A Village in the Fields now available in eBook format

Books are no more threatened by Kindle than stairs by elevators.
– Stephen Fry, English comedian, actor, writer, and activist

For those of you who like reading in electronic format, with its advantages of portability and cost-effectiveness, I’m announcing the release of my debut novel, A Village in the Fields, which was published by Eastwind Books of Berkeley in September 2015, as an eBook. You can order your copy, at $19.95, at Smashwords.com. Check out the link here.

It’s my hope that an eBook version of my historical novel enables more Asian-American Studies professors to include my book in their reading list for their Filipino-American history courses. Desk copies of the eBook for the purpose of teaching are available. Please contact me at info@pattyenrado.com.

Enjoy your summer reading . . . into fall semester!

 

Porterville College C.H.A.P. presentation

It’s a funny thing coming home. Nothing changes. Everything looks the same, feels the same, even smells the same. You realize what’s changed is you.
– F. Scott Fitzgerald, American writer

I received the link to a presentation I had given at Porterville College on October 7, 2016, for PC’s Cultural, Historical Awareness Program (C.H.A.P.). The theme of my presentation was called, “Coming Home: Finding My Filipino-American Roots.” You can view it on the CCC YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/xNQ16dnwb_o or click here. Enjoy!

Me and my book at the PC bookstore.

Returning to my alma mater!

Book signing after the presentation.

The late August and September garden

If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
– Marcus Tullius Cicero, Roman politician and lawyer

I continue to catalog the bouquets from my garden.

The August 26th bouquet for our LUNAFEST chair, Joann. She has done so much for the East Bay LUNAFEST film festival the past 10 years, that delivering bouquets this summer was just a small token of my appreciation for all that she does and continues to do in the community.

The other side of the bouquet.

The August 30th bouquet for Joann.

Close-up of the August 30th bouquet. I love the combination of pink and blue.

We spend Labor Day Weekend with my cousin and her husband, who live in the next town over from our hometown of Terra Bella. I brought cut flowers and made an arrangement for her dining room table. The light hit it just right in the early morning.

Another view of the bouquet in its pretty green vase, with alstromeria, dahlias, and arctotis.

The September 4th bouquet for Joann.

The September 10th bouquet for Joann.

A late bloomer, one of my new favorites is the rudbeckia hirta “Cherry Brandy.” I love the deep cherry red of this hardy flower.

A nice close-up of a scabiosa and a pink and orange zinnia. I love the little star-shaped details in the center of the zinnia.

The September 16th bouquet for Joann.

A close-up of a zinnia and scabiosas.

Zinnias in the planter box in mid-September.

A butterfly on a miniature bi-color rose, which we got from Trader Joe’s. At first the roses turned black and I cut the four different kinds of roses way back. Then they came back, and they are healthy and prolific bloomers. I’m glad I stuck with them and didn’t pull them out and compost them!

David caught this bee visiting our cosmos. We are excited to see so many bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds in our backyard, which is something that we told our landscape architect that we wanted to see with regard to flower and plant selection.

Following the path of the butterfly as it lands in the monster red straw plant in our backyard garden.

The September 20th bouquet for Joann. I like this painting-like photo of this bouquet. The gourd, which my cousin Janet made, gives it an autumnal touch, especially with the red gaillardia x grandi celebration flora, which is right in the front.

A close-up of the September 20th bouquet. The zinnias give it a fall touch.

We had a LUNAFEST reunion dinner at committee member Laurie’s house. Along with a bottle of wine, dessert, and David’s torta, I made this bouquet for the hostess.

I made two bouquets for my friend Soizic. One always brings bottles of wine and bouquets for the hostess. This one features alstromeria, echinacea, dianthus, scabiosa, and amazingly the resurrected dahlias. This is a favorite of mine this season, too.

The second bouquet for my friend Soizic. This one has a lot of zinnias and arctotis. I really like this bouquet, and I consider it one of my favorites of the season.

Looking back on the garden in August

Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. Gardening is an instrument of grace.
– May Sarton, American poet, novelist, and memoirist

It’s already October, mid-October at that, and I’m behind in my reportage of my summer garden. Time to play catch-up. Here are the bouquets of late summer, with fall bouquets still in production.

For the August 11th delivery for the Korematsu bouquets, here’s the first one.

Here’s the second Korematsu bouquet, a more colorful and bright bouquet.

A close-up of my favorite, the scabiosa, which for the first time in my garden has been giving me more than a few blooms per season. And oh the beauty of the light yellow dahlia tipped in the faintest of pink hues.

The deep pink dahlia in all its perfection.

And the spiked magenta dahlia.

Dinner-plate size pink dahlia.

Spiked fireworks dahlia.

When I was in Maine, I found some beautiful little bottles, some vintage, at some shops in Brunswick. Since I have a lot of flowers that are short-stemmed but equally beautiful, I thought to highlight them in this display. I put them on a platter and used this display as decoration for David’s office group party in mid-August.

Here’s a close-up of the bottles, holding echinacea, rudbeckia “Prairie Sun,” centaurea cyanus blue, and a pink rudbeckia-type flower.

I made a bouquet for David’s office group party, as well. Cosmos, dianthus, and alstromeria accompanied this bouquet of dahlias.

The platter of tiny bouquets decorated the kitchen table alongside a plate of Isabella’s homemade vanilla iced scones.

A pair of swooping swallows, made in Haiti by artisans using reclaimed steel oil drums, appreciate the tiny bouquets I made that was placed on the tables in the patio for the party.

The August 15th bouquet is spilling over in its splendor, with white snow puff cosmos and monster red straw flowers.

For the August 15th ECHS bouquet, I added a platter of tiny bouquets.

The next day, August 16th, I had a lot of flowers to cut, so I made this bouquet for our LUNAFEST chair, Joann. The scabiosa, monster red straw flowers, and zinnias were in abundance.

Another view of the August 16th bouquet for Joann.

One more view of the August 16th bouquet. I confess I’m not great at curating these photos. This one shows off the pink zinnias.

This August 18th bouquet for the Korematsu auction winners is one of my all-time favorites. I like it because it’s so horizontal and bountiful.

Here’s a top-down close-up with zinnias, rudbeckia, echinacea, scabiosa, cosmos, and pink arctotis (African daisy).

The other side of this horizontal bouquet.

The second August 18th bouquet for the other Korematsu auction winner.

A close-up of this second bouquet, featuring rudbeckia, echinacea, arctotis, and zinnia.

I have fallen in love with the zinnia, so I’ll be growing more of these long-lasting flowers next year, even if they are annuals.

The other side of the second bouquet.

The August 20th bouquet for Joann.

A close-up of scabiosa columbaria, “flutter deep blue.”

The other side of Joann’s bouquet.

A variety of African daisy, another new flower that I’ve introduced to the garden.

Joann invited me to attend the El Cerrito City Hall’s time capsule celebration, one of the many events commemorating the city’s centennial. So I made a bouquet to take to City Hall.

A close-up of one of my favorite dahlias in the August 24th bouquet.

The bouquet at City Hall.

Riding in the El Cerrito Centennial parade

It’s been my belief that learning how to do something in your hometown is the most important thing.
– Pete Seeger, American folk singer and social activist

My town of El Cerrito, Calif., where I’ve lived since 1996, is celebrating its centennial this year. One of the major events for the celebration was the Showcase Parade, which featured 59 groups or distinguished individuals. I was invited to participate as a local award-winning writer. But the biggest honor was sharing the red convertible with Gail Tsukiyama, award-winning writer of eight novels and resident of El Cerrito.

Pictures say it all, so I will let them do the talking.

Everyone is getting ready for the start of the parade at the staging grounds. Lots of convertibles and jeeps.

Ruth, our driver and owner of the red convertible, took a picture of Gail and me before the parade started.

And we’re off! That’s Nathan the Magician behind us, who unicycled and juggled all the way to the end of the parade – and wearing a dress shirt and tie! Nathan is an El Cerrito High School grad who, after college, became a full-time magician.

The parade in front of us. We turned right onto Richmond Street, which is a major street in El Cerrito. The ECHS marching band was in front of us, too.

We’ve got our signs up!

Looking behind us. Keeping Nathan honest.

My sad attempt at a selfie with Gail as we enjoy the 70s music that the El Cerrito High School dance group was dancing to.

The energetic ECHS dance troupe entertaining us all.

Residents waved from their picture windows of their homes on residential Richmond Street, and many pulled up their chairs and waved from the curbside.

I recognized a number of families from our schools, and was pleasantly surprised to see our long-time friends Yoko and Bruce at one of the street corners.

Coming up Moeser Street and getting closer to Cerrito Vista Park, our destination.

More crowd shots.

We have an active El Cerrito Arts and Culture Committee, thanks to parent and San Francisco State professor Chris Sterba. Marching in the parade is Maw Shein Win, El Cerrito’s Poet Laureate, in the red with the hat.

David, my husband, was near the park entrance and took this picture of Gail and me. And that’s Chris Sterba on the left, handing out leaflets on the Arts and Culture Committee.

A close-up as we drove by.

And I had to include this photo of Ernie Broglio, who is an ECHS alum who also pitched for the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs. Best known as the player who was traded to the Cubs from the Cardinals in exchange for Lou Brock. Yep, you know which team made out big. But the other big thing is that our house is Ernie’s childhood home. His family was the first owners of our current house. We are the second owners. After the parade, David went up to tell him we own his house. What a pleasant surprise that was for him!

The end of the road for us, while more townspeople gather at Cerrito Vista Park. What a great event.

How does the garden grow? A pictorial from mid-July to early August

A garden should make you feel you’ve entered privileged space – a place not just set apart but reverberant – and it seems to me that, to achieve this, the gardener must put some kind of twist on the existing landscape, turn its prose into something nearer poetry.
– Michael Pollan, American author, journalist, activist, and professor of journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, from Second Nature: A Gardener’s Education

When one talks about his or her garden, it’s best left to pictures. So I’ll do that. I’m picking up from my last blog post and displaying photos of the bouquets beginning with July 14th. But first, some solo shots in the dahlia garden.

This petite tri-color dahlia has tight tubular petals.

Another petite dahlia with spikey petals.

One of my favorites – a deep maroon dahlia, which was one of my prolific bloomers.

One of the two Korematsu bouquets for July 14th.

Closeup with heliotrope alba trailing down the vase and rudbeckia “Prairie Sun” on the left and right.

The second Korematsu bouquet for July 14th.

Closeup with the rare white dahlia and a tiny orange zinnia in attendance.

Front car seat loaded up with flowers, with my daughter, Isabella, dutifully assisting me on all my deliveries. And Sammy, too.

A July 16th bouquet for my friend Kelly, with the birthday gift that keeps on giving.

This petite orange dahlia has been a productive flower all summer.

Because I can’t get enough of this rare white dinner plate-size dahlia. Perfection.

The July 18th ECHS bouquet with a pink and burgandy theme.

The other side of this same bouquet looks like a different bouquet – with carnations, daisies, helipterum roseum “Pierrot,” and cosmos bipinnatus “Snow Puff.”

A tiny arrangement that will keep my friend, Joann, happy because these echibeckia Summerina Yellow daisies will look great as a dried arrangement.

My bonus bouquet for Tuesday, July 18th, was given to my LUNAFEST chair and community leader extraordinaire, Joann.

A closeup with a big beautiful yellow dahlia, which is original to the first owner of our home, ol’ Joe Broglio. Also starring centaurea cyanus blue, alstroemeria, and Love in a Mist.

I only had one delivery for my July 21st Korematsu bouquets because one of the families went away on vacation. So I call this bouquet my stuffed dahlia arrangement.

Bear with me, as I couldn’t curate the pictures for this particular bouquet. Another angle with one of my favorite and also rare salmon, orange-colored dahlia in the middle.

A closeup of this beauty of a dahlia.

And another closeup, but of the pink variety, which looks beautiful next to the trailing heliotrope alba.

Magenta and burgundy.

And the pale yellow dahlia with pale pink streaks.

The day that I was leaving to take a red-eye to Portland, ME, for my business trip, I couldn’t resist making two last bouquets. To whom to give them? This went to my neighbor Carla.

Closeup of the brash and showy bi-color dahlias.

My neighbor Faith got the yellow and orange dahlia arrangement.

When I got back early Monday morning, July 31st, the garden was bursting with flowers.

I got back to work with gusto. Look at all these blooms!

I made four bouquets in all. First, the August 1st ECHS bouquet.

It’s really a rare dahlia, though I take a million pictures of it.

This compact bouquet of maybe only six dahlias was a statement piece nonetheless with the dinner-plate size of the blooms. The recipient of this red, purple, and yellow bouquet? My friend Joann.

Even though it was a Tuesday, August 1st, I had enough for the Korematsu auction winners. This pale but bursting beauty was one of the Korematsu bouquets.

Closeup of the spikey pale yellow dahlias with scabiosa atropurpurea “Florist Blue.”

This is the second Korematsu bouquet. Because of the lighting and its resulting moodiness, this picture reminds me of a Dutch still life, a Vermeer.

The same bouquet in bright light.

Back to the Friday delivery of the Korematsu bouquets. Here is the August 4th first bouquet, anchored by a ginger plant and flanked by Helichrysum bractetum “Monster Rose” on the sides.

The second August 4th Korematsu bouquet.

We celebrated my college roommate Susan’s birthday on August 5th. I wanted to do a big bouquet for the celebration.

There were many stunning dahlias in this bouquet. One of my favorite dinner plate-size burgundy.

Magenta beauty.

The white dinner plate.

Yellow spiked dahlia.

What a pair.

Dahlia love.

A different view of the bouquet.

This magenta dahlia is perfectly formed, underneath a purple dahlia.

Two bouquets for the August 8th ECHS delivery. Here’s the smaller of the two – and a non-dahlia bouquet at that.

The other side of the smaller bouquet.

The second bouquet – an explosion of dahlias.

The other side of the bouquet.

Accompanying the dahlias are scabiosa atropurpurea “Florist Blue” and the venedio arctotis daisies.

Rose-colored dahlia.

Helipterum roseum “Pierrot” (white flower with black centered rimmed in yellow) and catananche caerulea “Cupid’s dart” flowers hidden in between the dahlias.

Two bouquets ready for delivery!