Flower Power

Flower power means something totally different today than yesterday. Over the past couple years, the Gardner here at Black Birch Estates (I'm the Steward) has developed some pretty nice flower gardens and other avenues to display flowers e.g. hanging baskets, whiskey barrels, and other fun things. We must have a half dozen gardens of various sizes now; the triangle, the birdbath, the southern deck, the back deck, St. Francis, and more.

The Gardner has always enjoyed - well, gardening - but last year she stepped it up a notch and this year another notch yet, and let me tell ya, it looks pretty lush and colorful around here. We've lived here now over 20 years, so things like lilacs and flowering crabs, willows, and other trees have reached nice maturity and things look really good. A canopy of leafy branches hovers over our 500 foot drive, and upon entering, one feels like you're headed down a living tunnel into the woods. The unique setting we have here on four acres, a peninsula jutting into the Father of Waters, actually makes us feel somewhat isolated...not being able to hear or see a neighbor. It's wonderful, with wild flora and fauna in abundance. Not often enough we take pause, take a deep breath, and are truly thankful for how we have been blessed with this wonderful place in the woods. A home we built with our own hands, with a lot of help from our friends.

Our place was voted the coolest place to deliver food by nine out of ten pizza delivery drivers thirteen years running now, or since they started keeping statistics for such things.

Well Barbara is not shy about asking for help with gardens and flowers. Our friend Rachelle has the credentials to be a Master Gardner but doesn't have to go to all those darn old meetings. And she just loves to help. And she did help...spend lots of money on both annuals and perennials this year. She gets as excited as Barb does - so it's wonderful, and the place is just beautiful.

Now I know nothing of flowers, but the women around me do. Daughters, nieces, sisters-in-law and women friends have been raving about the gardens here this year. So I'm just going to post photos because there is only one flower I know the name of, lilac. Man, I do love the scent of lilacs. More flowers than garden photos, but that's because a good share of the photos were taken by Rachelle's daughter Ashley, an excellent photographer by the way, who appreciates the intricacies of flora.

I do appreciate gardens as nature and know how that affects me in a spiritual sense, but rather than embarrass myself, I will let poets and others speak my thoughts. So here's to flowers and the women who love them.
The best place to seek God is in a garden. You can dig for him there. ~George Bernard Shaw
Don't wear perfume in the garden - unless you want to be pollinated by bees. ~Anne Raver
Science, or para-science, tells us that geraniums bloom better if they are spoken to. But a kind word every now and then is really quite enough. Too much attention, like too much feeding, and weeding and hoeing, inhibits and embarrasses them. ~Victoria Glendinning

In my garden there is a large place for sentiment. My garden of flowers is also my garden of thoughts and dreams. The thoughts grow as freely as the flowers, and the dreams are as beautiful. ~Abram L. Urban

God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done. ~Author Unknown

There can be no other occupation like gardening in which, if you were to creep up behind someone at their work, you would find them smiling. ~Mirabel Osler

Happy gardeners Barbara and Ashley pose for a photo while taking a break from the soil.

When one of my plants dies, I die a little inside, too. ~Linda Solegato
Gardening is about enjoying the smell of things growing in the soil, getting dirty without feeling guilty, and generally taking the time to soak up a little peace and serenity. ~Lindley Karstens

The Gardner from Black Birch Estates being photographed by the Steward.

Ashley, such a pleasant young woman. She's digs right in. Not shy a bit when it comes to planting or photography.

Rachelle, a wonderful friend who gets so giddy when working in gardens you'd think they were her own. Wanna know the names of flowers and read about it? Check out Rachelle's blog at http://www.rachelleann41.blogspot.com/

The Sentinel. Benson the dog, a Llasa Apso, that's his job...to keep the critters away from Barbie's salads.

I know that if odour were visible, as colour is, I'd see the summer garden in rainbow clouds. ~Robert Bridges, "Testament of Beauty"

You can bury a lot of troubles digging in the dirt. ~Author Unknown
Garden writing is often very tame, a real waste when you think how opinionated, inquisitive, irreverent and lascivious gardeners themselves tend to be. Nobody talks much about the muscular limbs, dark, swollen buds, strip-tease trees and unholy beauty that have made us all slaves of the Goddess Flora. ~Ketzel Levine
I think that if ever a mortal heard the voice of God it would be in a garden at the cool of the day. ~F. Frankfort Moore, A Garden of Peace

The gardeners work the bird bath garden. Man you should see it now. More photos later perhaps.

Barbara shows her thanks and affection for her garden helper and teacher, Rachelle.

Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed.

~Walt Whitman
Why try to explain miracles to your kids when you can just have them plant a garden. ~Robert Brault

Barb did a lot of unusual things this year to take up space and add variety to compliment the flowers. There are milk cans, step stools, old time tricycles, bird houses. Here's a stepping stone to peace. I'll bet you were wondering where that was, perhaps we should send it to Washington.

Gardens take your breath away, especially when they are well done. Here's a stepping stone with a reminder to breath.

All done planting and such happy faces. Great job, I didn't do much,

but I am an excellent cheer leader.

The best fertilizer is the gardener's shadow. ~Author Unknown
I appreciate the misunderstanding I have had with Nature over my perennial border. I think it is a flower garden; she thinks it is a meadow lacking grass, and tries to correct the error. ~Sara Stein
Gardening is civil and social, but it wants the vigor and freedom of the forest and the outlaw. ~Henry David Thoreau
Gardens... should be like lovely, well-shaped girls: all curves, secret corners, unexpected deviations, seductive surprises and then still more curves. ~H.E. Bates, A Love of Flowers
It pleases me to take amateur photographs of my garden, and it pleases my garden to make my photographs look professional. ~Robert Brault

The kiss of the sun for pardon,

The song of the birds for mirth,

One is nearer God's heart in a garden

Than anywhere else on earth.

~Dorothy Frances Gurney