One Month into Spring

It snowed here last night. Not a lot, but still cold, icy, snow.

Third week in April. It's supposed to be springtime now, right?



My driveway ~ can you see the pear & apple blossoms covered in snow?


It's been a long, cold, wet winter. I am tired of the rain and snow now.



Cherry Tree & Bay Tree ~ snow frosted



CA Redbud Tree ~ in full bloom ~ snow frosted

Note my lounge chair in the photo above. The one I enjoy sunning myself in when it's warm outside. Covered in a thin layer of snow this morning. No sunning myself today!

That's the edge of my main raised bed garden to the right of the photo. Full of snow. Good thing I have been too busy to plant it yet. Only the over wintered garlic grows in there today. I normally have all of my cool weather crops in by the first week in April. Between the weather and my schedule this year, I have done almost nothing to ready my gardens. The guys did help me to weed it. So that's something.


Manzanita Trees ~ pretty when laced with snow


I long for the softness, warmth and sweet scents of Spring. I want to see my gardens grow. I love the little seedlings pushing up from the soil. So brave. So strong. So determined. I love how they grow big and produce much.

Butterflies and flowers. I am so ready for them.



Colorful Roses ~ picked April 18th

The beautiful, sweet smelling roses in this last photo, were picked at my Mom's old house located a couple of hundred miles from here in a warmer sea-level climate. It was actually almost hot there last Sunday when I collected them. They remind me of her.

© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

Tulips for My Heart

So I was down by the chicken coop when I heard the Fed Ex truck roll up my gravel driveway. The nice Fed Ex lady handed me this long cardboard box:



I had been warned to stay home to receive a Fed Ex delivery, but I was not completely sure what to expect.

Here is what I saw when I opened the box:



This is how they deliver flowers nowadays. No water. A nice vase. A packet of flower-fresh powder to mix into the water. A nice cellophane, raffia and gauze wrapping:



Colorful Spring tulips! Aren't they beautiful??

So I carefully mixed up the water and the contents of the flower-fresh packet, trimmed each stem a little bit to help the flower drink more easily, and then arranged them as best I could in their very nice vase:

My sweet kitty Jessie supervised the whole process, but I didn't get her picture this time. I think she thought I was preparing something good to eat since I was so busy in the kitchen. Given the chance, she would eat these beautiful flowers as a snack!

So these beautiful multi-colored tulips are a Valentine's Day gift from my partner Bob. Thank you Bob, my Sweetie, for bringing Spring into my home a whole month early!


Beautiful Spring Tulips

I Love Tulips!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

Flowers in the Rain

Rainy Day Flower Harvest Basket

Today is a blissfully peaceful, rainy, cloudy, sort of cool but humid day here at Mountain Harvest Basket.

My phone has not rung even once today. I can hardly believe that. I pick up the receiver occasionally to make sure the dial tone is still working.

Even my incoming emails have been less than usual. Certainly my outgoing ones are less on the weekends lately.

I love that today is a slow, stay-around-home-and-do-what-I feel-like-doing day. That is such a rarity in my life. Usually I am going in several directions at once with many partially finished tasks all at the same time and juggling phone calls, emails, people, activities, outings and events. I can do that. I am even pretty good at all that coordination stuff, but it sure wears me out to a frazzle sometimes.

Why do I feel like I always have to give 110% of my energy to each project, event or person? Why can't just part of me, my energy or my attention be "good enough"?

Because it isn't. That's why.

I am sure you all can relate to this. Then since it is impossible to give so much of myself to every single thing that I pile up on my massive To-Do lists, I get frustrated with myself and then I feel like I have failed. I freeze and proscrastinate starting projects because I know I won't be able to do them perfectly as well as I would like to. I also sometimes feel like I have let myself or others down in the process.

Sometimes I am just so stressed out that I want to run away, far away, and hide for awhile. I fantasize about jumping into my car and just driving away somewhere. Somewhere peaceful and beautiful. Somewhere where nobody knows me and nobody expects anything from me. It would be peaceful.......for awhile. Crazy thing to fantasize about, huh? Yeah, probably.

I am really not the hermit type in general though. And I can't really jump in my car and just drive away from here in search for peace, beauty and anonymity. I have responsibilities here.

So instead of running away today, I stayed here at my home and listened to it softly rain. Felt the breezes on my skin and the let the big raindrops wet my hair as I weeded my vegetable garden and picked myself a bouquet of lovely Spring flowers to brighten my day and my heart.



I picked a bunch of sweet smelling multi-colored Sweet Williams that grow down in my lower garden near the herbs and berries. While down there I discovered that I had a slightly over-ripe artichoke (also a flower) so I brought it in to eat later as a snack. On my way back to the house I snipped a few bundles of French Lavender that grows in my herb garden right below my bedroom window. Lovely, all of them.

Flowers, especially the softly scented ones, make me happy. Flowers also remind me of my Mom, and sometimes this little girl needs to feel her Mom close to her, especially on a peaceful, rainy, cloudy day sandwiched in between weeks of frenetic chaotic activity. Sometimes I need to remember that I can't do it all or be everything to everybody all the time. Sometimes it helps to imagine my Mom telling me that everything will be OK, and then to see her smile and hear her wonderful laugh...even if it is only in my memory.




Thanks Mom. These flowers are for you too. I know how much you love them.

I can feel you with me in the garden telling the flowers to grow.






© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Spring Blossoms

Braeburn Apple Blossoms

Even though today was cold and rainy here in the mountains, Spring has definitely sprung around here. Earlier this week we had high temperatures in the 80's. It was downright hot! I wore shorts & sandals (and had to shave my legs)!

Anyway, since I haven't posted anything here in awhile, I thought I'd get back into the blogging swing of things by showing you some pretty Spring blossoms.

The photo above is a close up shot of my Braeburn apple tree blossoms. The tree is covered in delicate pink blossoms this year. More than I have seen in years past. I love their pink color. This tree is now 10 years old. Some years it produces an abundance of crisp and tart apples. Other years, not so much.

This next photo is not actually of blossoms, but if you look closely you can see some tiny plums on this Santa Rosa plum tree. It blossomed a few weeks ago, and some of the blossoms and fruit survived the freakish late snow storm we had recently.


Santa Rosa Plum Tree ~ see the tiny green plums?

Next up is my newest Bartlett pear tree. It is so new that it has not produced any fruit yet. My old Bartlett pear died a few years ago. Probably due to gophers attacking its roots (even though I installed a wire gopher basket) or perhaps due to root rot. I am not sure. I purchased and planted this new little Bartlett 2 or 3 winters ago. I usually buy bare root fruit trees. They are easier to handle, cost less and seem to grow faster and stronger when transplanted.


Young Bartlett Pear Tree ~ lotsa blooms, no fruit yet


The photo below is not fruit tree blossoms or even native ornamental flowers. This is a pretty bouquet that graced our Greek Orthodox Easter dinner table last Sunday evening. Bob gave me this bright bouquet of flowers and it added just the right splash of color to go with our traditional bright red Greek Easter eggs.


Bright Spring Bouquet

I will post about both of our Easter celebrations another day. I am so behind on my posting!

Happy Spring everyone! Enjoy the warming weather.

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Spring in January?

Spring bulbs emerging early

I know that many parts of the US are having very cold weather right now. Lots of snow, ice and rain going on out there according to the weather news. Here in the Sierra foothills we have been having unseasonably mild weather all week. It's been very sunny and warm during the day with mild breezes. Feels like Spring is happening in the middle of January.

A couple of days ago, I donned a short sleeved tee shirt and a pair of summer shorts and sat in my lounge chair (you know, the lounge chair that was covered in 6 inches of snow not very long ago) to soak up some sun and get my natural vitamin D while reading my newest herb book. I must have stayed out there about an hour just enjoying the quiet day and relaxing. Something I don't do very often. I even heard a few frogs/toads waking up and talking to each other. Sure seemed like Spring was starting in the middle of January.

The photo above shows Spring bulbs, they are either crocus or grape hyacinth, that are planted in my terra cotta bowl on my porch, emerging from the soil as the weather warms up this week. They are even bigger today than when I took this photo earlier in the week.

I know we will get more cold, rainy and even snowy weather before Spring really arrives in March, but for now we are having a nice Spring preview. It is confusing the plants though. They will all pop out and then get snowed on in a few days or weeks. Always an adventure with nature.

For those of you who have colder weather where you are right now, take heart that Spring is not very far away. It will be here soon.

The nights are still cold here. Each day in the late afternoon the temperature drops and my house does get quite cool. I haven't been building many fires in my woodstove yet this winter, but I have been baking things in my kitchen. You know, just to help warm up the house...

Last week I baked a batch of banana muffins to use up the overripe bananas, and to warm up the house, of course.

I need to make another batch, as these are long gone by now, and I have more overripe bananas sitting around. And I need to keep my house warm on these cold nights....yeah...that's it...keep the house warm.

What's the weather like where you are today?

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Still Cold Here

Yard Art Hen & Chick in the Snow~ where are the other 3 chicks?

It is still very cold here today. Much snow is still on the ground, at least in the shady places. No new snow for a few days, but very cold temps have kept the snow around and made the roads and driveways icy.

It's been so cold in fact, that I moved my remaining two old hens into my living room a couple of nights ago.

Hens in the House

I think they were getting a little frostbite happening on their combs and wattles. I brought them inside to warm them up and to observe them. They seemed fine the next day, so I moved them back outside after adding more straw to their nest boxes and replacing their light bulb (used for warmth) with a higher wattage one.

I heard a strange sound a few nights ago, and wondered if it was a bobcat or coyote. Then I found these tracks on the snow.

Animal Tracks

They look more like dog tracks than a bobcat or even coyote. I did also see a stray dog running around by my driveway that same day.

I have been staying mostly inside and keeping warm with my electric heaters or with a fire in my woodstove. Of course, these beautiful red roses helped to keep my heart warm.

Thank you for my roses, Bob.

With the cold weather, and me being more housebound, I've been baking more often this week too. I find that using the oven to bake something really helps to heat the cold house and also makes some delicious food too. I love that it serves two useful purposes at the same time.


More Cast Iron Skillet Cornbread ~ this time with whole wheat flour added

I also baked a nice apricot crisp last night. No photos. No crisp left either. Between me and the guys, it is long gone already!

Happy Winter to you! Winter Solstice is tomorrow. Celebrate by lighting a candle and thanking our Universe for the light, the warmth of the sun, and the seasons.

I am thankful for all of you.



© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Red Flowers to Cheer Me

Two weeks ago I was grumbling about how the cold, rainy, grey weather was adversely affecting my mood and that my pretty red petunias had died after living through 2 summers and last winter. I wrote that I really missed their colorful red faces that greeted me when I went out to my front porch.

Well right after I published that post, Bob visited our nearest big city and brought back a beautiful red flowering plant for me. It is a cyclamen. I've never had one of those before. Look how beautiful and bright red it is!


Bright Red Cyclamen

Since receiving this cyclamen it has really blossomed out. It has 3 times as many flowers on it right now than it had when it first got here.

Then, a few days later, I was over at Jack's and was admiring his potted rose bush by the front door. So he gave me a full deep pink bloom to take home with me. It is so deep pink that it's almost red. See it there next to my pink wine:


Beautiful Rose Bloom

This cut rose bloom still looks just like this and it is almost 1 week old today. It's really lasted a long time for a rose.

Both of these flower gifts have made my life and my home a little cheerier. I am grateful to have such wonderful partners who love me and give me little reminders of their love all the time.

I love flowers. I love to receive them, and I love to grow them, but I have been so busy growing vegetables & fruit for the past 10 years, that I really haven't grown many flowers. Sure my red petunias lasted in a pot on my porch for awhile, until they died recently. My roses struggle along never quite blooming enough to suit me. Something ate my daisies. The gophers eat my tulip bulbs and the deer scarf down the blooms. My irises grow, but don't bloom that much anymore. I guess my lavender plants flower pretty well all year. They have sort of taken over my herb garden. And the amaryllis bulbs that my Mom gave me years and years ago, called Naked Ladies, a light pink showy blossom, do pretty well each summer, although I think the gophers may get to them too. The only flowers that do really well each year are my spring daffodils. Nothing eats them and they poke their bright yellow heads up to face the warm spring sun only to get rained and snowed on for their bravery. I love how brave they are. I want to be like them. Sunny, bright, delicate, yet strong and brave.

Be a flower. Brighten someone's day.

Thanks Bob and Jack for my beautiful red flowers. I love them, and I love you.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Bolting Greens

Beets, Carrots & Snow Peas ~ a field of green

The weather is hot and sunny, and my garden is growing like crazy. The greens have been keeping me busy tending them. I need to harvest their leaves every couple of days before they get too large or else they will start to taste bitter. Also, the hot weather signals the greens that their growing season is almost over (they prefer cooler weather) so the little green leafy plants start to send up tall flower stalks in an effort to reproduce and continue their life cycle. Smart little greens. The act of flowering like this when the hot weather hits is called bolting. A term that was unfamiliar to me until I started this vegetable garden here in the mountains about 10 years ago. I read about bolting in several of my gardening books.


Colorful Red Flower Stalk on Bolting Swiss Chard

Greens that bolt start to put all of their life energy and nutrients into the flower stalks and resulting seeds for the next generation of plants. Because of this, the green leafy parts start to become bitter tasting and usually are smaller, which is not good for those of us who like to eat the grean leafy parts of lettuce, mesclun, Swiss Chard, spinach, cabbage, bok choy etc.


Tall Stalks of White Flowers on the Arugula (part of the mesclun salad greens)

There are ways to slow this bolting process down a bit, but nature will always have her way eventually. You can provide more shade for the green plants, thus keeping them a bit cooler and tricking them into thinking that their growing season is extended. You can snip off the flower stalks as they form, forcing the plant to produce more stalks. This method works well with green leafy herbs, but doesn't delay the green veggies very long. They are quick to recover and send up more flower stalks.


Yellow Flowers on the China Choy Cabbage

So today, I harvested a bunch of greens from my garden. I did my usual snipping off of individual outer leaves and left the plant in the ground to produce more leaves, and I also thinned them out by pulling up whole plants by the roots. That gave them more air circulation to prevent rot and slugs and other creepy crawlies from making themselves at home in my salad greens.

I brought in 1 lb of Swiss Chard (a combination of the Bright Lights variety and Fordhook Green), 1 3/4 lb of mixed mesclun and baby lettuce, and 1 1/4 lb of China Choy (like baby bok choy). They are soaking in bowls of cool water rejuvenating their crispness as I type this.

I guess I will be eating fresh green salads and lots of stir fry dinners for awhile. Good and healthy.




© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

A Light Lunch

Garden Salad with Shrimp & Blue Cheese Crumbles

As the weather has been warmer, I've been trying to eat lighter meals and especially meals that I can prepare using freshly picked homegrown veggies from my organic garden. Today's lunch was a light but satisfying green salad topped with some shrimp and blue cheese crumbles. It was very tasty. You'll also notice my favorite plastic tumbler full of ice tea in the photo above. It's my Lion King glass that I got at some fast food joint about a decade ago. I still love it!

The mixed salad greens were a combination of the spicy mesclun from my garden, some organic leaf lettuce from the grocery store and some organic spinach from our local farm store. I sliced up one of those huge homegrown radishes that I showed you awhile back and added a little tomato. The blue cheese and shrimp were purchased at Trader Joe's. As was the cocktail sauce adorning the shrimp. A squeeze of lime, some balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil and a few spices added the finishing touches.

It's a good thing I enjoy fresh salads. I have a lot of salad greens in my garden!



Aren't these beautiful?

I just had to show off the velvety red roses that Bob gave me a few days ago.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Rainy Morning Harvest

Sweet William Flower Bouquet and Artichoke freshly picked in the rain

It's raining, grey, foggy and cold here today. Very strange weather for a Memorial Day Weekend. Usually it is sunny, clear and hot.

I did manage to play in my wet garden a little and picked a nice artichoke and a bunch of colorful Sweet William flowers to brighten things up in here. See them above in my produce scale on my front porch.

Today the 3 of us, Bob, Jack and me, will be attending the annual Memorial Day BBQ bash that is hosted by one of our neighbors. The event is usually held outside on the beautiful grounds of a lovely mountain home a few miles away from here and a few hundred feet higher in elevation than my home which is at approximately 3000 ft. We will be climbing up the local hills here to about 4500-5000 ft high, which means that it will likely be even colder and more rainy up there today. Snow was predicted last night at the 6000 ft level.

So it will be a different experience for us today. I am sitting here wearing a warm sweatshirt when a few days ago I had on tee shirts and tank tops trying to stay cool. I have laid out a nice pullover sweater to wear to the BBQ party. Must finish this blog post so that I can have time to get ready to leave soon.

Partner Bob picked me a lovely bouquet of roses from his garden and brought them to me this morning when he came by to collect my trash and recyclables to take to the local dump. What more could a girl ask for, a man who takes her trash away and replaces it with sweet smelling beautiful flowers...


Sweet scented Roses from Bob's garden

Enjoy the weather whatever it is where you are today! I'll take my camera to the rainy BBQ and see what interesting photos I can capture for future blog posts.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Some Catching Up!

Porch Table Flora - Petunias still blooming!

Wow! It has been almost 2 full weeks since I last posted anything in this my personal blog. Time for me to do a little catching up I guess.

Health
Since I last wrote I have been recovering from a nasty head cold that had me feeling very fuzzy headed and weak. I had no energy to do my daily things, nevermind any of the seasonal projects that present themselves this time of year. Well, I got over the head cold late last week and then had another bout of headache and sinus pain early this week. My theory is that the heavy pollen that has been around me lately triggers some of my sinus headaches. Mix that with stress and some early menopause hormone fluctuations and I get very painful 3 day headaches. Ahh, but they have finally gone now, for awhile anyway. I have had a bit more sleep and little more energy these past couple of days since my head has stopped hurting.

Herbs
So last Sunday I finally planted the basil seedlings that partner Bob gifted me with last March. Until very recently it had been too cold to plant them in the garden, so I had been nursing them along on my porch table. They were anxious to get into some nutritious soil, so I planted them in my raised bed herb garden along with one of my curly leaf parsely seedlings. They are doing fine as of my garden "rounds" this morning. I'll post some photos of the herb gardens another day.

Fruit
I also have been protecting my fruit trees and berry vines with coverings of bird netting. A tedious job, but if not done, the birds and other critters will eat every piece of fruit before I can harvest any. I still have a few more trees to go. I have already harvested a couple of handfulls of strawberries. Very small. Very tasty. Not many made it all the way into the house.

Flowers
Early last week Bob gave me a nice mixed bouquet of flowers that are organically and locally grown right here in our little town. He offers them for sale in his hardware store (the local general store), North Fork Hardware, and the flower growers, Three Springs Flower Garden, offer them by monthly subscription to many individuals and businesses in our area. The mix of flowers changes as the summer season progresses. Last year I received a summer long subscription of flowers which provided me a new bouquet each week. This year, I requested a break from the subscription flowers as my pollen allergies seem more severe this year and these particular flowers seem to have a lot of heavy pollen that sadly brings me nasal misery. Anyway, even though I did have to place the mixed bouqet of flowers outside on my porch table, I did appreciate and enjoy the beauty of the flowers and the generosity of the gift. See the bouquet in the photo below. There are daisies, gallardias, sweet williams and some I am not sure of.


Mixed Flower Bouquet

Then later in the week, Bob's Mom, who lives very near me, dropped by for a visit bearing a huge bucket of sweet smelling, bright red roses in very full bloom. A friend of hers had given her a whole bunch of these wonderful roses and she decided to share some of them with me. (I think Bob may have hinted that I really liked roses a whole lot...) See them in the photo below:


Mother's Day Roses from Bob's Mom

Then about 2 days later, in a fit of romance and spontaneity, Bob was out grocery shopping and spied a dozen long stemmed red roses just starting to open their buds. They didn't have that homegrown heavenly rose scent, but each rose bud was perfect, deep red and beautiful. The gift of a dozen red roses for no special occasion at all from my guy is one of the most romantic gifts I can think of. It made me feel very special and loved. The photo below does not do their beauty justice.

Romantic Red Roses from Bob

So I received many wonderful flowers last week and had them around me until just yesterday. A wonderful way for me to celebrate Mother's Day and remember my own Mom who dearly loved her flowers and her gardens. She taught me to love them too.

Veggies

Today I managed to get out there and plant summer squash and cucumber seeds. I planted 24 Northern Pickling Cukes, and 3 each of Dark Green zucchini, Raven (also dark green) zuke, Clarimore Light Green zuke and Early Yellow Crookneck Squash. All my seeds were purchased from Peaceful Valley Farm Supply, my favorite organic seed supplier.

I also weeded and prepared the garden bed for planting my green beans hopefully tomorrow. Much more hand weeding must be done in between the lettuce seedlings and root crops that I planted a couple of weeks ago. I can hardly see the seedlings in between all of the healthy fast growing weeds out there.

Well, that's enough catching up today. I will write more about my garden, home, pets, social activities and dreams of my heart, etc. another day soon. I have some nice photos to share too.

Thanks for reading all my mundane stuff. It's all part of my Mountain Harvest Basket.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Flowers Around Me

California Redbud Tree in Spring Bloom

This blog post is about the flowering things that are around me that I did not plant.

The first is the California or Western Redbud seen in its colorful Spring glory in the above photo. This interesting tree was here when I arrived. Obviously, it is named for its Spring profusion of reddish pink blossoms that attract hundreds of bees everyday. This tree literally buzzes with activity very loudly all day long. The bees are focused on gathering their sweet nectar that they don't bother me when I walk underneath the tree on my way to my chicken coop. Oh, a few fly around and follow me for a short distance, but then go back to the blossoms. As the blossoms fade in mid-Spring, the tree grows lovely green leaves and stays that way until Fall, when it then drops it leaves and shows off all of its thin brown seed pods that rattle in the wind. When I read the Wikipedia article about the Redbud, I learned that it is in the legume family of plants, hence the seedpods. I learn something new all the time around here!


Bush Lupine

The purple blossomed bush in the photo above grows wild here in the Sierra foothills. It is also a legume, a type of Lupine. This is a purple Bush Lupine. We also have smaller purple, white and yellow lupine flowers that grow closer to the ground in fields and along roadsides. I mostly have the larger bush variety growing on my property. This year I have several big beautiful specimens all around my home. I planted none of them. They just grow here and bring me beauty. When I first moved here (10 years ago now) I brought some of the pretty lupine flowers inside in a vase and quickly took them back outside, as their heavy pollen scent was too much for my nose to handle. These legumes are good for the soil in which they grow as legumes enrich their soil with nitrogen making it fertile for other green things to grow.


Rosemary bush in bloom

The photo above is a close up of one of my Rosemary herb bushes that the previous owner planted out in back of my house. I have several of them all in a row out there. They are beautiful, useful culinary herbs that also smell good and are almost care-free. They need a little water now and then, especially in the Summer. Another nice thing about them is that they are not tasty to the herds of deer and other wild critters that live here with me.

So that's it for today's flower tour. These are the easy-care flowers that live here. Some other day I will show you the not-so-easy-care flowers and trees.

Spring color and easy-care all at the same time. Lovely.




© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket