Here are sweet peas, on tiptoe for a flight; With wings of gentle flush o’er delicate white, And taper fingers catching at all things, To bind them all about with tiny rings. – John Keats, English Romantic poet
Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades. – Boris Pasternak, Russian poet, novelist, and literary translator
I’ll leave the actual odes to the sweet pea, or lathyrus, to John Keats and Boris Pasternak, the real poets. I’m just going to gush about the new favorite flower for this season and share pictures of my bounty. Last year was the first season I’d planted seeds and they actually sprouted and gave me these beautiful bi-colored, deep blue-and-magenta flowers for many months. I carefully saved the dried seed pods and gave the seeds away and kept a handful.
I went crazy and bought half a dozen or seven different varieties at Annie’s Annuals. Last fall, I had David and Jacob cut down the two shrubs that were originally planted when we remodeled the backyard in the late spring of 2017, which David was not happy about doing. Apparently, our landscape architect was sad about it, too, because we had broken up the flow of the shrubbery from all around the perimeter of the backyard. But I felt that the shrubs were overtaking the small patio area and I wanted to look out in the kitchen/family room windows during spring and summer and see greenery and color!
So I planted the fledgling plants and here’s where my visual ode to the laythrus begins. Enjoy!
Once the shrubs were taken down, David and Jacob painted the ugly red fence that we’d painted more than 20 years ago. I resurrected the book-reading fairy with broken wing that we had gotten maybe as many as 25 years ago and that had been forgotten in the side yard. (Side note: We had buried our first family dog Bailey’s dog toys after she had passed away in the side yard and planted the winged fairy to watch over her toys.) We put up trellises (little did we know that this wouldn’t be enough for the bounteous sweet peas). I planted a few tulips and may plant more to give some color for very early spring. I also planted three different columbines, or aquilegia, in the front to provide some color at the bottom of the planter box. I also later planted a low-ground violet viola and the lacy orlaya grandiflora, or Minoan lace, annual, to provide some pretty white contrast to smaller bouquets. More on them later. This is March 23rd.
The sweet peas have started climbing the trellis and the columbine are starting to take flight. This is April 21st.
Early May: We had secured the trellis to the fence and put up smaller trellises in the front. We would soon need to tie strong string across various planks to keep the vines upright. As you can see, I planted them too close together (lesson learned for next season).
Mid-May: This is what I see from the kitchen table. This is exactly the scene I had envisioned last fall for this spring.
Early June. Despite all the support systems, ad hoc as they were, the vines were so heavy and laden with blooms that they pitched forward. What ended up happening is that we have a little bit of a natural overhang. I can’t get to the blooms close to the fence on the other side of this overhang – something we’ll have to figure out for next year.
Mid-June in full bloom: And here you can see the orlaya grandiflora below my favorite sweet pea variety, Frances Kate.
This is the view when you walk out of the downstairs utility room – way better than looking at two overgrown bushes!
Another favorite besides the Frances Kate is the North Shore sweet pea.
I strategically planted the orlaya grandiflora beneath the Frances Kate and North Shore sweet peas. Imagine them in a small bouquet together!
The early bloom of the orlaya grandiflora, or Minoan lace.
And when they go crazy blooming. Now you know why they’re called Minoan lace, originating from the island of Crete.
The ever-favorite butterfly-kite-like columbine is a perfect companion in the sweet pea planter box. And white is a nice compliment against the green, pink, white, and magenta colors all around this columbine.
So one thing I didn’t think of was the attraction to bees! Lots of them. A nice surprise is seeing birds coming in and out, and the hummingbirds hovering and resting on the dewy vines and seeking shade beneath the overhang.
This is one of the first bouquets in the spring – later April. The stems were wonderfully long, which meant I could use slender vases. This is a mix of Bix, Solstice Crimson, Nuance, and Bix.
More long-stemmed bouquets. As the season wore on, the stems have become shorter and shorter, which is something to note when procuring vases for sweet peas for the season – getting enough vases with the right height and circumference for the beginning and middle-end of the season!
A typical harvest every third day – seriously. I could spend an hour cutting and then putting them in short vases or cups.
An early mix of sweet peas when they were just starting to bloom.
This set, which I found at T.J. Maxx, is originally for utensils for an outdoor party, but they are much prettier as vases. From left to right: a mix of Blue Vein, Solstice Crimson, and Annie B. Gilroy in the first vase; a mix of North Shore and Cupani in the second vase; and a mix of Nuance and Bix in the third vase.
Another mix in a vase that had several “pockets” for bunches of flowers.
I have become a collector of tiny bottles and vases. Even a small vintage pitcher that I found in a vintage store is perfect for sweet peas – Bix on the left and Frances Kate on the right.
One harvest produced a row of sweet-smelling blooms. Oh, and that’s my artist friend Tana’s painting hanging in our library!
And now for individual attention to each variety. The Solstice Crimson didn’t last long and produced few blooms. It came up early and died early. I think that was due to planting too many of them so close together. Next year, I’ll find a singular spot for this beauty.
The Blue Vein was also one that struggled. Few blooms, tiny blooms. But oh so pretty up close. Again, I’ll have to find another spot so this one can shine next year.
Look at the Blue Vein up close and you’ll see why it’s aptly named! They look like butterflies on a stem! Lovely, lovely!
This gorgeous variety is called North Shore. Delicately marked and bi-colored, this sweet pea is going to have its own place in the garden so it doesn’t get lost among the similarly colored sweet peas.
Here is a small bouquet of North Shore sweet peas and the seed pods of love-in-a-mist.
I think this is a North Shore slowly deepening its colors.
Nuance (pink) mixed with Bix (cream tinged with pink)
Close-of mostly Nuance with some Bix at the top.
Like cotton candy up close! A mix of Nuance and Bix.
I tend to stuff the sweet pea bouquets because there are so many blooms. However, a few, some tender and not opened yet, give a Victorian feel, especially when put into a bottle that looks Victorian.
Cupani, a frangrant heirloom sweet pea.
Another version of the Cupani. I’m not quite sure whether these blooms are from the seeds of last year’s sweet pea. A couple of the varieties look similar!
I saved the best for last: Frances Kate. This variety has remained long-stemmed even at this stage of the season. I love how the stems twist and turn, so all you have to do is put them in a small vase and they create their own architectural shapes, almost like a Japanese arrangement.
Ruffly blooms, they’re like tiny full skirts.
A symmetrical shaped arrangement.
Another arrangement.
A wild, natural-looking arrangement.
Here is the vintage pitcher that is well suited for long-stemmed Frances Kate sweet pea.
I love the long, curved stems of the Frances Kate, the ruffly petals, and the intense purple markings and edging.
Another close-up.
And the last close-up.
When I write, I love having the bouquets around me, so I can enjoy their fragrance and their intense colors.
And our broken-winged, reading fairy is also happy to be among the sweet peas in his new spot in the backyard patio garden. I’ve learned some lessons for next year – don’t plant so closely, spray for powdery mildew earlier, set up the trellis and string/wire much earlier, and find other places in the garden so that I can accommodate the current varieties I planted and the others that I didn’t get at Annie’s Annuals but will next year. Hope you enjoyed the sweet pea mini-garden. Stay tuned for an expanded version next year!
May I a small house and large garden have; And a few friends, And many books, both true. ― Abraham Cowley, 17th century English poet
At some point this summer, I hope to actually enjoy my garden. I mean resting and not pruning, pinching back buds, weeding, and so on, but actually sitting in one of the chairs in the garden and reading a book, thinking about a tangle in a chapter in my novel-in-progress, eating a snack or a meal, or just hanging out with family members, as if I didn’t have a million things to do, as if I had all the time in the world, as if I could have a really long sentence and not care where the period ends it.
In the meantime, I wanted to put together what the garden looks like this season. I’ll start with when our magnolia trees were in full bloom back in late February, when COVID-19 was spreading across our country and we had no idea we would find ourselves in shelter in place.
Our backyard isn’t that big (perhaps it is in the Bay Area), but a picture of one and a half of our magnolia trees makes the yard seem like a park. This is our magnolia tress in full bloom.
Our magnolia tress from the view of our intrepid, watchful angel.
Our tulips starting coming up in March, on the heels of the daffodils. And I see those pesky bluebells, which we thought we’d pulled all bulbs many years ago. They are persistent, I will give them that.
We always welcome the California poppies that brighten up our side yard and front yard.
I don’t know what the name of this beautiful shrub is in the backyard, but in the spring it explodes in beautiful purple flowers. We also have this shrub in the front yard. I failed to remember the name of flower bulbs I bought at Costco and planted in the fall. It was a colorful mix. But I also planted ranunculus bulbs.
Here are some of the mystery flowers that made that flower box really vibrant with color.
More colors.
Close-ups of this flower box.
Delicate flowers, vibrant colors.
Oh, hello, Sammy!
Behold the pink ranunculus!
Here’s the shrub in all its glory.
Here’s one of my favorite pictures of the garden. This is what I see when I step out from the family room’s sliding glass door to the landing. Good morning!
Our angel bathed in light and hammered steel drum garden art.
I had to replace the gnarly dianthus on the right of this flower box, but our Chomley Farran and red dianthus went gangbusters this season. They are starting to fade and peter out, but it was a really good season for them this year. I love how the morning light makes a grand statement in this picture.
Another shot of our angel and a sunspot.
Another morning before I pruned the miniature roses and uncovered our angel.
In April, the yellow columbine or aquilegia were ready to take off in flight.
Close-up of the delicate yellow columbine.
Looking at the corner of the garden with flower boxes.
One day, I will read a book in this corner.
I decided to redo my pathetic mini succulent gardens and put them outdoors.
Hidden under the magnolia tree in the corner garden are wind chimes, a white bird house, and one of my favorite garden art – the copper leaves.
A recent addition to the pots in the corner garden – viola ‘Karma Blue Butterfly” in front paired with calceolaria mexicana in the background.
If you keep going from the corner to the fence running to the side yard of dahlias, you will come across a pair of smiling garden sprites under the magnolia trees and above a stone bench and stone bird bath on a pedestal. I love these little stone guys. They bring a little interest and joy beneath the magnolia trees.
More garden art and a little succulent bouquet beneath the magnolia tree.
In the dahlia garden hangs a heavy stone sculpture. I’m not sure where I got it, but I love the Renaissance feel of it. The three headless nudes watch over the dahlias.
I didn’t take care of the dahlias early in the season when I should have, so this season I’ve been battling snails, cucumber beetles, and earwigs. I’m trying to catch up, but this season the dahlias aren’t lasting as long in bloom as they have in the past. We also had to deal with a gopher, which David took care of in quick order. We had dug up all the dahlias from the ground the winter of 2017, but nearly four years later, we will have to dig them up again and separate them and then put them back in the ground. This is no small feat, but we need to take care of our beauties.
A magenta dahlia. Hopefully I will be better about taking care of my favorite flower early in the season so they are hardier and longer lasting.
At the corner of the side yard of dahlias, three clay and metal versions of the sun watch over the delphiniums, ginger, and dahlias in pots.
From our front porch, you can look down into the dahlia side yard garden. A hint of what’s to come.
David captured a hummingbird in our alquilegia in the patio.
My favorite blue hydrangea greets me when I step out of our utility room into the patio area of the garden.
If you come around the other side of the backyard garden, you’ll see the patio.
What’s new this year? I had David and Jacob tear out the bushes in the planter in the patio that our landscape architect planted to hide the view of our neighbor house. But I wanted to see color and not bushes when I look out the kitchen and family room windows. I wanted the sweet smell of sweet peas when I sit in the patio.
So back in February, after the fall when David and Jacob painted the ugly red fence a more neutral stone color, I planted about seven varieties of sweet peas (too many for a small stretch!). One were from the seeds of my one vibrant bi-color blue and purple sweet peas from last year.
Originally I was going to put garden art across the top of the fence, but the sweet peas just kept growing higher and higher. David had to tie the vines to the fence and posts. They were so heavy and thick.
I can cut sweet peas for hours one day and then cut the same amount 3-4 days later. They are so abundant and prolific. I love it. I just wish I had more room.
Our fairy with a broken wing that we bought before we even got married, now resides with the sweet peas and the aquilegia.
Our little bird on a glass globe also watches over the sweet peas.
Delphinium and guillardia.
Our landscape architect didn’t prune the alstroemeria this season, so we had them in abundance this year in our backyard. And not only a lot of them, but Amazonian-size orange and pink alstroemeria. They made wonderful jumbo bouquets this season.
Miniature dahlias in a pot at the edge of our patio.
Violet scabiosa in a stone container by the edge of the patio.
I have red, white, pink and orange gerberas that come up reliably every year since I planted them four years ago.
One of my favorite flowers is the scabiosa – in all different colors and varieties. I have planted them in the front, side, and backyards, and I never get very many blooms. This year I am planting a variety of them in one of the planter boxes. We’ll see if I’m able to get a good crop.
Our garden attracts birds, bees, and butterflies. Isabella took a picture of this little guy enjoying the view from our fence. Thanks for taking a tour of this year’s garden. See you next year!
Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time. ― John Lubbock, English banker, Liberal politician, philanthropist, scientist and polymath, from The Use Of Life
When I was in elementary school, one of my teachers assigned us an art exercise to sit outside the classroom and draw the clouds. It was her way of teaching us about the different types of clouds by engaging us and tapping our creativity, instead of just going through the textbook. I remembered drawing them and falling in love with clouds. I even loved the names they were given – cirrocumulus, cirrus, and cirrostratus (the high clouds); altocumulus, altostratus, and nimbostratus (the mid-level clouds); and stratus, cumulus, cumulonimbus, and stratocumulus (the low clouds).
Flash forward several decades and I find that when I walk our dog, Sammy, and our previous family dogs, I have tended to look down at the sidewalk. Of course, I look at the homes in the neighborhood and the landscaping and flowers and trees. But I usually – most noticeably before shelter in place – spend that time thinking things through, either with work or my novel. On what I call our shelter-in-place walks (simply walks that David, Isabella, and I have taken around the greater neighborhood), I have paid more attention to details, to plants and flowers, trees and animals. But that’s for another blog post. I discovered the clouds again. One evening in particular, the clouds were so ethereal that I took photographs with my smartphone, fully know that they could never capture the wonder that I saw with the naked eye at that moment in time.
And yet, I was pleasantly surprised that many of the photos did their best to capture what I saw and produce in me an awe, a catch-the-breath moment. So I thought a few weeks ago, when I have time, when I make time, I want to share my cloud photos. And here they are. Enjoy.
This photo was taken on our early shelter-in-place (SIP) walks up the hilly Moeser Street and then a detour to get to El Cerrito’s Memorial Grove. It was about 5 o’clock on a mid-March middle of the week afternoon. San Francisco is on the left, with Alcatraz not far off. You can see the Golden Gate Bridge and Marin on the right. I didn’t think the clouds would be adequately captured, but there is a sense of the heavens in these clouds, an expansiveness, possibilities, even if they be filled with awe and dread.
Here’s an even farther view out of the Bay and city of El Cerrito below us. Here the clouds and sky really make one feel quite small and insignificant.
Final shot of that evening’s walk, with a focus on the clouds and open space in the sky above the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marin headlands.
I couldn’t escape the rooftops and telephone wires, but I had to capture this full-bodied cumulus cloud. I think about the plane rides where you go through a bank of clouds and there’s this other-worldly sense to it. I imagine to myself sometimes what would it be like to be in the middle of that cloud. Like thick Tule fog, no doubt.
When the sun is behind the clouds, these amazing shadows and shapes edged with light capture your attention. It was a windy late afternoon when I looked up and admired the clouds.
The other thing I love to do is watch clouds change shape and sail on by on a windy day. These clouds had such texture to them.
Stepping back, I wanted to capture this march of clouds being prodded by the wind.
The rest of the photos are from a single evening in May where I was mesmerized by the clouds and I confess that I couldn’t curate the many photos I took, so please bear with me. Here is a mix of feathery cirrus clouds and cotton-ball cumulus clouds.
A trace of chiaroscuro on this photo.
More cirrus clouds intermingling with altocumulus clouds. This reminds me of a painting I imagine that my artist friend, Tana would paint.
I love the layering of altocumulus clouds against the cirrus clouds, how the dark altocumulus clouds contrast and come to the forefront.
This photo looks surreal. It reminds me of what a Raphael sky would look like. The sky is an amazing shade of cornflower blue. The cirrus clouds look like they’re raining down on the altocumulus clouds, with their white glow in the background giving this photo a three-dimensional feel to it.
When you go farther out with the camera view, it feels like a cloud fireworks – cloudworks – is erupting in the sky. I would love to see my artist friend Kathy render her interpretation of this photo.
The “tentacles” hanging down from these clouds remind me of jellyfish. And note the light edging the clouds in the top right-side of the photo.
The picture before this one was cropped. Here’s the full view. You can see the shadowy altocumulus clouds below the wispy cirrus clouds above it. I love the light and shadow play.
It was a half-moon evening. I love how the cirrus clouds around the moon looks like smoke from a cigarette and the subtle shades of blue in the sky and clouds.
Stepping back for the full effect, with the half-moon in view.
Cloud ripples and inky blots.
More loveliness. A close-up of the photo below. The white cloud on the left seems to sparkle.
The sky or the heavens?
The half-moon and the raining clouds. Goodnight Clouds, Goodnight, Moon.
In joy or sadness, flowers are our constant friends. ― Okakura Kakuzo, Japanese scholar, from The Book of Tea
It’s already June and I’m late with my spring bouquets blog. That said, time has been flying for some years now and this, to say the least, has been an unusual year. We are certainly living in interesting times – unprecedented times for our generation. Sheltered in place since March 16th, we are coming upon the end of our third month. One thing that the novel coronavirus has not canceled is the arrival of spring, the arrival of spring flowers in our yard.
Now that I no longer deliver weekly bouquets for the middle school auction, I have the freedom to make the bouquets whenever and each week to ask a local friend if she would like some flowers to enjoy. So without further ado, here are this spring’s bounty to share. One new addition to the garden has been different varieties of sweet peas, and while I’ll post them here, I will blog separately about my new favorite flower. So here we go!
I didn’t cut very many tulips this year. I was so busy with writing and work that I didn’t have time, but I also, for some reason, was reluctant to cut them because they were so beautiful and plentiful in the side yard this spring. So this is a rare bouquet that I made in late March. I dedicated this bouquet and the next to my cousin Annie Esperanza, who passed away untimely after a failed heart transplant. I gave the bouquet to Birthe, who always won the middle school auction year and after, because I knew she would appreciate them. I really enjoyed pairing the yellow butterfly-like columbines with the lipstick-red tulips.
Here is another view of the same bouquet. In addition to the two different types of tulip, I also added the flighty yellow columbines and the sturdy gerberas.
Here are my favorite calla lilies paired with deep magenta tulips and a new flower in our garden, pink ranunculus. I saw pictures of ballet-pink ranunculus, and I loved the tight layers of petals, almost like an old-fashioned tulle skirt.
Here’s a close-up up the pink ranunculus and the pollen-covered calla lily.
I spy two other tulips with their feather-like petals and a magenta ranunculus beside another pink ranunculus with even tighter petals (these look like streamers before you unspool them.
Birthe was the recipient of this trio of spring bouquets.
Calla lilies, white and blue scabiosas, red dianthus, and new flowers from a spring mix I got at Costco.
More on this beauty in a later blog, but here are four different varieties of the ever-fragrant sweet peas that I planted in the planter box in the patio.
I also thought gerberas were annuals, but one year I left them in the planter box in the backyard after the season, and to my surprise, they came up the following spring. They last through summer and are hardy and are coming up with taller stems. So red and pink gerberas, lavender and blue scabiosas, and red dianthus, with a little fern.
So our once-a-year gardener/landscaper usually thins out our alstroemeria very late winter. This year they didn’t, and I’m glad they didn’t. We had a ton of them, and a ton of Amazonian-size blooms. I could have made three or even four bouquets out of the flowers that I stuffed into this vase, but I guess I was seeing how many stems I could fit into the vase. The great thing about alstroemeria is that they are long lasting in a vase. A post-birthday and belated Mother’s Day arrangement for Kelly.
Here is another alstroemeria bouquet. With each one I started getting better about shaping them (not this one, though) and making sure the blooms were all over. For my friend Raissa.
Using a vase that one of the kids made in a summer camp years ago, I created this little beauty – my favorite Chomley Farran bi-colored dianthus and also red dianthus, white gerbera, small magenta dahlias, and blue and lavender scabiosas.
A close-up of the Chomley-Farran dianthus, pink dahlia, and blue scabiosas.
Lone calla lily, scabiosas, a few white columbines, and different varieties of dahlias.
This next batch of flowers were for my friend Susie. Here is a top view of six different varieties of sweet peas. Too bad you can scratch and sniff. The sweetness is intoxicating, wafting through the room when you walk by.
This vase had five different “pockets” to put flowers in, which suited the different varieties of sweet peas like a hand in a glove.
More alstroemeria!
I love this little bouquet: red and bi-colored Chomley-Farran dianthus, red and pink gerbera, tiny magenta dahlias, and miniature white roses.
This mostly dahlias bouquet with lone calla lily features miniature white roses and a few blue scabiosas. In honor of our friend Dan’s graduation and birthday!
My favorite sweet peas. The way this beauty grows out, most of its stems are curved, which makes it quite easy to make interesting miniature bouquets with it.
These next and last bouquets were delivered to my friend Karen. I’m finally sort of getting it right in terms of shaping the alstroemeria.
The usual sweet small bouquet that I’ve added love-in-a-mist flowers, which are now turning into beautiful seed pods and thus make a great addition to bouquets.
My favorite deep-blue hydrangea from our patio is the centerpiece for this small bouquet of white dianthus, miniature magenta dahlias, lavender and two blue scabiosas, and the seed pods of love-in-a-mist flowers.
A close-up portrait in monochrome.
Highlighting the delicate and beautiful annual orlaya grandiflora, “Minoan Lace.”
The all-dahlia bouquet.
Close-up of dahlia blooms.
And the sweet pea that reminds me of Japanese art.
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