New year, new changes

Posted on by
7

It is bitter cold here in Western Pennsylvania, with about 5″ of snow on the ground. Finally, a typical winter! Fortunately the snow insulates the plants and the garden should be abundant this coming season.Pixie and I have spent a few quiet evenings by the fireplace as I considered how I want to proceed on the blog and on all of my social media. Did I want to shut down everything online or commit to writing and creating material more regularly? I explored each option fully, as I was frustrated and frankly, bored, with the status quo. I finally realized that I needed to unhook the direct connection between my life in the garden and my work as a composer – each continues to affect the other but trying to sustain material for two separate threads here and on YouTube has prevented me from doing work I would like to do.

Wild turkey tracks

The good news is that I’m continuing the Composer in the Garden blog with the emphasis on the garden while currently in the process of starting new gardening YouTube and Instagram channels with the same Composer in the Garden name. You may have noticed the new header image and tag line (Gardening in harmony with nature) above, which will carry through everything I do.

While I continue to work on this substantial reimagining of my online sites, please enjoy a video that I made last year that I haven’t posted here, the final episode of my Garden Dreams collaboration.

Working through this process has clarified what I want to do in the garden and on the page while reinvigorating my desire to post frequently and more thoughtfully. I look forward to being more present on the page going forward. Thank you my friends for staying with me all of these years and taking time to read and comment – it means more than you know.

Sometimes we can only find our true direction when we let the wind of change carry us. ~Mimi Novic

Let it snow

Posted on by
16

The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found? ~J. B. Priestley

For the first time in several years, snow has returned to our region (south west Pennsylvania, US) in November and December. For the last few years we were lucky to get one or two snowfalls a year; we’ve already had several inches of snow in December and one gorgeous deep fluffy snowfall right before Christmas. Not only is it beautiful but it provides protection in the garden from deep freezes (known here as “white mulch”) and fixes nitrogen in the soil. After a difficult drought in late summer through early autumn, this is heaven sent moisture for the garden and also provided an enchanting snowy Christmas this year.

Various health issues prevented me from posting much this summer – it was all I could do to keep the garden going in the drought – but now I can relax and reflect on the garden year while enjoying the fun of decorating the house for the holidays. Dear friends spent a few days with us for Christmas, much to the delight and endless fascination of Pixie who is unaccustomed to having unrestricted access to visitors!

As I write, Christmas music is playing quietly in the background and the low winter sun is softly lighting the room. A time for reflection and hopes for a peaceful year-  in our hearts at least – to come. Here is a short video of the decorations of the season and the beautiful snowfalls that we enjoyed, with my song “Christmas in My Heart” playing underneath.  Enjoy!

Pixie and I wish everyone everywhere a beautiful season of joy, light and celebration and hope you are able to “keep Christmas” in your hearts.

The green deep woods

Posted on by
29

It has been a year for green so far – weekly wild storms have brought incessant rain, turning the garden and woods lush and green.
Earlier this spring, we were having a tree trimmed away from the roof of the house when the arborists found that it was completely hollow – “like a straw” they said – and needed to come down. They did a magnificent job of bringing down the trunk and refitting it together so that I could make it a garden feature as part of the new woodland walk.

They leveled the stump, which was ready-filled with soft compost, and I used it as a fern planter.

The smaller branches were chipped and then used to line the path. Although the trunk landed where the mayapples grow, they found their way around it. You can see the hollow where the rain came in and disintegrated the inside of the tree over time.

I’ve continued filling the new beds along then fence with plants native to our area and it is beginning to resemble a garden. Now the woodland walk is a lush green place for Pixie and I to wander each morning, rain or shine.

Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green deep woods. ~John Muir

Here’s the story of the woodland walk in video as a part of the Garden Dreams series that I’m sharing with 4 other collaborators.

Days of rain alternating with very hot sunny days spurred plant growth and spawned violent thunderstorms and tornados more typical of July than May. Last weekend, after days of rain and very warm weather, everything changed. The temperatures cooled and the rain turned to mist. I filmed the mist outside the door that night and the next day I rose before dawn to film what I was sure would be fog. Here’s a short film of that magical misty morning in the garden.

I hope you enjoyed walking through my garden with me; I wish you beautiful days now and to come.

 

A greenness grew

Posted on by
23

Spring drew on…and a greenness grew over those brown beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps. ~Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

On this first day of May, I look out the window and see green – green! – on the tree branches. Flowers have been blooming since February – snowdrops, crocus, daffodils, tulips – and their color is so welcome.  Yet when the woods light up in delicate green, it feels as if spring is complete.

The ostrich ferns have completely unfurled, refracting light through their intricate fronds

while the sunlight pouring through white daffodil ‘Bella Coola’ turns its petals translucent.

The weather has had several wild swings this spring, hot summer temperatures for days in early spring followed by deep drops into bitter cold, the process repeated again and again. Yet the plants have survived somehow, resilient and beautiful.

Parts of the garden have come fully into bloom – the grape and lemonade bed is always its showiest this time of year.

‘Shirley’ tulips with forget-me-nots
‘Shirley’ tulip
Grape and lemonade bed

After years of tolerating our makeshift garden gate built of fence parts, I found a beautifully crafted gate to create a dramatic entrance into the garden.

Green isn’t the only foliage color in the garden now – the red Japanese maples have fully unfurled their leaves

as has the purple smokebush entwined with Clematis ‘Sweet Sugar Blues’.  Our wild violets (Viola sororia) have been blooming for weeks and are now joined by the soft blue and white blossoms of hardy geraniums.

My latest garden video traces the gradual emergence of spring and the light that shines through the garden at this bewitching time of year.

Wherever you are in the world, and in whatever season you find yourself, may you see the light shining through the beautiful things around us.

Garden Dreams

Posted on by
28

Is there a gardener living who doesn’t dream of what a new garden season can bring? Our long winter months in the American north encourage that dreaming. The sharp changes from warm to frozen and back again inspired me to freeze some hellebore buds in ice to reflect this spring’s crazy weather. The seeds I ordered by Christmas were planted indoors under lights and outdoors in wintersown jugs by early February. Lists of  plants were made and remade, then ordered – they are now arriving almost daily.

The garden slowly evolved from its late winter glow

into early spring bloom

and then into vibrant spring color.

The weeping cherry in the center of the circle garden bloomed early and profusely. As always, it was alive with hungry pollinators looking for a early meal.

Gradually it released its petals as the greens of the garden emerged,

followed by fragrant purple sandcherry blossoms perfuming the air near the deck.

My biggest garden dream this year is to plant several new woodland garden beds with all native plants. For the past three years, I have been systematically removing invasive plants in the woods and plants that are not pollinator friendly in the garden beds. My longterm goal is to have 70% of the garden plants be native (the woods are already 90%). As I increase that percentage each year, more insects and birds take up home here and grace the garden with their presence.

I’ll be tracking my progress this year as part of a collaboration with some YouTube garden friends as we each pursue and document our garden dreams over the year. Here is my first installment of the video series, let me know what you think below in the comments. Happy garden dreams!

Spring drew on…and a greenness grew over those brown beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps. ~Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre