It's always a good feeling in the late spring to see the garden come together out of the chaos of leaf mulch into neat rows ready for planting. It's a powerful feeling, making a garden, like bringing the world into order. We spent a very rainy day over the weekend mulching the garden paths and tilling up new rows, and I can't wait to get all the seeds in and begin the watching, waiting and ...
A Few Tips on Fir Tips
In the Spring, when trees are putting out their new growth, it's the perfect time to harvest Douglas-fir tips for brewing tea and beer. If you have never tried them, imagine that good smell trees have, and that's about what they taste like. They are not only delicious, but good for you, and fortifying with a nice, local source of vitamin-C. You can store them either dried or frozen for use ...
The River’s Edge
Here, on the river's verge, I could be busy for months without changing my place, simply leaning a little more to right or left. ~Paul Cezanne ...
Spring Sights and Sounds of the McKenzie River Trail
May is such a good time to take a walk along a river and see what Spring has been up to. I feel incredibly fortunate to live so close to so many wonderful hiking trails in the McKenzie River watershed, one of which being the McKenzie trail itself. Simply walking along a riverbank is one of the most rejuvenating experiences I have found in the midst of life's busy happenings. I went out on an ...
The Best Peep Show Around!
Ms. Frizzle went broody again this spring, just like every year, so I decided to make it a win-win situation for everyone and got nine fuzzy little chicks from the feed store for her to raise in her own private brooding pen in the barn. Ms. Frizzle took all those fluffballs under her wing immediately, and she is now the proud mama chicken of five assorted bantams, two Welsummers, one Maran and one ...
May-Day
May-Day By Ralph Waldo Emerson (This is a lengthy poem, but it's Emerson at his finest, and well worth the read!) Daughter of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring, With sudden passion languishing, Teaching Barren moors to smile, Painting pictures mile on mile, Holds a cup with cowslip-wreaths, Whence a smokeless incense breathes. The air is full of whistlings bland; What was that I heard Out of ...
Gathering Around the Maypole
It's May Day and almost time for our Waldorf School's annual May Faire! I am busily crafting away, working with wool, roots, moss and sticks to create things to sell in my Mountain Hearth Handcrafts booth. I recently finished a needlefelted wool wall hanging of a maypole dance in honor of the occasion. It is similar to one I made a few years ago, but I am pleased to see how the unique ...
Brought to You by April Showers…
Apple Blossoms Bluebells Trilliums Flowering Dogwood Flowering Currant Plum Blossoms And last but not least, Lilacs. ...
Spring in the Garden
It's a good feeling to be all settled in during the spring and starting into the second year with an established garden. It's a real joy seeing all our cultivating, mulching, weeding and composting pay off. This time last year, we were in the thick of moving, with plants being dug up and stuck in the ground wherever there was room, and the garden hastily put in mid-May. Now we have mulched areas ...
Lilacs
In the dooryard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash’d palings, Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shaped leaves of rich green, With many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love, With every leaf a miracle—and from this bush in the dooryard, With delicate-color’d blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green, A sprig with its flower I ...