Earth Day

Tomorrow is Earth Day.

I thought I'd share a few ideas I had on how to celebrate.

Plant a redbud tree.

Purchase more grocery totes.

Purchase a water filter for the kitchen faucet.

Take name off junk mail list. http://directmail.com/directory/mail_preference/

Find coffee thermos for coffee-on-the-go (This helps the savings account also).

Plant a few pansies just to brighten the day, the table, and the soul.

Buy locally grown asparagus (my favorite way to fix it is to put it on hot dog forks or skewers, drizzle with olive oil, salt & pepper to taste, then grill. May be topped with shredded Parmesan cheese).

Or just roll in the grass!

Let's enjoy our Earth tomorrow.

Warm Weather

Hello Warm Weather and April! We have been blessed with temperatures in the 70’s, today close to 80 degrees. Yesterday, the girls and I went out and worked in the garden. I trimmed the clematis. This took some research that I wanted to share.

Here is some background. My plant came from my grandmother over 10 years ago and she did not know the variety or type. This poor plant has moved with me 5 times. So it has not had a chance to thrive or for me to see it bloom. Well it bloomed last summer big beautiful purple blooms. A picture from clematisnursery of my variety -

I have not trimmed it all these years because it has never gotten over 3 feet. My last move was 3 blocks two summers ago, when I got married, so I dug it up with a big soil ball, put it in the wheelbarrow, walked it up the street and planted in immediately. And it bloomed the first year in a new spot. Yeah! Now it is time to prune, it is falling over the support. I found out after visiting two wonderful sites – homeofclematis.net and clematisnursery.com – that I have a Jackmanii variety. More specifically, I have a 'Purpurea Superba' with dark, velvety purple flowers. Here is a photo of the clematis before pruning -

Another photo I can not resist putting in of Bubble.

Now here is all the other wonderful information I found. Clematis can live up to 50 years and its trellis or support should be adequate for its final height. (Mine is not so it is time to think of something new.) ‘Clematis X jackmanii was the first of the large-flowered clematis hybrids, and it and its subsequent selections and hybrids are still the most popular varieties. Members of the Jackman group of clematis produce flowers on the current season's growth, and therefore bloom later in the season than do clematis cultivars that produce their flowers on the previous season's growth. The Jackman cultivars climb with twining stems and cling with leaf stalks that twist and clasp. With good support, vines can reach a length of 10 ft (3 m) in a single growing season. The vines are semi woody and the deciduous leaves are trifoliate or simple, opposite, and 2-4 in (5-10 cm) long. The spectacular flowers are abundant and large, to 7 in (17.8 cm) across, with 4-6 petal-like sepals, each about 2 in (5 cm) long. Produced from midsummer until first frost, flowers of the various cultivars may be single or double and come in a rainbow of colors. They are saucer shaped and face up and outward, proud of their singular beauty. The fruit is a very distinctive achene (dry, 1-seeded capsule) with a 2 in (5 cm) long silver gray wispy "tail" covered with long silky hairs. They are packed in long lasting fluffy clusters…

…Since Jackman clematis produces flowers on the current season's growth, they should be pruned to the ground in late winter or early spring before new growth begins.’ This all comes from Steve Christman, http://www.floridata.com/ref/c/clem_xja.cfm. I'm thinking again, I need a new pillar or a tall trellis. What will it be? I quick picture of the girls watching me prune - the grass isn't greening up but it is a great day. (A note about the girls they are adopted retired greyhounds. They love to run for short periods of time and then they rest for longer periods of time. They are such great company in the garden.)

Some of the rest good information I found was wonderful pruning diagrams from clematisnursery.com. So I pruned out the dead wood and broken vines. Here is a picture of it completed - no hanging vines.

Afterwards I sat down with a friend, a glass of tea and enjoyed the sun. The tea was a new recipe of green tea with frozen blueberries and strawberries, it need a zip maybe next time a bit of mint or sugar. I’ll keep you up to date on the recipe. Let’s go enjoy the sun again today.

Remember today is April Fool's Day in the USA. I am not a good person for thinking up pranks but I do enjoy hearing about them. So today let's remember 1998 and the USA Today newspaper story of Burger King's Left-Handed Whopper. So when is the Right-Handed Whopper coming out?

Spring is flirting with us!

Spring is flirting with us in Michigan these past few days. The weather has been unseasonably warm in the 60's. I took the 'girls' for a walk yesterday - today we just played in the backyard. They ran through the crocus I planted last fall, only a few were broke. I'll have to come up with an interesting fence. Today I am planting my leeks and 'Green Zebra' tomatoes inside. I am a little late on the leeks but the seed just arrived today. My neighbor tried starting the 'Green Zebra' tomatoes last year with the other tomatoes and they didn't have enough time to produce. So I thought I'd start now. I am trying a few seed trays that I had in the garden shed.

I decided to start a variety of heirloom tomatoes, leeks, Nicotiana alata (flowering tobacco) and a few French vegetables (Rouge d'Hiver Romaine lettuce, Merveilledes Quatre saisons, and Quadrato d'Asti Red Bell Pepper). This is a wink to my education of all things French. On the Michigan side of my garden, the garlic I planted last fall is coming up. I caught the 'girls' checking it out also. I think they were checking to be sure it was coming up because a few hours after I planted it - they were digging it up. (They only dig where I dig in fresh soil and never dig undisturbed soil. Interesting....) But both the hard-neck and soft-neck garlic varieties are coming through nicely. Here is Paige by the hard-neck garlic.

The soft-neck garlic is poking up also.

Here are a couple of my favorite books on garlic - 'Growing Great Garlic' by Ron L. Engeland and 'Garlic is LIfe' by Checter Aaron. The 'Growing Great Garlic is linked to a good source for both types of garlic. I do need to share two last photos of our early spring. The day in the yard with the sun shining was fun for all. I got the birdbath up and Paige has claimed it as her outside water dish...

...Bubble and Paige looking around for a ball or squirrel to chase...

As a final word for the day, 'Welcome Sunshine!'