LeafNotes

I told my oldest daughter (almost 3) to look out the window to let me know if she sees any mushrooms in the garden yet because once the mushrooms show up that means that the fairies are seriously considering moving in.  She looked a couple of times over a day or two and still no mushrooms.  But then, all of a sudden yesterday morning, there were mushrooms!  We immediately had to go out to investigate and sat on the stones surrounding the garden discussing fairies for quite some time.  The fairies visited us again and we are convinced they’ll be back!

Who knew when I started planning my fairy garden that fairies are the hot thing right now. Disney is even taking a princess break and going with all things Tinkerbell and fairy. Fairies are taking over my life. Just last week I even sewed a fairy skirt for my daughter to go with her fairy wings, crown and wand for Halloween. Of course, she wears her outfit constantly. Let’s hope the wings hold up until Halloween.

My fairy garden is coming right along. I recently made some Sculpy mushrooms, a blue fairy door, a well and a chimney. Still no homes, thought I did find an intriguing website called Enchanted Gardens that is dedicated to all things you might find in a fairy garden and I am considering ordering a home as a sample and otherwise may borrow some of their ideas. I love crafting and I’ll see what I come up with.  Here are some updated pictures:

Did you spot all 5 mushrooms? One is a bit hidden ;)  The well and bridge (from the aquarium section of Walmart) are also present though the blue door is still waiting for it’s house.

I have been doing a bit more research on fairy gardens and discovered that  fairies like all things purple and I have that serendipitously covered as most  plants in this fairy garden will bloom purple, including the mondo grass and baby’s tears- who knew!  I need to add some sage as reportedly fairies like to sleep on sage.  Fortunately I have a LOT of creeping sage elsewhere in my garden and I will relocate a few cuttings.  Fiaries also supposedly like digitalis as a fashion statement but I am not putting that into this child-friendly garden as it is very poisonous (though I do have it elsewhere in the garden which will have to be good enough.)  Then I’ll add some crocus for the spring and will have saffron covered as well.  I fortunately also have St. John’s Wort in garden in case I need to counteract fairy spells which aren’t to my liking.

Oh boy, this is fun!  I get to garden, craft, do internet searches and shopping all for the same project.

Today’s the day I have known was coming for awhile.  It is the first day accompanied by cricket song which means that autumn is coming and summer is drawing to a close.  The sky is slightly overcast, the temperature is 68 and when the sun does peek out it is not with the white hot intensity of summer but a softer, more golden light.  Everything green is turning a more yellow green as the season gets ready to change.  My mood is also one of anticipation as is often the case with change.  First the sounds of summer change to autumn, the light changes, the colors of the garden change, then my oldest daughter is going to preschool for the first time and the youngest will have her first swimming lessons.  Summer will be over soon and it’s not that just the season is changing, but it would seem that life is changing too.

Sunrise, Sunset Lyrics- it seems appropriate, though my mood is not quite so drastic and my kids are still small- thank goodness!  But time sure does fly…

(Tevye)
Is this the little girl I carried?
Is this the little boy at play?

(Golde)
I don’t remember growing older
When did they?

(Tevye)
When did she get to be a beauty?
When did he get to be so tall?

(Golde)
Wasn’t it yesterday
When they were small?

(Men)
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the days
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers
Blossoming even as we gaze

(Women)
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears

(Tevye)
What words of wisdom can I give them?
How can I help to ease their way?

(Tevye)
Now they must learn from one another
Day by day

(Perchik)
They look so natural together

(Hodel)
Just like two newlyweds should be

(Perchik & Hodel)
Is there a canopy in store for me?

(All)
Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the days
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers
Blossoming even as we gaze

Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years
One season following another
Laden with happiness and tears

Today I spent a satisfying 2 hours on the garden. After visiting my local Arboretum’s plant sale in the morning and scrounging around in my yard, I amassed a good selection of plants, moss and rocks for my fairy garden. After relocating 3 violets and two large primula I was ready to plant. I selected a location under a Himalayan birch, visible from the house and next to the edge of a raised bed for easy access for the children. I planted a small fern, some miniature mondo grass, 2 very small primula, a miniature hosta, some lily-of-the-valley, 3 different “stepable” plants and some miniature ground cover and finished it off with some moss paths. I added a few small rocks and then three glow-in-the-dark pebbles where each of the houses are planned to be. The magic pebbles will hopefully transform into fairy homes sooner rather than later. We’ll see how quickly I manage to find appropriate dwellings. I will try to find a couple little toad stools as well which should finish off the garden eventually. Most of the plants I used in this garden are very hardy and “stepable,” especially those in the front so they’ll hold up during playtime. Once the homes are in place I’ll look for fairy figurines for the kids to play with. I think it would also be fun to hang some glow-in-the-dark “fairy” balls from the birch as well. This garden will be a work in progress based on what I find but I think I have a fun start. My oldest daughter thinks it’s really neat that the fairies picked her backyard to build homes in.  I’ll periodically post pictures as the garden settles and the plants grow as well as of any new additions.
Here are the before and after shots of the fairy garden:

Before…

Now the fairy garden…

Other than the fairy garden, I spruced up next to my patio as well by removing a sad looking rhodie and replacing it with a paper birch. I also added clumping bamboo as well as two new stepping stones in the area and finished it all with a coating of beauty bark. Here are the before and after shots.

Before…

After…

Finally some dead-heading and I was ready to call it a satifying day’s work in the garden.

Periodically I consider life after stay-at-home parenting and I am not sure it involves the lucrative, though not exactly exciting career of corporate compliance that I used to call my daily grind.  I think I may finally take a clue from my past of growing corn in a sandbox and landscaping earthen dams as an elementary schooler to growing and propagating african violets as a teenager and then as an adult always having a garden or at least a balcony full of potted plants.  Clearly, working with plants makes me happy and why not try to do for a living what makes me happy.

Just the other day I was browsing through a continuing ed. catalog from the local university, University of Washington, when I saw a program that peaked my curiosity.  A certificate in Therapeutic Gardens.  I think this is the program for me.  I have considered landscape design in the past, but was having a difficult time getting excited about it and landscape designers always seemed so “dime a dozen.”  This program sounds like an interesting niche of landscaping that hopefully has a good future, especially as the baby boomers age.  It is also more in line with why I garden and the joy and relaxation my garden brings me. Year round interest, texture, blooms, color, motion, wildlife, morning, noon and night interest are characteristics that I consider in my garden and with some formal training, I think I could bring 24×7, year round gardens to others, especially those challenged by age or infirmity and really feel satisfaction and enjoyment from the endeavor.

My children are still too young for me to go to school this year, but hopefully this program will still be offered in 2009!

It’s our second 90+ degree day with the hottest day expected tomorrow.  I was just looking out of my bathroom window at my nice green lawn thinking, “Thank goodness for our irrigation system!”  I was getting exhausted just thinking about watering everything by hand/sprinkler like I did the first summer we lived here and it was a LOT of work.  Of course, I had a lot less garden, but still, there was enough.  I feel bad for home owners without irrigation systems.  Our HOA mandates green lawns which I agree look nice, but sure are a waste of water as I would be perfectly happy to let my lawn go dormant.  Either way, at least I don’t have to worry about anything other than paying the water bill these days.  My irrigation system is currently set to run through my 7 zones in 60 minutes which seems to do the trick.  Though, even with irrigation, I still had to provide some supplemental water in the evening last night to some of the drier areas though I am taking the night off tonight.   Then of course, the kids had a blast jumping through the sprinkler last night after dinner.  Talk about killing two birds with one stone!  The dry patch of grass got watered and the kids were entertained. This afternoon the kiddie pool watered a different dry patch as a 1 and 2 year old enjoy making sure water gets out of the pool as quickly as possible, though all in good fun.

Newly blooming:

• Japanese anemone/windflower, Anemone x hybrida
• Balloon flower/ Chinese Bellflower, Platycodon grandiflorus