2008 Botanicla Garden Tour: Part 1

(Warning: a very picture heavy post)

So I have finished the baby sweater. This is the sweater for the first grandchild of a very good friend. Her daughter, this baby's mother, was a favorite babysitter for my girls when they were just wee ones. She lost her little girl last year so this baby was very nervously anticipated. I just received word that he was born last evening and is a happy, healthy baby boy. Yeah!!!

All this little guy needs is some cute buttons.
I would like to make a little jester hat or booties to go with this jacket but don't have much of the blue left. Maybe I will make some booties and just crochet a little edging.

Yarn: Mission Falls1824 Cotton
Needles: Addi Turbos size 4 circulars
Chest Measurement: 22"

Now I would like you to suspend reality for a moment and pretend this is the entrance to my garden...


Don't I just wish. I don't have the buckos to do this and if I were in charge it wouldn't be this amazing. (When I showed this to the Head of Maintenance he asked who would be plowing over those stones this winter. He is all in favor of our black asphalt, so I guess this won't be the view into my garden anytime soon.) This is just a little teaser to entice you to follow me on the 2008 Pittsburgh Botanical Garden Open Gardens Tour. It was an overcast day that threatened rain off and on but was actually a great day to see the gardens, not too hot, not too bright, and except for a few showers, just right. So let me lead you down the garden path.



All shades of blue and white. Blue petunias, catmint, balloon flower, must remember this.


This is their perennial garden. It is very long but obviously not very deep. If I were in charge (and they must thank God every day that I am not). This sucker would be about 12 feet deep and just stuffed with plant material. I would have put in lots of vertical elements and ruined the whole composition. The thing I like about this perennial border is that it is low and you can see the forest beyond. It would be quite manageable too. I could learn a lot from this garden. It was serene and lovely.


A really well done water feature. So many water features look plunked down from on high. I think this one works. I would love a little waterfall at our place so will keep this shot in mind when I win the lottery.



We also peeked in the windows. It was furnished in a contemporary style, very clean and modern, an interesting juxtaposition with such a traditional exterior. I loved it and could have moved right in, no one extended the invitation so we moved on.


The sight of this tree completely took my breathe away. A weeping Kutsura tree is a thing of great beauty. I have spent the last 3 days imagining where I could plant one here on the farm. Now you would think with 40 acres to play with this wouldn't take 3 days. But this is a special tree which deserves a lot of forethought. I'll let you know what I come up with.


This was the view behind us from the terrace. This garden was my absolute favorite. The people living in the house now did not make the garden but they are wonderful stewards to the vision of the previous owners. The previous owners purchased the home in the 80's and had all the trees on the property removed. Now this is a big deal because in this particular borough of Pittsburgh you are not allowed to cut down any trees without permission. They paid the fines, brought in yards of good soil and compost and designed an enchanting garden on a sloped, relatively small city lot.





The cutting or butterfly garden, not sure but it was lovely.






And this is my all time favorite water feature. Doesn't it make you just want to spend your afternoon watching the fish go by. This is incredibly peaceful,so large and on a sloped lot, amazing design. It is tucked in next to a retaining wall.

Does anyone have any idea what this plant is? It was growing with the hostas and hellebores in the shade. The new owner didn't know what it is and I would like to plant it in my woodland garden.



I think that is enough for now. Hope this has been as inspiring for you as it was for me. Now I am off to my sorry little patch.

Little of this and a little of that

There has been some knitting, but so much more gardening. So maybe we will start with that.

I love garden blogs that show the long shots of the garden not just close ups of the pretty flowers. I am always curious about the design of the gardens. I am not particularly happy with the design right now.


Everything is just green. I know as a gardener I am supposed to be interested in the textures and foliage. Somehow that makes me a more sophisticated gardener, but sometimes I just want the flower shots.


This is the garden down by the pool which I planned to be very colorful for the summer months when we enjoy spending time swimming. This is not very successful, just green, green, green. Not what I envisioned.
This is a beautiful Pagoda dogwood that has one branch reverting to just green. Margaret talked about this issue at awaytogarden. I cut this branch out after I took the picture.

The endless summer hydrangeas are gorgeous this year and I can say that because I had absolutely nothing to do with mine. They are blue and full of flowers just the way an hydrangea should be. (Sorry, about how washed out the blue looks, I even took this early in the morning but nothing is showing the intensity of the blue.)
The stewartia is in bloom. I love this small, understory tree. No fragrance, but 4 seasons of interest. The bark is amazing.
The hosta bed looks very nice, don't you think,

until you get up close...We have 3 does wandering around the farm. One has a set of twin fawns, who while very cute are munching away on a few of my favorites, these hostas included.



You be the judge. I feel like I should dig everything up, move plants and rethink the whole design. This may have something to do with being on vacation when the spring show was on and I missed the whole thing; peonies, roses, geraniums, dianthus, nepetas, sweet peas. Most of my favorites and I missed them all.

But there has been knitting...


I finished the little Blue Sky Alpaca and Silk Helena sweater and hat for my friend's new baby girl. I am very happy with how it turned out and even have a skein left to play with. This yarn is dreamy. Thought you might like to see the adorable buttons too. I purchased this yarn and the buttons at Sheep to Shore on Nantucket, MA, my hometown.
If you ever find yourself on Nantucket with a few hours to yourself, make your way out to Sheep to Shore. It is a wonderful shop and Chris, the owner, is fantastic. I would love to spend my entire vacation just hanging out in her shop. It is warm, inviting, inspiring, comfortable and oh so beautiful. And all the ladies who work their are great. Hi Sheila(whose husband Matt happens to make the best sandwiches on the whole island. Something Natural is absolutely worth the trip.)

I am also knitting a lace shawl that I hope will be used as a christening blanket for the first grand child of a good friend. The yarn is Alpaca and it feels like buttah. I was inspired the christening blanket by Franklin Habit knit for his niece. The baby is due in August so I need to get cracking on this.

Ann Hanson's Tesserae socks out of the Blue Moon Fiber Arts medium weight sock yarn on size 1 needles. They should be very warm as they are very compacted.
Another baby sweater for the first child of one of my daughter's favorite babysitters when they were wee tikes. We know she is having a boy. Mission Falls Cotton , my own design. Now I must find just the perfect buttons.
Also have to finish a Fair Isle vest for a particular someone who will be home from Venice in 3 weeks. Luckily the weather will be too hot for her to wear it right away.

Now I have a question for you all. This Sunday 2 of my friends and I will be touring gardens of Pittsburgh and Ligonier on the Pittsburgh Botanical Open Garden Tour. I know I will be taking oodles of pictures. What is the correct etiquette about sharing other people's garden pictures on my blog? I am thinking that is not too kosher but not sure. I am sure some of them will be amazing and I would love to share with you all but don't think it is proper. What do you think????

Let there be Berries.

Perhaps you remember this early spring activity....

Mulching 350 blueberry bushes.


Well all that work had paid off handsomely. The bushes are bursting. There are so many berries the new, pliable branches can't even support them, so our high bush blueberries are pretty droopy.









There are mountains of berries to pick.DH diligently pruned all350 bushes with a Saws-All and then we mulched each bush with 6-8" of aged sawdust. Pruning and sawdust apparently make blueberries very happy.



He has put out the signs, the scale, the cash box, the pails and the pickers are picking.

I am a very spoiled woman. This man picks me fresh berries every morning.





This is a study of Bubba in the Blueberries. (Doesn't she look like a runway model posing for a fashion designer? I hope I have half her beauty at 80.)






I have this gracious lady to thank for the beautiful berries my husband shares with me every morning. Thank you Bub, for raising such a good man. (His dad was also in the patch with us but wouldn't stop grazing the berries long enough to pose for a picture. I am certain he had something to do with how well my husband turned out.)

C'est la Vie!!

Look who rode by our house today.






The Tour of Pennsylvania went right by our house. This is a race from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. All the riders are young men between the ages of 18 and 24, some of who may go on to ride the Tour de France. It was so fun to see these guys up close and to watch them climb a hill, even a little one. Yesterday they climbed some very steep and long hills to get to Latrobe, and today they climbed a few more before they headed off to Pittsburgh. Their average speed is about 28-30 miles per hour. That's booking. My average speed is about 15-16 mph, of course I am an old lady, but still.

Enjoy!

I'm back

Well, we took a 2 week vacation and I didn't take one picture. Now that we are back it has taken us nearly 2 weeks to tame the yard and gardens again. And I will never believe the English gardening lady who wrote that you should always use garden compost to mulch your flower beds and not use shredded bark mulch. Well, that is all well and good if you never leave your garden and are there every day to keep up the weeding. However,when you return from a holiday and all the pumpkin and hay seeds are a foot tall in all your ornamental beds you feel like screaming. Note to self: order the mulch early next year so the mulching is done before the plants are as big as VW Bugs.

I think I need to talk to Al Gore, this is what it did in Pennsylvania on June 20th.
Hail the size of marbles, big marbles. Our blueberries look pretty bruised and the husband is worried about his crop. My peas got banged around but their shells protect them, blueberries are right out in the open without any protection. I will let you know how they taste.



Look what I found among the weeds of my veggie garden. A pitcher plant. They are relatively rare, blog plants which eat flies, I believe. I was amazed and a little concerned that the ground near the veggie beds is this wet.



There has been knitting...there are many new babies to cover so I have knit the Helena sweater from the new Knitty.



Yarn: Blue Sky Alpacas, Alpaca Silk, color Guava, 3 skeins
Needles: Size 5 and 2 Addi Turbos, 24" circs.
Size: 22" chest, Size 2
Modifications: I changed the edging around the front, made it a picot edge and used three buttons rather than the ties.

I also made a hat to match which I will add as soon as it is dry. I love this yarn but it has absolutely no body and I am not sure I am happy with the drappy nature of the bodice. Everyone I showed it to assures me it is fine but I would have knit a much firmer fabric.

This is going to a little girl I will rarely see and I would so love to see this on a little one. May have to remember this if there is ever a little girl grand baby. (My husband is praying for boys, not that he didn't adore his girls, but he thinks it would be nice not to be outnumbered.)

I am thrilled to show you some shots of a garden I designed and planted last spring for my friend Marie-Paul. She and her husband JT had just finished building a new home when their 12 year old son was diagnosed with a brain tumor. After 6 months of surgeries, radiation and chemotherapy, I wanted to give them something to brighten their lives. Marie-Paul is from Belgium and loves flowers and gardens and didn't want anything to do with typical foundation plantings. I think we came up with a nice solution and she seems to be very happy with the results.


Isn't her lavender hedge gorgeous? All the plants came back beautifully but one. This is amazing for our climate and the generally clay soil we have here in the mountains of western PA. We amended her soil with yards and yards of composted horse manure and I think the plants are very happy.




She would like to have an arbor at this end of the walk someday.

Another friend lost her son this spring. He was the same age as DD#1. They were good buddies in elementary school and graduated together. I wanted to do something special for her. When ever a female friend is going through chemotherapy I like to knit them a shawl so they can stay warm during their treatments. I thought she could use something warm to wrap up in this winter to remember her beautiful, strong son hugging her. So I knit her a pray shawl too.


Yarn: Jade Sapphire Cashmere
Pattern: My own design, I think it is the horseshoe lace from Barbara Walker, not sure which book.

DD#2 looks especially fetching, don't you think?


Doesn't every 20 year old need a cashmere shawl? I think I could have a full time job just keeping she and her sister in knitwear. Let's see, Fair Isle vest, Aran cabled sweater, hats, gloves, mittens, scarves and now shawls. Luckily they are both very thin and we all share the same color sense so I love knitting for them.


Have a great day and if you love gardening check out the Margaret Roach gardening blog I just discovered, awaytogarden.com. It is fantastic.

Garden Tour?

Everything is sooo beautiful in the garden right now I thought I would give you a little tour.

Welcome to the Garden (this isn't really the entrance to the garden but it looked so pretty I thought I would take some poetic license )

The allium are just starting to open. I love this plant, it is very dainty and delicate but creates an explosion of color that I love.


Down by the pool (excuse the cover) the hostas are just starting to unfurl. It is hard to tell but above them is a wonderful pagoda dogwood. My conscientious husband wraps this tree in wire ever year so that the deer do not nibble during the winter. In the summer with it's variegated leaves it looks just like a wedding cake.

A very interesting Japanese maple which I planted two years ago. I hope it takes off this summer and actually starts to look like a tree. It will be stunning someday, I just hope I live long enough to see it.


Everything looks too washed out. The colors of all the tulips and the forget-me-knots are very bright and pretty.

The lilacs are in full flower and smell so good, but my all time favorite for fragrance has to be the Daphne "Carol Mackie" I planted right outside the mudroom door.
The wisteria trees have also put on a spectacular show this year. They finally started to flower last year. They say it takes 7 years for a wisteria to bloom and this one has been in the garden for exactly 8 years. Last year it began with 7 panicles of flowers and this year it is covered.

And yes, this is still a knitting blog. And there is some actual knitting going on, it is a little boring at the moment. Nothing momentous to show you. I have started a simple cable ribbed cardigan for myself out of some fantastic RY Silk Wool DK I purchased in Alexandria, VA at Knit Happens while I was in DC. This stuff feels like buttah. I am not sure if I am worthy. I have the back, one front and one sleeve finished. But I have started on another project which is more important and so will have to put this aside for the time being. The new project is in cashmere so not much of a sacrifice but I really need to finish something soon, I think I qualify for a medical condition and startitis doesn't sound serious enough.


This is another reason I can't stop starting new projects. Sundara keeps sending me these wonderful packages. Every time I receive a new Seasons Yarn Club mailing I drop everything, even cashmere to play with the new kid on the block. I never knew I was this fickle. I have been married to the same man for 25 years, I have shown my stick-to-it-tiveness. But show me a pretty new yarn and I am dropping the old like a bag of rocks. Obviously a character flaw I should work on. Right after I start a new shawl. (Oh, it's Sundara's Aran Silky Merino in Charcoal over Blue Lagoon, 50% merino, 50% silk, yummy!)




And this is why I haven't written for a while. I was in Washington, DC attending a conference for Cooperative Extension and then we met with our congressmen. It was a glorious week and the final day on the Hill was magnificent. I even got to go to the National Botanical Garden. (Which doesn't compare with our own Phipps Botanical Gardens in Pittsburgh, but it was very nice and the weather was phenomenal.)

Our nation's capital... I am patriotic enough that this view always chokes me up, every time. And this was after touring the Botanical gardens for free, what a country.