Spring is Here at #3 !!!

The time of awakening gardens has arrived, and none too soon for me!! With all of the heartache, violence and anger in the world right now I have found myself yearning for the peace and realistic perspective that always comes to me when I am outside working in the garden. We have had a lovely amount of rain this spring and it is finally starting to warm up. Every day I see new signs of the return of old friends as they lift their heads above the soil and push the leaf cover aside to greet the sunshine. Many of my perrenials that have been limping along , have finally decided that they are happy in their homes and have spread and emerged newly invigorated. Above you can see my unfurling Bleeding Hearts. I love the intensity fo the ruby red of the still to open blossoms.

The Pink Impression Hybrid Tulips are back again and stronger in number and look so at home beneath the weeping Cherry tree.

Here are my absolute favorite garden treasure, a true pass-along plant. This is an English Primrose called Hose-On -Hose and each year each plant creates a sister plant. The clumps grow very quickly and love part shade. When it is cool and rainy, the blossoms last for a very long time. You would have had a good chuckle if you had seen the contortions that I went to in order to get these shots. Lets just say a change of clothes was in order!!

We have Gold Finches swarming our thisle feeders and filling the yard with birdsong.

As our winter was relatively mild, the Pansies that I planted in the fall have rebounded beautifully and are filling the yards with their wonderful scent. I love this combo of the orange Pansie with the bright pink Phlox.

Last fall, I planted a large number of Grecian Wind Flowers, or anemones, in clusters all over the garden. These bulbs will naturalize and spread and fill the beds with these glorious corn flower blue flowers. i just adore this color!!!

To end our little garden stroll I will leave you with more shots of these glorious Pink impression Tulips. It really does work to plant the bulbs extra deep, if you want them to return year after year!!!

I hope that the glories of spring are arriving in your part of the counrty. Goodness knows we all need a healthy dose of perspective and grace that one can only gain when one spends time amoung the glories of the garden!!

Painting With Fibers

You have seen this image before. It is from the previous post about my fabulous Workshop with Fiber Artist Margo Duke. These are the samples that we created in class. The poppy piece was meant to grow into a flower garden scene. This week, after helping a friend with a felting project using my Embellishing machine, I took advantage of the setup and did alot more work on this piece.

Below you can see it after I have added several more poppy buds and little blue silk flowers to the garden.

So far I had only used the Embellishing Machine and done some hand needle felting on this piece. Remember that I had started out with a plain piece of water soluble fabric, also known as Vilene. It really looks like a medium weight interfacing but the magic happens when one adds water!!! So to reiterate, I began with the Vilene and then added all of the fibers to paint my garden scene. It truely looks and feels like one is painting with small bits of fluff and fabric to create a wonderful picture! The next step was to do some Free Motion Embroidery with invisible thread. I had a horrendous time trying to get the bobbin wound correctly- it is very difficult as the thread is really and truely invisible (actually a very fine nylon fishing line type of thread). The thread kept getting caught on the spindle and snapping- So Frustrating!!!! I stopped to take a deep breath- it was either that or hurl the bobbin across the room, never to be found again, when I remembered that Margo had told us to use regular thread in the bobbin and adjust the tension ,if necessary, so the bobbin thread does not show!!! Thank goodness I remembered !!!

So below you will see a picture of the back of the piece so you can see that I did do the free motion stitching.

Then it was magic time!!! I immersed the felted piece in tepid water with a bit of soap and voila, the base Vilene was gone!!!! I then rolled the piece in a layer of bubble wrap and shelf liner and rolled away! After changing the position of the piece several times and rolling till my arms hurt, I rinsed and squeezed the fabric several times, till all of the soap was gone. Below you will see the dried piece after wet felting.

I just LOVE this piece!!! It is so very delicate and thin- there is no denseness what so ever. If it were a larger piece, it would have a wonderful drape and be very different from what one would normally think of as felted material. The secret, as Margo says ,is the Water Soluble fabric!!!!

Here is a detail shot!

I am planning on doing some beading, especailly in the black center of the poppy. I might also add a bit of embroidery. Then I plan to mount it on acid free White matt board and frame it in a shadow box frame. I will be using this technique and my fabulous embellishing machine many times over and taking inspiration from my own garden!!

Speaking of gardens, I thought that I might share some shots of what is blooming in my garden right now. These shots have my mind blossoming with embellishing project opportunitities!!!

My wonderful English Primroses are really putting on a glorious show this year, thanks to all of the precipitation that we have had!!!

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I love these little tiny Grecian Windflowers. They are small bulbs and they are supposed to spread like crazy if they are happy. I plan to keep them happy!!

I love my Pink Impression Tulips and they are coming back for a third year as I planted them extra deep!!

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Easter and that you are enjoying a beautiful Spring day!! To those of you Down Under, I hope that your fall weather is delightful and that you are enjoying a nice tomato harvest, YUM!!!!!!

Spring has Sprung in My Garden

We are entering the time of year when I run the risk of making you all sick to death of floral photography!! This is my favorite time of year and I work very hard on my chemical free compost and manure only organic garden, so you will be seeing alot of pictures of it. I will understand if you don't leave comments every time or even if you run through the post overly quickly, but watch out ,you may miss some new art tucked in amoungst the fleurs!!There is one plant that I am so excited to see each year. It is a very unusual yellow primrose that is a true Pass-Along Plant. It began in the British Isles somewhere and was brought across the Atlantic in the suitcase of a dear elderly friend of my Mother's. Sally had clumps of primroses all over her yard and my Mom offered to help with the transplanting as they desperately needed to be divided. each year each plant produces a new plant via a rootlet so you can see how a clump can very gquickly become massive. So then my Mom had many clumps that needed to be divided. Any visitors who showed any interest were given a small clump and wherever I have lived , all ove the US, Mom has sent me clumps of the plants in the mail- they are very hardy. So the Woodfords have left a trail of these glorious buttery flowers all over the lower 48! I was told to not even try to grow these plants in central Oklahoma by experts at the Oklahoma Boatanical gardens- well they threw down the challenge!! i got them to grow in profusion in a very sheltered spot on the north side of the house where they were protedted from the blistering wind and heat. When we left Ok I "passed them along" to a wonderful gardening friend who was thrilled to have them!

As you can see one little blossom grows right from the center of it's neighbor. The blossoms come in pedulous clustersa nd the slugs will not touch them!! i just adore these plants!!

Here you see one of my favorite floral color combinations, fragrance color form and bloom time- this twosome ahs it all!!

Well enough nattering on, now I will just present you with some more pictures!!

Waterperry Veronica.

Although I did not make it into DC to see the Cherry Blossoms, I have a Cherry blooming in the yard. Next year I WILL get into DC to see the big explosion of color!!!

I came across this wonderful quote the other day and fell that it is most fitting for an end to this post!

"Peace is not something you wish for; It's something you make, something you do, something you are and something you give away." Robert Fulghum

An Artist's Date in Old Towne Fredericksburg

Lately, I have been traveling in and out of Fredericksburg several times a week. I am there to drop off art work at Liberty Town , to meet friends for lunch or to go to the Chiropractor. It seems that I always have to be somewhere, yet I see all of these wonderful scenes that I wish to capture on film. Fredericksburg is a southern city that played a very large part in the Civil War with several battles being played out right in the city . The Union troops massed on the Northern side of the Rappahanock River and the Southern troops on the southern side. These battles were fierce and brutal and were fought amidst the townspeople. The city is charming and beautiful, especially at this time of year. The Virginia Garden Society has made a huge effort to restore and maintain many of the gardens of so many historic homes in Virginia and the annual garden cellebration titled Garden Week arrives in 7 days. During this week , many of the historic homes are open to the public and staffed by volunteers in period dress and the whole city turns out for the coming of spring.

I decided on one of my hurried trips to and fro , that I needed an Artist's Date, with my camera, wandering the streets of Old Town. My opportunity came last thursday. It was a beautiful spring day and there were no plans except to wander. What a treat!!

Here are some of the pictures that I snapped along the way. the birds were singing, many residents and volunteers were working in gardens and other's were out enjoying the morning with their children in strollers and dogs on walks.

Many of the house open right onto the narrow streets but if you peek down the alley ways you can catch glimpses of hidden gardens tucked in behind.

This is one of my favorite doorways . It is the color that gets me! I just love it!!

Yet to leaf out Beech trees.

Bursting Magnolia blossoms.

as you arrive in the area with the larger homes, most have front yards with wonderful enty ways. this yard is graced by a gloriously gnarled Catalpa tree. Just have to love the texture of that bark!!!

Beatifully detailed front doors and windows.

This house was built in 1836.

This small cluster of flowers adorns the back stoop of Mary Washington, the mother of George Washington. This home is open to the public and the gardens are maintained in the manner of the day by a full time Master Gardener and a host of volunteers.

A wonderful street side patch of bulbs.

A quiet place to sit.

A secret garden entrance. No, I DID NOT scale the wall!!

A rare neglected home, begging for some TLC. Love the peeling paint texture though.

RedBud trees blooming everywhere!

Historic churches viewed throught the trees. ( Less likely to notice all of the telephone poles and wires!)

A beautifully painted Victorian porch.

A Land Grant marker tucked along the sidewalk, dated 1671.

Red Buds and Cherry Blossoms.

A view of the Northern bank of the Rappahannock River at the site where the Northern army used pontoon bridges to cross the river during the Battle of Fredericksburg.

Virginia Bluebells tucked in against 250 year old brick walls.

Glorious tulips planted along Caroline Street.

Newly unfurled Pink Dogwood blossoms.

I am planning on attending some of the activities during Garden Week. You can be assured that my camera will be with me and I will have more photos to share!

Happy Spring!!