Raspberries

The rhythm in my garden is in motion. As the last strawberries wait to be picked, the first ripe raspberries make an appearance. And by the look of the snow peas flowers, they aren't too far behind. We've been eating leaf lettuce and baby beets for a while now. So the garden flows predicably to an extent. But I don't take it for granted; the raspberry cart or the snow pea bushel can be turned over by a whim of Nature.

The raspberries are good this year, very sweet and on the large size for my bushes. I think this year I'll have enough to freeze. Usually, we just eat 'em the same day they're picked; Nature's version of a drive-through resturant. But this year, it looks like we can have our raspberry and freeze it, too.

The great thing about raspberriy bushes is that they can be used in so many ways. First, naturally, there's the berries. Then after they are done, I add the leaves to my rabbits' food. In the fall, I cut the canes back and feed them to the rabbits who chew them up with gusto.

The raspberries are at the top of my main garden, next to the strawberries. And like strawberries, the raspberries' offshoots are springing up all over the place. I even have some poking merrily up through my lettuce and dill. So I'm thinking this fall, I might move the younger canes to the old wooden log fence that hems one side of the garden. The space by the fence always been overgrown since it is so hard to get in there to do anything. Plus I like the look of raspberries hanging over the fence. It looks so inviting and homey. So when the harvest is done and all I have left to do is look forward to a long winter, it will be nice to transplant the raspberries and know another spring is on her way.

The Butterfly Garden

The Butterfly Garden was started as a joint project between T, then pre-teen daughter, and myself. I thought it would be a fun project for the two of us. We both were interested in seeing what kind of butterflies would show up. It has come with benefits; we’ve had marvelous conversations while weeding. While T has moved on to other interests the garden remains and she still will come out every now and then, pick a few weeds and talk. The topics, like butterflies, are varied and most times, as butterflies would, the topics flutter and float away. Some topics occasionally settle, like a butterfly alighting on a rock to sun itself; and becoming a real discussion of importance.

The Butterfly Garden originally was full of little white stone paths and almost everything in it was an annual. It was very pretty and whimsical. I put an old wagon wheel I found in a long forgotten corner of our property in it and scattered garden stepping stones and ornaments wherever I found a spot for them. But as daughters grow and change, so has the butterfly garden.

It's funny how one's priorities change when practicality moves in. It took me one summer to figure out while stone paths were very pretty; they were a royal pain to weed. The stones themselves kept migrating to the garden or worse, to the lawn where driving over them with the lawn mower turned them into flying missiles. I couldn’t use a trowel to loosen the weeds because of the stones. Only took one stone to the forehead to figure that one out. Now, instead of many trailing stone path, I have one down the center. I still have to weed it but I have found that adding a bag of stones every year is finally discouraging the weeds to the point where I’m hoping they’ll give up. I have applied the same philosophy to T, I don’t sweat the clothes she wears or the make up she applies because the grades are good, she’s not rude and does the chores. Like I said, priorities change.

After two summers, I realized I simply didn't have the time to plan, arrange and sow seeds every spring considering the other gardens I had to work on. So I started planting perennials that I heard attracted butterflies. I’ve got lambs’ ear, lavender, asterbies, lovage, and bee balm. The seeds I do plant of plants that are self-seeding and will come back, calendula and cone flowers. The ornaments and stepping-stones are more strewn now than placed. Any flaw I want to cover, I plop a knick-knack on it. Some of the time saved is now spent with T, and while I don’t want to cover her flaws, an occasional weeding of her attitude works wonders.

The Butterfly Garden has changed over the years, but it is still a gentle place, full of quiet beauty and sweet dreams, as is my daughter. And like my daughter, it has grown, becoming more practical and mature but the original charm, likability, and uniqueness have been kept beautifully.


Every now and then, there is an unexpected joy. Like this cosmo growing amoung the Calendulas. A seed from last year that persevered through the winter and grew strong and beautiful. Or T offering to shingle the top part of the chicken coop, conquering her fear of heights because she knew with my vertigo, it would be difficult for me. And so I carefully tend, nurture and occasionally put on a pile of tried and true compost, also known as advice. The gifts and the accomplishment come with the years.