key to attracting mythical fairies. I try to fashion my fairy garden with living plants, rocks and twigs, as well as items I would otherwise toss or recycle.

Fairy tables throughout the years include wine corks, an empty spool of thread, rocks and a muselet. My neighbor and fellow gardener, Ruth stopped by, took one look at the fairy birthday garden table, and told me about the cafe chairs. Be still my heart!

She loaned me the charming red chair pictured here so I could create one of my own. It was easy and fun. Since I’m Organized at Heart, I twisted the back of mine into an organic heart shape, but really, the skies the limit.

Next time you’re at a party, you can wow your host by leaving behind a tiny chair at the end of the evening. You could also put a bug in the ear of the caterer at a wedding and offer to take the muselet off their hands. Once home, you can fashion a pair of chairs for the bride and groom as an unexpected anniversary gift. These would make cute gift toppers as well. Who needs a bow when you can attach a cafe chair instead?

Specials thanks to Ruth for the inspiration and the loan of her chair.

Here’s a quick visual tutorial:

Muselet Cafe Chair tutorial: 1. Remove from bottle, 2. untwist and lay flat; 3. remove the long steel wire piece from the base; and 4. twist into shape and attach along the back of the chair legs.

Muselet Cafe Chairs

I found this great blog on all things muselet. (Sorry…I can’t stop saying that…muselet, muselet, muselet). Did you know about the six turns? Check it out!
Fellow blogger Greenhousing is making Elderflower Champagne in her garden. You can follow along here. Doesn’t that look tasty?
For the truly inspired, check out L’art du muselet. These are stunning artisan miniatures.

Please drink responsibly.

July 22, 2013 by Born To Organize

Here’s the Dirt

Purple Bachelor Button

I finally got to the bottom of my Planter Box Failure. In a word, Topsoil. All dirt is not created equal.

I ordered planting mix from a local supplier, but they delivered topsoil instead. The otherwise healthy plants weren’t thriving and I couldn’t figure out why. In the end, it comes down to the basics: sun, water, soil. The soil delivered was far too heavy and ill-suited for my needs.

The supplier offered a refund, but they can’t or won’t pick up the unwanted dirt.

Freecycle to the Rescue!

One of my readers suggested I offer the soil on Freecycle. I posted the offer last night and woke up to half a dozen emails. Wow!

The soil is going to one or two good homes and the emptied planter box will soon be mine. It’s late in the season to start over, but I’m going to plant a bag of flowers seeds I have on hand and see what grows.

Meanwhile, I had to scramble to transplant the surviving plants. I filled in some bare spots in the triangle at the corner of the lawn. I pulled four spent sunflowers which gave me room to transplant the status. I transplanted snapdragons and several cosmos that were struggling to establish. The roots of the plants hadn’t spread at all. They’ll do so much better now in their new fertile soil. The one plant that seemed to be taking hold in the box was the chocolate mint. Each plant sent out foot long runners beneath the soil and were really taking hold. The mint will go back into the new and improved planter box, but for now they’re resting in a few plastic pots along the walkway wall.

What seemed daunting last week now feels like an adventure. I love planting, so enjoyed ‘rearranging’ the plants. I’m happy the mint is doing well and can replant accordingly. Most of all, it feels great to find a home for all that dirt.