Just for me

There are a few things I've been up to lately that are doing a wonderful job of (to put it all smooshy like) feeding my soul.



Picking raspberries is one. Harvesting the lavender is another. I love the intense blue violet of the tiny blossoms, the smell is divine and a big sniff can undo any amount of stress for even just a second which is so worth it. Also there's a soothing drone in my garden that comes from the bees who come to visit for the lavender and thyme flowers.

Also feeding my soul is the few minutes here and there that I've been able to be creative again. It started for the Peanut's birthday with a Chinese lantern chandelier, a stick a hat on Quack poster and a tiny tissue cake banner. Since then I've been playing around with image transfers.

I've been using images from the Vintage Moth blog which are fantastic by the way. I've almost perfected a transfer technique using liquid sculpey and my mind is whirling around ways to put it to good use. I recently bought some small cradled panels that I want to make into shadow box art pieces which would work well with a little translucent imagery.

So don't let me air out all my soul feeding ways alone; what's been feeding your soul lately?

A Thousand Words

The Pictures that should have been in my last post

There should really be a photograph with this post

but rather than taking my camera out in the morning when I head into the garden, I've been focused on the much more important task of berry picking.

There's something intensely satisfying about the juicy thud that a raspberry makes when it's dropped into a large yogurt container. Also the glow of the red berries when the morning sun touches them through the leaves... like poetry to my eyes. I love picking berries. It's my latest just for me thing to do. I head out before the husband leaves for work and fill a container with those enticing ruby red treasures.

I also annihilate a few slugs, pull up a few weeds, pick some pees and disturb the ants that have decided to make the strawberry plants their home base. It's satisfying and I get to feel like I've gotten something good done at the start of the day since the Bean is still a big time napper.

I'm keenly looking forward to the wild blackberries at the end of our street to ripen...

Fingers crossed I'll take the camera out and shoot a few of those berries before they fill up my bucket

Garden time!

We're hoping to head out into the back yard and start work in the dirt this weekend. Top of the list is to get the Peanut's butterfly garden started.

Last weekend the bunny brought her a little garden set and a packet of pumpkin and wildflower seeds suited to bring butterflies into our yard. she's pretty excited about it and I'm hoping that being able to dig into her own dirt will make her want to help out in the kitchen garden. She's nearly five and I'll be honest in my expectations of that. They are low, very low, but I'm not too worried about it. having her own space is a good start.

The scrape, shush sound

We've been pretty lucky with the weather lately. I've been able to get out and rake the leaves that keep falling off the trees in our yards on a regular enough basis that the hob doesn't seen so enormous.

If you're asking yourself why I'm raking the leaves? I'll answer. It's an excellent way to burn of some blood glucose after lunch (anything to keep those BGL's down and also I can only walk around the block after every meal so many times before I start to get bored of the neighborhood). On top of that I enjoy raking leaves. I love the rustling shush sound they make as they make it into a nice big pile. I love looking at the leaves still clinging onto the branches, and the light that passes through those leaves from the sun. It's a meditative job and one that I enjoy. Also when I rake leaves there's the opportunity for this:

Tomatoes

and by that I mean I have some.

When we planted our garden last spring we were winging it, and by that I mean we had no clue what we were doing other than, you know digging little holes, dropping in seeds and covering them back up again. Of course we went with seedlings in a few places. For the longest time this summer I thought we were going to be tomato less because we started out with cool and wet weather. Now we have flowers and actual fruit. Add that with the carrots, onions and the potatoes that we've already sampled; and our first garden seems to be a bit of a success.

How is your garden growing?

Going green

You know how it is when you're feeling overwhelmed, devoid of creative spark and in need of something new to think about, to get you excited and in the frame of mind to keep going, try something new or put a twist on what you've been doing to make it that much better? I have a great reading list of blogs that I follow where I can get inspiration and find new ideas to put me in that place. I also am lucky enough to be in a place that offers up some great inspiration whether it's my neighborhood, the Metro Vancouver Area or in my living room where the seeds we planted last month have sprouted and are now adding a degree of life to our living room I never realized we needed until the thought of taking them out to the garden to plant them.

I know that it's one of those cliches that growing a plant from a seed is a bit like a miracle. In fact it's one of those things that I have a habit of overlooking because of the cliche in a kind of yeah yeah yeah, miracle of life blah blah blah kind of way. But really, since we brought home the tomato seedlings we were given earlier this year, and we planted our own seeds; I have to say that I'm enthralled, I stop every time I go by the table they are sitting on to look and see how they are, to marvel at how tall the sprouts are to gasp at how big the pumpkin leaves seem to have grown each time I look at them. It's my next best thing to being pregnant again; something that gets less and less likely with each passing month. And another great side effect is that I'm feeling more and more in tune with the earth which is such a good thing.

So the seedlings will be headed out doors soon and I'm going to be missing the living green. Obviously we are going to have to remedy this situation. Did I mention that I have a lot of great blogs in my reading list that are a fantastic resource for me? Of course some of the ideas are less achievable than others; the living wall for instance. Oh how I would love, adore and am coveting a living wall after reading this post.
With my Student Loan interest relief coming to it's end this month little extras like a wally pocket are out of my price range but I'm thinking I might start small with a spider plant. Since I've had luck with them in the past, but wouldn't it be lovely to have a wall of living green to add inside your home?

Saying Goodbye when you aren't there and cough and a fever

were just a few things I did on the weekend.


Last week was a little rough, but things seem to be easier now. My Cousin's funeral was held on Friday in the community hall that was used for our Grandpa's service. He was buried with our Grandparents and my Dad, which; I was told by my Aunt, was comforting; leaving him to be close to all of them.

I couldn't make it, as I mentioned last week our single income budget wouldn't allow it but I did my best to say goodbye on my own in my own way. What do you do to mark the passing of a loved one when you can't be with the rest of the family?

Of course with my mind on other things the Peanut got a little less attention than usual and to make up for it, she decided to bring the focus right back to where it belongs with a nice cough and fever combo (which as of this morning has developed into a leaky nose, cough and fever trio).

I'm a little tied up with booger wrangling and temperature taking today. In other news, the newest return of my 5 Question feature was a huge success, with lots of hits on the post. If you haven't read it yet go on over to it and let me know what you think. I'm really looking forward to next months feature.

So to leave you on an upbeat note here's what's been happening with our seedlings over the last four days. I couldn't be more excited about it... or impatient for the rest of them to show themselves

Planting and Eggs

We started working on the garden this weekend. What better way to observe Ostara and the first day of spring than to wake up the earth in our garden and sow some seeds for planting next month? Oh yeah and the eggs, we coloured some eggs and decorated the window with some tissue cherry blossoms.

So, what will we have in our garden? Onions, carrots, potatoes, broccoli, lettuce, parsley, basil, thyme, rosemary, peas raspberries, blueberries and strawberries. We are also trying our hand at a pumpkin and a watermelon and the Peanut grabbed a packet of Velvet Queen Sunflowers which will be adorning the small plot in front of the front steps because; as she said, we have to have flowers!

Now we have to start planning where everything is going to go... I've taken some books out of the library which have been helpful and not so helpful. My next step has been to see how other people do it. I'm wanting to go as green as possible, using companion planting and natural ways to help discourage pests. It's a little daunting when there is so much to learn and so little time to pick it all up. I've been reading this great book called Eat More Dirt by Ellen Sandbeck. It's full of advice and suggestions and reads like a magazine article in book form which is my way of saying that it is full of personal anecdotes and fun little illustrations and tidbits. As far as planning the garden goes, I came across a link to this site called GrowVeg.com that we are thinking of using to set everything out. I read about it on Flicker's Lair's blog.
in her post she also mentions a few books she finds indispensable and I'll be looking for them in the garden section of our library to check out too.

Next week we continue the celebration of the beginning of spring with chocolate and an egg hunt or two. Any chocolate in your future? what about gardening? Am I the only garden virgin out there this year?