Sweete Felicity

Dear Reader,

Thanks so much for coming by today; we hope you had a lovely Mother's Day, full of the little remembrances that mean so much more than lavish gifts.



Last Thursday we had our own "Little House" adventure, when the heavy winds tore down and flipped over our greenhouse, which was on a cement foundation (But obviously a not big enough one!). My mum thankfully was out here at the time, helping sort out the herb cupboard, when Audrey looked out the window and noticed the up-ended greenhouse. Everyone pulled together, rescuing the flats of cabbages that we had purchased that morning and that were upended on the side of the greenhouse, and collecting all the empty plastic jugs that were going to be filled with water to serve as a "thermal mass". Mum held onto one end of the greenhouse till someone stopped to help, and we managed to take apart the panels which were acting like the sails on a boat, threatening to carry everything into the highway by which we live. Though the greenhouse was flattened, we were just thankful that noone was hurt!

The sad remains.

The old Chevy was called into service as a temporary anchor.

On Friday, Mum brought out lots of feverfew starts she was thinning, and on Saturday, the neighbors brought over lots of strawberries that they were thinning. Free plants are always appreciated! We wish we could share with you, dear reader, all of the Christmas cactus and rose-scented geranium starts we have, that noone in the area seems to want.

Saturday Mr. Graham fixed the fence that the wind also broke, and made us a couple of raised beds, including one which we'll use as a cold frame (Hopefully the wind doesn't take it, too!). We're thinking that if we were going to stay here for a very long time, we would build a pit greenhouse, that would be lower to the ground and out of the wind's way.



We also planted some onions and flowers for the girls' gardens.

Do you see the path edging made of Perrier bottles? We admit a slight addiction.

Getting a few ideas from "The Art of French Gardening".

The neighbors whose horses live across the street brought the horses back from their winter pasture, and Frankie has been enamored of them ever since. . .

Just not that close!

On Sunday after church and dinner, we went to the cemetery where our baby Victoria (Along with my grandparents and their baby) is buried, to spend some time meditating. The girls made rubbings of the headstone for a remembrance.



May you have a wonderful day, dear friends,

Love,

Marqueta

**********************************

"Western culture insists on distinctions between work and rest, work and play, job and vacation, distinctions that become problematic and even meaningless in the garden. A decorative potager, even more than the utilitarian variety, requires work; but it is a welcoming place, a haven, a repose for the eye as well as for the mind, a kind of small Eden. And if it is not a paradise where one sits around plucking fruit, forbidden or not, it is still a bad day when the gardener does not experience his or her own small plot as idyllic.

For although the decorate vegetable garden involves constant effort, it is often said that in such a domain one does not feel time passing. Just being there is restful."

~Louisa Jones, "The Art of French Vegetable Gardening"