Each Little World

Making shade

A few years ago we lost a 50-year-old crabapple tree. This was not a dwarf but a big old tree that was home to a group of mature shade plants. Plants that were too happy and healthy — and too big — to move, even if there was a spot for them elsewhere in the garden. We replaced the crab with a multi-trunk Pagoda dogwood that is already a significant presence. What it isn't, however, is a significant source of shade for most of the plants around it.

Last year, my Kirengeshoma palmata started to fry in the hot, sunny and dry days of July. The leaves burned, and the flower buds dried up. Watering it helped, but wasn't enough to keep it from turning into a poor copy of itself. This month — with half the usual July rainfall — it looked like the Kirengeshoma was going to suffer the same fate. 

At four feet high and about five feet across, Kirengeshoma is more shrub than perennial. Though the canopy of the new dogwood is teasingly touching the plant's edges, it's not enough to keep the Kirengeshoma lush and lovely. So I created my own shade at the critical moment. I decided if a big umbrella could protect me from sunburn, it could do the same for the plant. 

I unearthed this umbrella, of unknown origin, from the basement. Made of heavily waxed paper, it lets some light through but deflects the harsh noontime rays of the sun. I stuck the handle in a big ceramic jar to keep it in place — and, voila! Instant sunshade. I've protected the plant on and off for almost a month. This last week has brought cooler temperatures, clouds and, yesterday, even some rain. The Kirengeshoma is covered with fat buds about to open. Soon I'll be able to close up my sun screen, sit back, and enjoy the show. 

My garden odyssey: Path transformation

EPISODE XXXV

SHE SAID: One of the ongoing maintenance issues with my moss garden has been keeping debris from washing into it during heavy rains. I couple of years ago I edged the whole area with bricks to keep the bark mulch on the adjacent path in place. It helped but it also looked — at least to me — like the temporary solution it was.

Once Mark added a gravel garden edged with flat-topped stones near the Tsukubai (above), I realized a similar treatment would be perfect bordering the moss. Not only would it solve the maintenance problem, but it would also echo the material and the opposing curve across the garden.

I convinced Mark that if we picked out the boulders now, I could do the work myself. Does any project in the garden ever turn out to be as simple and easy as we envision it? First, I realized I wasn't as strong as I imagined and had trouble even lifting some of the boulders off the piles at the stone yard, let alone out of the bed of the pickup truck and into the wheel barrows. My barrow loads were half the size and weight of Mark's.

Even when it came to setting the stones, he was annoyingly more competent. He'd done it before, but I think it's also his skill with 3-d concepts and visualizing. I agonized over every rock trying to decide if it would work next to the previous one, while he glanced at the pile and saw the exact jigsaw piece required next. 

Suffice it to say that Mark did the majority of the edging work; meaning it was done efficiently and thoughtfully. I did enough to understand the work involved and to truthfully claim that I helped. It looks great and seems to be working. Now I need to backfill any spaces between the rocks with clay to encourage more moss. 

Actually, the new border looked so good that it necessitated moving one of the future projects on the garden life list to first place: replacing the wood chip paths with gravel. The paths desperately needed new mulch and it seemed a waste of time and money to put down chips again. 

I suggested we redo the paths now and be done with that particular project on our list. Mark agreed and we went looking for gray stone to match what we'd already used elsewhere in the garden. Of course, no one had quite the same size but it's unlikely that anyone but us will notice the difference! 

The next step involved measuring and marking the paths so the width would be the same and the curves the degree we wanted. Mark — as is his habit — made a tool when I said I was having trouble easily marking off the 3' width so I could remove grass and plants in the way. He used the tops from some tin cans to make little "wheels" so we could make a visible mark in the dirt.

He pretty much took over the task of prepping the old path for its new topping, too. He raked up the old mulch, sifting it to save reusable soil. 

He removed a layer of soil approsimately 3" deep x 3' wide x 200' of path. We now have a gorgeous pile of soil ready to fill in low spots in the garden or to pot up houseplants. 

And he cleaned up the paths all the way to the weed barrier that was put down the year we installed the pond: 1997! All that's left now is to get the gravel in place and we're done.

Wonders, large and small

HE SAID: Last week I took my 88 year old mother for a drive. She thought these were wonderful!

Summer mystery: Why Shoot a Butler?

"The butler did it" is such a staple of mystery writing (and parlor games and jokes) that doing in the butler in the opening pages of "Why Shoot a Butler?" clearly identifies Georgette Heyer as an inventive author — and one not above writing with tongue firmly in cheek. This classic country house mystery is prime Heyer territory filled with a strong sense of of time, place and character. 

If you're not familiar with Heyer, she's the author I turn to when I need a break from re-reading Jane Austen. Her characters all have a strong independent streak, are intelligent and witty and able to deal with almost any eventuality. Most of her books are set in the early 19th century, a period she knows so well that her novel of Waterloo — "An Infamous Army" — has been used as a text at Sandhurst.  

I've read almost all of Heyer's novels at least once. If I woke up in Regency England I'd know what a tiger does with a yard of tin. Her books are so steeped in the events and slang of that era, that it never occurred to me she might be equally adept at writing in another genre and era. "Why Shoot a Butler" is my first foray into this new territory and the 1930s country house setting was a romp. 

There's the sleuthing barrister, the damsel in distress, the shady staff at the great house, lots of cocktails and smooth cars. The mystery is plausible, though I did not figure it out. I did, however, manage to catch a few clues. And it had all the things that make for a good read: words that were new and unfamiliar and required looking up; throwaway references to both historical events and classic characters in literature; bits of trivia about the running of an estate and wonderful names like Upper Nettlefold. 

A good read for a rainy afternoon at the lake house.

My garden odyssey: Art of the garden (concluded)

EPISODE XXXIV

HE SAID: Last week you said that an object is right when it works with the garden as a whole. What did you mean by that?

SHE SAID: Well, i remember early on that we spent a lot of time discussing the notions of East and West. When we were designing the Tsukubai, for instance, we had some fairly heated discussions about how "authentic" we should try to make it...

HE SAID: ...knowing full well that the term "authentic" would never apply to our garden as a Japanese garden.

SHE SAID:  So I said, why try. Why not draw from whatever influences attracted us but not be constrained by some other culture's definition of a garden.

HE SAID: I think that's when I first started using the word "analog" to describe a structure that is similar in function but one that evolved out of another culture. Like using copper piping for the flume in the Tsukubai instead of the traditional bamboo...

SHE SAID: ...or turning the English chimney pot into a lantern.

HE SAID: But, now that we have several more traditional looking lanterns, I'm not sure I feel the same way about the chimney pot. It's still a great garden ornament with a wonderful shape and patina, but does it still work as a lantern analog?

SHE SAID:  My point is: it doesn't have to. What's that old saying — consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds?

HE SAID: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines." — Emerson (I looked it up.) But doesn't a certain amount of consistency make sense, contribute to the feeling of unity or wholeness we claim to be after.

SHE SAID:  Well, a couple of thoughts suggest themselves. One, I think we need to trust our instincts. We've made good decisions in the past, for the most part; and when we've been wrong, we've had the courage to admit it and banish the misfit object. And two, we're both artists. Why shouldn't we have art in our garden, real art which challenges its surroundings?

HE SAID: I don't know. I still think that the garden, as an artwork, should take precedence over art objects that are added to the garden.

SHE SAID:  Which brings us back to where we started: "an object is right when it works with the garden as a whole."

HE SAID: Do you think the crane is too much of a cliche?

SHE SAID:  I think we should give it a rest!

Pink water lilies

After my recent post about limiting the color of the water lilies in our pond to whites and yellows, what should suddenly appear but a pink flower. A delicate, sweet, baby pink — but pink nonetheless. Where it came from or how it came to be, I leave up to the more scientifically inclined to determine. My guess is that our white lily — Nymphea marliacea albida — which is typically flushed with pink, had a hot flash. 

I suggested we pull off the flower after photographing it, the way you'd pull out a green leaf on a variegated plant, but Mark demurred. Whether pinkie was a fluke or a sign of things to come is not clear yet, as that plant has not sent up another flower. I can't deny she was very pretty but I'm hoping she doesn't try to spoil my carefully made plans again.

Summer reading: Miss Buncle's Book

Barbara Buncle has me beaming.

Actually it's Miss Buncle's book that's put the smile on my face. That is, DE Stevenson's 1934 novel, "Miss Buncle's Book," which tells the story of the unassuming but highly observant Barbara Buncle, who pens a best-selling roman a clef about her country town.

Published as "Disturber of the Peace," under the nome de plume John Smith, the book has that exact effect on her neighbors, with its healthy dose of wit and irony in its depictions of the personalities and goings on of sleepy little Silverstream aka Copperfield. In the second part of "Disturber," however, Miss Buncle gives free reign to her imagination, fantasizing a Golden Boy whose music has an incendiary effect on some of the townsfolk.

The endpapers in "Miss Buncle's Book" are taken from "Flower vase lit by rays from a table lamp," a screen-printed cotton and rayon designed by Vanessa Bell for Allan Walton Textiles in 1934.

"Disturber" becomes a best seller to the dismay of the more officious and hypocritical members of the community who threaten libel suits and determine to unmask John Smith, going to lengths that Miss Buncle's publisher considers stranger than fiction. 

Stevenson's Miss Buncle is a first cousin to Winifred Watson's Miss Pettigrew. They're both unappreciated women of a certain age who draw on unsuspected reserves of creativity and intelligence to pull themselves out of dire financial straits. In the process, they transform themselves and those around them — to the endless delight of this reader. It seems amazing to never have heard of Stevenson, given that four million copies of her books were sold in Britain and three million in the U.S. between 1923 and 1970. Thanks again to Persephone for providing another perfect read.

Miss Buncle's Golden Boy graces the cover of this early edition of the book. Persephone's reprint, of course, is clothed in its distinctive discrete grey covers.

Two bloggers are having a Read a Persephone Book week next month for all you fans of the publisher. I still have a couple of unread titles on my shelf so I may try to join in.

My garden odyssey: Art of the garden (continued)

EPISODE XXXIII

SHE SAID: I think we should talk about some of the things that are actually in our garden — you know, the man-made things you wanted to get rid of a couple of weeks ago.

HE SAID: I didn't really want to throw them all out; but I thought we should try to see them as others might, without our emotional attachment. The Valentine piece, for instance ...

SHE: It's staying!

HE: I made this piece for Linda one summer while she was away attend an art class in Door County, Wisconsin, as an out-of-season valentine. It consists of three discarded industrial saw blades of the type used to make cuts in concrete pavement. On them, I wrote "I Love You" in German ("Ich Liebe Dich") using a commercial rust inhibitor.

HE: Calm down; I'm not suggesting we get rid of it. But — honestly — how does it connect to our garden?

SHE: Well ... it's round like the window you're planning for the Tea House, and the Moon Garden and the circle around the Mica rock.

We bought this red rock which is riddled with mica because we couldn't resist. But when it came time to place it in the garden, we found that it didn't "fit" anywhere; it was too dramatic. Rather than trying to make it blend in, we finally decided to frame it within a circle of ivy.

HE: And it does have that nicely rusty surface which qualifies it for Wabi-Sabi status. But what is it doing there? What does it contribute to the overall vision of the garden?

SHE: I think it adds mystery, and poetry. It's never seemed to bother you when Ian Finlay added textual elements to his garden. Am I wrong, or aren't you quite fond of Little Sparta?

HE: OK, OK. But that was the whole point of his garden — the classical literary allusions. Do you think that it still works if we only have the one piece of text?

SHE: In our case, it's not the text that's important; it's the inclusion of objects that are compatible with the garden as a whole. 

This was a pipe standard for a basketball backboard and basket that was set in concrete next to the driveway when we bought the house. We tried, without success, to turn it into a garden sculpture. 

HE: Remember how we struggled with the baskeball standard? You so desperately wanted that to work as sculpture; and no matter what we tried, what color we painted it, where we placed it, we were never happy with it. 

SHE: Unlike the obelisk, which has always looked great no matter how you configured it or where we put it.

This sculpture is made of 84 pieces of limestone recycled from a building project on the University of Wisconsin campus. Mark cut each pair of pieces slightly smaller that the next which gave them a gradual taper as they were stacked. Beginning with an obelisk arrangement, this is the third different stacking pattern we've used as the sculpture has been moved from place to place.

HE: Which reminds me, I've been thinking it's about time I tried something new with it.

SHE: Not until you get the Tea House finished! And maybe not even then, as the area around it has now all been landscaped using it as a focal point.

HE: Getting back to the subject, what about the cello piece?

This is a cast iron form used to make 3/4 size cellos. We found it at a local shop — "Unearthed" — that specializes in recycled industrial products for the home.

SHE: I like it.

HE: I don't know. I find it somehow too literal, not literary, but concrete, for the garden. I'd like to try it inside. I think music is more of an indoor idea.

SHE: What about the bells? We've got what, eight bells in the garden? What's the difference?

Paolo Soleri casts these bells and sells them to support Arcosanti, an "ecological human habitat" he's been building in Arizona since 1970.

HE: Well the bells are as much about the sound as they are about their form. They're about interacting — with the wind in the case of the Soleri bells — and with people for the ones that need to be struck to make a sound. The cello, for me, is about the contradictions: the heavy iron version of a delicate instrument, pitted rust versus polished wood.

SHE: I'm willing to give it a try inside. Oh, and I thought of something else that works that's round — our ceramic platters.

A wood-fired stoneware platter, by Mark Skudlarek of Cambridge Woodfired Pottery near Cambridge, Wisconsin, hangs outside our backdoor. (It is 18 inches in diameter).

HE: I won't argue with you about that. There's something about wood-fired ceramics that just seems to be a natural in the garden. 

SHE: How long ago was it that I took you out to Mark Skudlarek's to see his big pots?

HE: And we came home with the biggest one he had.

Wood-fired pot by Mark Skudlarek, approximately 24 inches high.

SHE: And never regretted it.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day: 07.15.09

A dozen small pleasures add up to a delicate pointillist bouquet.

This arrangement is just over one foot tall. The flowers in the bouquet are listed in order of posting. Image 1: Echinacea hybrid 'Sundown,' 2: Geranium oxonium 'A.T. Johnson,'  3: Nepeta subsessils 'Sweet Dreams,' 4: Allium, 5: Spirea japonica 'Magic Carpet,' 6: Chrysanthemum parthenium 'Gold Moss,' 7: Lysimachia ciliata purpurea; 8: Hosta 'Gold Edger,' 9: Astrantia major, 10: Nepeta hybrida (most likely 'Souvenir d'Andre Chaudron'), 11: Sempervivum 'Oddity,' 12: Digitalis grandiflora.

To see past GBBD posts, click on that subject in the categories list. To see what gardeners around the world have blooming on July 15th, check out the home of Garden Bloggers Bloom Day: May Dreams Gardens.

Blueberry tart time travel

Our neighbors to the west of us had us over to proudly show off their newly planted blueberry bushes this past week. Last year at this time, our neighbors on the other side, went to their cabin — "up north," as folks say here in Wisconsin — in late July. But not before they called us over to their huge veggie garden and pointed out the location of all their blueberry bushes — which were heavy with unripe fruit. While they were away, we feasted on their low-bush blueberries over vanilla ice cream, in pancakes, in lemony muffins and in my favorite treat: blueberry tart. And now we've got twice the opportunity to enjoy local blueberries.

I've been following this blueberry recipe since Judy Culp gave me the directions when we were both teaching at the DeWitt Road Elementary School in Webster, NY. Not a summer goes by without this dessert appearing on my table. And every time I make it, I see the faces of all the folks — children and grown-ups alike — who populated that school. 

That was another life, another world, another me. But a slice of Judy's tart can always take me back — if only for as long as it takes me to devour it.

JUDY CULP'S BLUEBERRY TART

1 cup water

1 cup sugar

3 Tablespoons cornstarch

pinch of salt

Mix first four ingredients together. Heat until it begins to thicken.

Add one cup fresh blueberries (picked over and washed).

Cook until they begin to pop and mixture is thick. 

Stir in the rest of a quart of blueberries plus a dab of butter.

Pour into a pie shell that you've already baked and let the filling cool and solidify before serving.