Flowers For A Family Wedding

Posted on August 1, 2016 by Ann Lovejoy
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The Perfection Of Imperfection

The daughter of dear friends was married this weekend and I’ve been privileged to lend a hand at various stages along the way. Wedding celebrations are so very personal (or can be) and when I’m involved, I’m always fascinated to see what’s important for the whole cast of participants. This was one of the truly lovely ones, a low key, informal and friendly back yard garden wedding in which anyone who wanted to contribute was encouraged to do so and every contribution was warmly welcomed.

As is not always the case, immediate family was generously amplified to include extended family in every direction as well as a wide community of friends. Pretty much everyone wanted to help in some way, so as the (very) informal wedding planner, I tried to figure out ways to invite active participation from anyone who wanted to contribute. The wedding couple had already decided to make the affair a potluck of sorts, with plenty of good things planned and prepared and others arriving in whatever form they happened to take.

Unifying Principles

In the garden, I like to weave an understated connection between color shifts by choosing plants with stems or foliage or buds in tints of burgundy and bronze. Though subtle, this creates a theme that unites what might seem like disparate vignettes. For wedding flowers, we chose to largely echo the bride’s color theme of shades of greens with cream and soft gold. Since the budget was modest, we started both a simple but effective yard renovation and some focussed flower growing in early spring.

Half the fairly small yard is stepped in terraces divided by steps nearly to the top, so we made narrow beds in the turf above each divided set of walls and planted them thickly with Peach Melba nasturtiums which quickly made sheets of color to drape each low wall. Tired old beds were cleared out, and a huge clump of Miscanthus sinensis was divided into five pieces and set across the top, undivided bed to make a strong backdrop. In between went more nasturtiums, and by July, the grasses stood in tall spires divided by generous tumbles of peachy blossoms.

If Few, Then Generous

Rather than spend a fortune on flowers, we made a little go a long way by using a simple palette and simple but bold plantings. For main floral effects on the turfy flat areas, we staged four magnificent hanging baskets that combined a range of peach tinted annuals. With hanger wires clipped off, these deep baskets were set on cinderblocks so their cascading skirts showed to full advantage. Fed every few weeks all summer, the baskets looked gorgeously abundant, their skirts over a yard wide, so they made a dramatic statement. Generous pots of marigolds were set at the ends of each terrace tier, which helped define the seating areas. A sturdy trellis arbor, decorated with flower and foliage garlands, framed the wedding stage, and ribbon sticks with tulle streamers lined the path to the arbor.

The open, sunny front yard is divided from the neighbors by a long fence. To lead guests into the back yard, we made a lengthy (150 foot) bunting which was looped up on cuphooks set in each fence post. For cloth, we dyed sheeting in shades of green. We then cut the cloth into 1-inch strips 30 inches long, tied some together to make the “rope”, then fastened the rest on with a simple clove hitch. Big buckets of flowers were placed along the fence and pathway, draped in swathes of soft yellow sheeting. This is a great way to unify a varied group of containers, and the result makes the flowers look like birthday presents.

Home Grown Wedding Flowers

By the morning of the wedding day, many large buckets held flowers gleaned from nearby gardens, some brought by friends or offered by neighbors. In general I am pretty fussy (as in controlling) about floral arrangements, but in this case, flower wrangling provided a way for many people to participate in the wedding decorating. We set up a table in the shade with small vases and jam jars and the eldest and the youngest family members spent a very happy hour or so filling them with short stemmed blossoms that wouldn’t work in larger scale arrangements. The results were random indeed but the overall effect was enchanting and very, very loving.

Several of the larger buckets also looked rather random, not to say jumbled. Just as I was about to start a massive rearrangement, I realized that several key people thought they looked terrific. Just as they were. Hmmm. Looking with fresh eyes, I could see how the odds and ends might look like the proverbial ‘riot of color’ to someone less critical-judgmental than myself. They might even look like an outpouring of love and kindness from friends and neighbors who gave what they had to brighten the day for their dear friends.

For Whom The Blossom Blooms

At such times, the appropriate question might be, “Who is this for?”. If the answer is NOT ME, then it’s a good idea to step back and consider fresh options. The most successful ‘arrangements’ (in my opinion) held either all one kind of flowers, like a large purple trug packed with blue hydrangeas, or significant quantities of just a few things, such as a bucket that held frilly plumes of Limelight hydrangeas, a sweep of Baptisia foliage, and a sheaf of variegated Miscanthus.

However, buckets that were crammed with pale pink phlox and golden buddleia, rosy lilies, dill, various gladiolas, a rose or two, some very mixed dahlias, and a few each of a dozen kinds of perennials made several hearts happy. The viewers were not looking at a work of art or skill but at an offering of love and friendship. Oh. Right. Right indeed! Step AWAY from the flowers and let them be what they are. Not a time for ego or intervention but for allowing a different good to prevail. I do admit to a pang when one person looked them over just a bit sniffily and said “These aren’t done, right?” to which I found no reply at all (unless “um” is a reply?).

Floral Potluck Unifiers

All that aside, I do like to create some sense of an overall floral theme for events. Thus, for the wedding potluck, I made piles of what I call “flower bundles”, using a centerpiece of a sprig of cluster flowering roses in a range of pinks. Each bundle was backed by taller sprays of flowering oregano, rosemary, fennel or lavender, with foliage herbs such as golden or green oregano, thyme, mint, or sage snugged in front. For a potluck, these floral tussymussies are placed on every platter or serving dish, where effect is lovely and unifying. The only stipulation is of course that each ingredient must be edible and organically grown (thus free of chemicals).

In summer, I bind each bundle together by a long strand of pheasant tail grass (Anamanthele lessoniana), using the wiry seedhead stems. The bundle stems are wrapped snugly, starting with the stem end of the grass, with the loose seedhead fluffed to make an airy mist around the flowers and foliage. At other times of the year, long stems of baby’s breath works nicely too. The bundles can be made a day or two ahead and stored in the fridge, in closed boxes if it’s a fridge with air circulating fans running. Even a plastic bag, loosely closed, will keep them fresh for several days.

Bottom Line

It’s always good to remember which things are truly important. To this lovely, fortunate family, the important things are the connecting ones, the community building ones, the family-building and friendly ones. It was an honor to be part of such a process and such an event.

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The Well Organized Garden

Posted on July 25, 2016 by Ann Lovejoy
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Getting A Grip On The Garden

Just so you know, this sometimes sorrowful story has a happy ending. Ready? For the first decade or so of my gardening life, my gardens were fairly easy to care for. I was fortunate in learning the exceptional value of mulch very early on, through mentors like Ruth Stout, whose landmark books, How To Have A Green Thumb Without An Aching Back, and Gardening Without Work heavily informed my ideas about gardening. Thanks to Ruth and a hefty collection of old Organic Farming And Gardening magazines, I found edible gardening relatively easy and deeply rewarding.

However, when I was given a copy of Vita Sackville-West’s Garden Book, my world changed again. Her poetic, imaginative plant descriptions reawakened my own childhood fascination with flowers and I dove head first into ornamental gardening. Back in the early 1980s, interest in perennials was starting to boom. I joined every seed exchange I could find, English or otherwise, and collected unfamiliar plants as fast as I could find them.

Surviving The Acquisitive Stage

Suddenly my gardens became utterly transformed. Instead of neat rows or patches of edibles, I filled curving beds with ribbons and sweeps and colonies of color-coordinated, seasonally sequenced perennials. That in itself wasn’t too hard a change to make, especially since mulch still played a major part in my bed-making, but as I accumulated more and more plants, the beds grew fuller and fuller until I couldn’t shoehorn in a single crocus bulb. At the same time, my rather impressive pot ghetto, packed with the unplanted and homeless, required endless watering and weeding. I could not pass up a cool new-to-me plant, even if I had no idea where to put it, and new specialty nurseries were popping up like mushrooms after rain.

The pot ghetto grew, and grew, and grew until I could no longer track what I had or where it was. Sometimes I would find a long-sought treasure and bring it triumphantly home only to discover that I already had the same thing, languishing in a pot. Sometimes I would weed my way through a tangle of overgrown pots and find that the plants had languished too long and were now former plants. Invariably the late lamented plants were extremely expensive, leaving me with an uncomfortable mixture of guilt, grief, and confusion. If I wanted these plants so desperately, why couldn’t I get them in the ground so they could bring glory to the garden? I kept making new beds and packing them full, yet the ghetto never seemed to shrink.

Assessment Before Action

Today, my pot ghetto holds fewer than a dozen plants, and my surprisingly well maintained and not over crowded garden holds both plants I love dearly and some I’m learning more about. In large part, this happy state came about because (frankly) the garden is pretty new, but also because a few years ago, I read an amazing book about organizing. It was not the currently trendy Japanese one. Mine was called When Organization Is Not Enough: SHED your stuff, Change your Life, by Julie Morgenstern. It includes most of the same tips and techniques usual to the genre, but one idea resonated deeply: If you don’t understand why you got and kept a particular object, getting rid of it won’t really help, because you’ll just accumulate more like it.

Thinking back, I realize that my hyper acquisitiveness had several major pieces, one of which was education. At a time when few perennials were available, the only way to learn how unfamiliar ones might fare in my corner of the world was to try to grow them. That was mostly valid back in the day, when I made a living killing off and/or succeeding with the unknowns. By the turn of the new century, the flood of newcomers had slowed to a steady trickle, so truly new-to-me plants didn’t need to pile up like they used to. Sadly, however, the pot ghetto was still with me because having extra plants on hand had become a habit.

Inventory Control

Another piece that played a big part in the mess was my inability to let a seedling or extra division of a valuable plant go. When perennials were rare, such treasures could be swapped for other cool stuff. Now, formerly prized plants like Crocosmia Lucifer can be found in gallons at the grocery store, and fantastic gems like Euphorbia Chameleon may be practically noxious weeds in some areas. In the garden, just like in your clothes closet or garage, part of the process of letting go requires evaluating your stash. What IS all this stuff, anyway? If I don’t really need something myself, where could it be of service?

For me, sorting is an important step toward clutter control. When I actually hauled the entire plant stash into the driveway and started categorizing, I saw that many of the plants were duplicates. I grouped those and figured out where they could usefully go (mostly to public parks or the library gardens). Many other ghetto dwellers were shade plants that no longer fit in my now-sunny garden. These too could be given to new homes where they would be happy and useful.

Open Up And Pass It On

Having now worked this process over and over, I find that passing things on to become useful and valued again is almost as addictive as acquisition once was. These days, a stuffed closet or over-planted garden bed feels like an invitation to divide and distribute. In fact, I now have an uncomfortable sense that stuff packed away is in some sense dead, where stuff in active circulation is connected to life. This feels true about money, books, clothing, tools and toys as well as plants. Today, I feel an not unpleasant need to unclutter every area of my garden, my home, and my life. It’s a new imperative: Open up and let anything stuck in stasis get out into the world and find new life!

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Midsummer Nurture

Posted on July 18, 2016 by Ann Lovejoy
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Keeping Plants And People Well Fed

After spring’s first burst of garden glory, the summer garden settles in to serious production. Or it should; maritime mornings continue to be grey and cool, while afternoons are warm and sunnier. Even for the experts, it’s still hard to know what the summer will bring in terms of temperatures. Though the El Nino warming effect officially ended in May, the expected La Nina cycle seems to be stalled out. In my garden, this flip-flop weather is keeping some plants back while others leap joyfully forward.

Such summers favor cool season crops, which produce with enthusiasm. This year, there were plump peas galore. Raspberries and strawberries cropped like crazy, packing freezers and filling pantries with jam. The heat lovers were more hesitant, since cold nights and overcast days set them back repeatedly. We maritimers have learned that for us, summer really ramps up around here in mid July. Finally, we can gather baskets full of tomatoes and tomatillos, basil and beans.

A Midsummer Snack

Because ongoing temperature swings are the norm here, I’ve switched almost entirely over to growing grafted tomatoes. After years of disappointment, I can now rely on harvesting enough tomatoes to enjoy them in a dozen ways. I freeze roasted tomatoes as well as sauce to enliven winter meals. I make fresh chutneys and salsas and countless salads, experimenting with dressings to find new ways to enhance that natural tomato spunkiness.

Over the years, I’ve found that a midsummer snack can keep my plants productive and boost flavor at the same time. I mix up my favorite plant elixir by the gallon and offer it to food crops as well as any garden ornamentals that seem to need a little help. It’s especially helpful for heat lovers, greening up their foliage while stimulating more productivity. The combination of liquid kelp, humic acid, and fish fertilizer offers gentle encouragement to pretty much everything. I spray it on tomato and pepper foliage and also use it as a root drench after watering my pots. Here’s the recipe:

Midsummer Plant Elixir

1 tablespoon liquid kelp concentrate
1 tablespoon humic acid concentrate
1/4 cup liquid fish fertilizer
1 gallon water

Combine in a gallon jug and let stand overnight. Store in a cool, dark place. Give each tomato plant (or hanging flower basket) 1 cup and each basil plant 1/2 cup of mixture every 2 weeks. Plants in 1 gallon containers get 1/4 cup each on same schedule.

Summery Yums

This spritely salad is my new go-to when serving tacos or enchiladas. It sounds too simple to be good, yet it is extremely more-ish. It’s also lovely tucked into split pitas with smoked tofu or grilled salmon and shredded Romaine.

Tomato Salsa Salad

2 tablespoons avocado oil
1-2 tablespoons seasoned rice vinegar
2 cups halved cherry tomatoes (use several kinds)
2 ears sweet corn, kernels cut off
1 cup chopped sweet red peppers
1/2 cup chopped red onion
1/2 cup stemmed cilantro
1 head Romaine lettuce, sliced in thin ribbons

In a serving bowl, whisk oil and vinegar together to taste. Add all but lettuce, toss gently and let stand for 10 minutes. Add lettuce, toss gently and serve. Serves 4.

A Chilly Appetizer

Creamy, spunky, and bright with sea salt, this simple sorbet makes an amazing amuse bouche. Use a melon ball scoop to give gazpacho a fantastic garnish. You can use cilantro or lemon thyme instead of basil for cilantro to change it up.

Tomato Basil Sorbet

1 cup pureed fresh tomatoes
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh basil
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
2 cups heavy organic cream

Combine all ingredients and chill overnight or up to 2 days. Freeze in an ice cream maker, pack into containers and freeze for at least an hour. Makes about 3 pints.

Summer Chutney

Fragrant and lightly spicy, chutney is equally delicious in salad dressings or offered as an appetizer dip for sliced apples and pears. Spoon a bit over grilled fish or chicken as well as basmati or nutty-tasting Bhutanese red rice. It keeps a long time in the refrigerator and makes a very welcome gift.

Tomato Paprika Chutney

1 teaspoon safflower oil
1 teaspoon coriander seed
1 teaspoon mustard seed
6 green cardamom pods
2 white or yellow onions, chopped
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 quart ripe tomatoes, sliced in wedges
2 tart apples, cored and chopped
1/4 cup chopped paprika peppers
2/3 cup apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup coconut sugar or cane sugar

In a deep pan, heat oil, seeds, and pods over medium high heat to the fragrance point (1-2 minutes).  Add onions and salt and cook over low heat for 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and apples, cover and cook until soft (10-15 minutes). Add vinegar and sugar and cook for 20 minutes, stirring often. Remove green cardamom pods, pour chutney into sterilized jars and seal. Makes about 6 cups.

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Growing Tomorrow’s Gardeners

Posted on July 12, 2016 by Ann Lovejoy
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Welcoming Children In The Garden

I’ve been getting a lot of questions about involving children in the garden. While the youngest may work willingly side by side with a parent or older sibling, tweens and teens seem harder to engage. Well, yes. Those are some complicated years, with a lot going on in pretty much every way. It certainly seems easier to capture them young, but it’s never too late. When a local nature preserve began accepting high school kids into an intern program, nearly all of the participants were transformed by the experience of working directly with plants. Some, including several who had never willingly wielded a shovel before, have gone on to pursue careers in horticulture.

Most avid gardeners have a story about a parent, grandparent, or neighbor who made them welcome in the garden as a child or as a tween or teen. Lifelong gardeners also credit their love of growing, cooking, and eating their own food crops to the encouragement of that older generation. It’s well established that food-fussy children who are invited to help plant and pick edible crops are more likely to eat things they grow themselves.

Room For Exploratory Play

By the same token, children who are free to play and explore in a garden setting are likely to become lifelong gardeners themselves. Perhaps the best way to engage children in gardening is to begin not with chores but with pleasurable projects. Small children love to help and they delight in working closely with adults. To promote these simple pleasures, set aside an area where enthusiastic but unskilled garden activities won’t wreak havoc with your main crops. A low picket fence can delineate ‘kid space’ and keep the joyful activity safely contained.

If more than one child will be in the garden with you, find a spot for each child to make their own. Toddlers will love a space that combines a sandbox and digging tools with a bit of planting ground. My grandson’s sandbox, which can double as a fire pit with the addition of a large metal fire bowl, is full of dinosaurs and dump trucks, with kale and carrots on the side. A short hose (drinking-quality) with an easy-to-use spray nozzle provides endless pleasure in watering plants, filling buckets, and occasionally soaking an unsuspecting granny. In a tiny garden, give each child a huge tree pot filled with sand (for playing) or soil (for growing). Tiered strawberry and lettuce planters can fit on the smallest deck or terrace, and many edibles can be grown in vertical gardening structures and containers designed to hang over fence railings.

Each One Teach One

My own boys, when very young,  delighted in creating a ‘truck garden’ filled with both toy trucks and easily grown, delicious crops like strawberries and baby carrots. The oldest, then aged four, loved working alongside me, and after a lengthy bulb planting session, I was enchanted to overhear him patiently instructing his little brother, then going on two. They had a bucket of compost and a box of bulbs and were industriously digging little holes, working in some compost, and tucking in bulbs together. Peter watched as Andrew plunked in a bulb, then gently tweaked its position saying, “Remember, Andrew; pointy side up!”

Similarly, there were usually a few peer leaders in each of the groups of children who planted together at Owen’s Playground, but the planting process was entirely collaborative. As the sensory gardens came into being, we could hear happy chatter as kids decided together how to arrange each bed. One group decided to make a magic forest of tall amaranth, and another proudly showed me a bright ribbon of calendulas weaving around a spiraling path.

When Work Meets Play

Just last week, my grandson, who just turned three, joined me for an early morning planting session at Owen’s Playground. After some discussion, he decided to plant some of his favorite foods, notably strawberries and several kinds of kale. After we planted a few together, he eagerly dug the holes himself, easily done in the newly shaped beds. We tipped out each plant one by one, then I showed him how to gently loosen the roots before planting. After that, he worked merrily along, singing a little song that went,”Dig dig dig, wake up, roots, tickle tickle tickle! Soil soil soil, pat pat pat.”

After tucking a strawberry plant on the edge of a bed, he said, “Let’s plant some more strawberries over here, so they can be friends.” I was enchanted by his companionable feeling for these little plants, with the instinctive recognition of the colonizing nature of plants. I’ve noticed that many children begin planting with a preference for things they enjoy eating. Even older kids usually enjoy choosing and growing particularly tasty varieties of a few favorite foods, such as raspberries and sweet corn. They may also be delighted by compact fruit trees, perhaps grafted with several choice kinds of apples or pears, and low-pruned for easy picking. As their skills improve, young people may proudly serve their very own produce, fresh or canned or made into jam or pies, at family meals and holiday feasts.

Gimme Shelter

Youngsters of all ages will appreciate the shelter of a garden shed that offers shade and a place to sit and shell peas, play quietly, or even take a nap. Make sure that sharp tools and any fertilizers and sprays (even safe, organic ones) are kept on high shelves, out of reach of the curious. Have water available for rinsing off small hands and yummy edibles. Water play is always fun for small children, so keep a few unbreakable bowls or pans on hand for rinsing produce or sailing pea pod boats. A tall, sturdy fence around the garden as a whole keeps deer and other critters out of the garden and wandering toddlers safely in.

Impromptu structures such as a bean teepee can be a fun first project for children, since little fingers can easily grasp plump bean seeds. Use tall branches, bamboo poles, or even pvc pipe to create the frame. Make your teepee tall enough that small people can stand up inside, and wide enough to accommodate several children at a time. As the beans clamber up the supports, the teepee becomes a leafy green hideout where imaginative play is sparked. Keep the area immediately around the teepee clear of precious plants, so children don’t have to worry about harming important crops. Mulch the interior and surrounding paths with soft, forgiving materials such as straw, sawdust or wood shavings rather than wood chips, which tend to be splintery.

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