Spring has officially sprung

When the hyacinths peek their fragrant heads up through the tangle of winter grasses, I know that spring has officially sprung. The nights may still be chilly, but the garden knows that spring is here. On hills and glens not far away, I spot almond blossoms coming forth on trees left to fend for themselves. Yes, spring has arrived. 

Another arrival has occurred. A pale pink camellia has been adopted into the garden. She has lived her life in a pot for the last decade and a half. My mom couldn't keep her so it was time for this "pink lady" to have her roots put into the earth here among others that have now become her sisters. Already she is happy. Soon she will be as tall as the "old lady" on her right and the "showoff" on her left.

The "showoff" has been dazzling us with quite a show. Thanks to Hubby's expertise in installing windows, we can now enjoy every moment of this brilliant camellia's performance even on the rainiest of days. 

The bees are busy on the north side of the house where all the camellias live. The saucer-sized blooms have the bees in quite a tizzy trying to decide which bloom to explore next with their chubby pollen-laden legs. As I meander down the shady path, I hear their happy buzzing and it makes my heart sing.

Spring has officially sprung.

For sunshine, daffodils and lemons in February... for these I am grateful

Oh blessed February! On the darkest day of the winter solstice I yearn for this month to arrive with its respite of sunshine both from the sun and from the garden.

The daffodils, jonquils and lemons glow yellow as if heralding to the world that the days are indeed growing slightly longer.

I chase the light with the lens of my camera and with the lenses of my eyes. I drink it in like rays of lemonade. I bask in its warmth and listen to the birds chirping out their courtship rituals around the bird feeders filled with seeds because there are not enough bugs to go around yet.

And I am profoundly grateful spring comes in February in the Bay Area.

Happy wanderers of the flora and fauna varieties

Hardenbergia violacea "Happy Wanderer"

Last month I was certain that I wouldn't see a single bloom on my one surviving hardenbergia vine this year. A succession of frosty January nights had come just as the buds were setting all over the vine and zapped them all to shriveled little purple dots.

"Oh well," I thought.

But like the loquat tree, the hardenbergia had a backup plan I wasn't privy to and now it is blooming profusely with tiny little orchid-like blooms that look like they walked straight out of Disney's Alice in Wonderland.

The vine is commonly known as "Happy Wanderer". I've found that it isn't the only "happy wanderer" gracing the garden right now...

Bombycilla cedrorum "Cedar waxwing"

I've been thrilled to see large flocks of cedar waxwings in the garden this winter. Every day when I go out to get some sun therapy to ward off my SAD, I am delighted to watch the cedar waxwings come down in small groups from high in the neighbor's fruitless mulberry tree to timidly drink at the bird fountain we installed in the back garden last summer. The cedar waxwings' heads bob up and down as they hurriedly get a drink. Like teenage girls who all have to go to the restroom in a flock, these winter visitors aren't as familiar with the garden as the other permanent residents and so they feel more comfortable venturing down in smallish groups.

Soon the cedar waxwings will fly home to their mountain climes, but for now I'm thoroughly enjoying their vacationing here. Until this year, I haven't had the pleasure of seeing whole groups of them winter here.

Honeybee on hardenbergia

The weather has warmed enough for the bees to happily wander into the garden in search of nectar. The small lavender and pineapple sage plants have been in bloom throughout the winter and provided the only food source for the bees hearty enough to venture from their hive (wherever it may be) on the warmer sunnier days. Now the hardenbergia and camellias are giving the bees some variety. And soon the orange tree and bay laurel tree will have more blooms for them to peruse and sip from.

I used to be a "happy wanderer" always looking for adventure on the horizon. But as I've put down roots here along with the plants and trees I've brought to the garden, I'm finding that I prefer to be the hostess for other "happy wanderers"--both flora and fauna.

February is camellia season (and oh how I love camellia season)

I've always wondered... why does February have to be all about a holiday that makes single people sad and men feel inadequate? In the midst of winter, February is a second chance to surround oneself with bright vibrant colors. The red of Christmas is replaced by the reds and pinks of hearts and flowers. Frilly fancy doilies take the place of paper snowflakes.

I used to mourn the passing of the Christmas and New Year season until I realized that as the Christmas tree was coming down (usually around the second week of January) the hearts and flowers of Valentine's Day could be going up. Such a revelation!

Hubby and I have just as much fun putting up the red and white Valentine decorations on our mantle as we do decorating the mantle for Christmas. We even have a special string of red glass heart lights that we put up so in the long winter evenings they glow with a brilliant red hue.

In our mild winter climate, February also brings the blooming of the camellia bushes. Growing on the sheltered north side of our house, the camellias have grown over the past 12 years with some having branches that touch the underside of the eaves. They set buds in November. Then we sit and wait with great anticipation until they begin blooming some time in late January or early February. February has become "camellia season" for me.

I sometimes like to bring two or three blooms inside and float them in low dishes filled with water. They look like Valentines from Nature herself.  The rest of the blooms I leave outside where we can see them through the windows on that side of the house. Even on a rainy day, they brighten and cheer the winter landscape. Cool and velvety-soft to the touch, the brilliant red and pink petals of the camellia blossoms stay on the bushes about as long as roses stay on the bush. Eventually the camellia petals fall to the ground carpeting the ground under the bushes as if a bride is expected to walk down the aisle there. It is dazzling.

I'm so happy camellia season is here once again.

 

Lessons from the hyacinth

Our warmer-than-normal February temps have prompted a profusion of spring blooms to burst forth from the garden. The pink hyacinths are earlier than their purple cousins so they get to share the stage next to the little sunny faces of the jonquils.

I am always struck by the life lessons I learn from the garden.

After photographing the hyacinths, I started the post-processing in my studio and noticed there were details that the camera had captured which hadn't been evident to my naked eye. The cluster of the hyacinth with its lines and forms often distracts me from seeing the subtler and smaller details.

I was struck by the beauty of each flower within the cluster--how it looks like a watercolor brush has streaked the pink color down the center of each petal. I was struck that in the center of each blossom were intricate details. And then I noticed the light dusting of hyacinth pollen on the petals.

I have to ask... if I missed so much detail in this simple flower (and I was really looking) how much detail and beauty gets missed in the world around me throughout the course of a day... a month... a year?

I don't want to miss beauty like that.

Hello February, hello narcissus

Digitally painted photograph "Hello February"

At the base of the olive tree

the narcissus bloom

sunshine yellow

amidst the drabness of winter.

Sit still and quiet

breath in

and smell their heady fragrance

wafting on the breeze

I know spring is near when the hardenbergia blooms

"Dreaming in purple watercolors"

digitally painted photograph by Cindy Garber Iverson

The photo above is one I created in 2009 from a photograph I took while walking our street. The neighbor had a wonderful climbing vine that was covered in this tiny purple flowers that grew on a pergola right on the sidewalk.

After falling in love with the teeny tiny orchid-like blooms, I did some investigation and found out that the vine is called Hardenbergia violacea or "Happy Wanderer" and acquired two for my own garden. Their are going on their second spring here at Rosehaven Cottage.

Because I've been recovering from surgery for the past 2 weeks (click here to read more about that), I haven't been out walking the garden looking for blooms like I usually do in mid-February. Imagine my delighted surprise when I looked out my studio window to see swathes of purple billowing up on their fence-line trellises!

Spring is definitely near when the hardenbergia blooms.

I used my own texture "Irridescence" to create the above digitally painted photograph.
This and other textures are available for free download by clicking here to go to
the Rosehaven Cottage Digital Download Shop

Blog Giveaway: School-style Valentines featuring "Kitty cat love"

I had so much fun painting my "Kitty cat love" Valentine illustration. I love kitty cats, and I love Valentine's Day so the pairing of the two seemed perfect. My illustration shows Mr. Kitty giving a chocolate mouse (not mousse) truffle to his Valentine Miss Kitty who has a red-bowed fish to give to her beau in return.

To celebrate the completion of this illustration, I had some sweet "school style" Valentines printed so I could host a giveaway here on the blog!

What's fun is that there will be more than one winner! There will be five winners! Each winner will receive a pack of 20 "school style" Valentines (2.5"w x 3.5"h) like the kind I loved exchanging with classmates when I was in elementary school.

Valentine Giveaway Guidelines:

• Everyone who leaves a comment here on this post will be entered. Each person will only be counted once so duplicate comments won't help your odds (sorry)
• Entries will be accepted up to midnight February 1, 2011
• I will pay shipping to the winners of the drawing
• If you don't have an email link connected to the i.d. you use to leave the comment, then you'll have to check back on February 2, 2011 to find out if you won and then contact me via email so I can get your postal address privately.
• If you do have an email link connected to the i.d. you use, then I will contact you off the blog as well as announce you as the winner.
• Basically, it's the standard blog giveaway rules that are out there in the "blog-o-sphere" already.

To see other ways to send a Valentine featuring Mr. and Miss Kitty, click on any of the pics below:

FREE e-valentine at pingg.com

Left to right:

• "I think you're the cat's meow" custom-printed Valentine
• "Kitty cat love" gallery wrapped giclee canvas in a variety of sizes
• Pack of 100 "school style" "Kitty cat love" Valentines

Too beautiful to post-process

The sun is shining today with white puffy clouds against a blue sky. It's like nature is wishing us a Happy Valentine's Day a day early.

I found the "My Fifi" rose bush trying to send out very early blossoms on some long canes that I've been meaning to cut back. I'm glad I didn't cut them back though, because it meant that I could photograph these precious little blossoms against the white clouds in the blue sky--the perfect backdrop.

I got back inside to post-process the photos and I just couldn't make myself do anything to this shot except a crop. To me, it's just too beautiful to post-process anymore. Sometimes it's just that way. It's "photographic serendipity".

First daffodils of 2010

Except for a slight crop and exposure adjustment, this shot is SOOC (straight out of the camera)

February is the month when we can expect daffodils to be in bloom, and just like clockwork the daffodils are brightening up the garden right now.

There was a break rain today, so I took the opportunity to go out and trudge around the garden with my camera to see what I could find that was pretty and worth photographing. Even though things look pretty boring from a distance, I found that if I looked up close I could find quite a few little pretties. Isn't that just like life...

Winter is almost over...

On a walk along our street today, I came across a neighbor's beautiful pyracantha bushes that are more like trees than bushes. As you can see, many of the trees around here are still leafless as they should be in winter. Although I have beautiful spring bulbs blooming in the sheltered areas of my garden, the rest of the area has yet to wake up from winter. In the meantime, the beautiful red berries and the lines of the branches are just as pretty to me.

The Camelias of February

I always associate camelias with the month of February. Camelia bushes are a popular choice for shade gardens here in our microclimate of the San Francisco Bay Area (very Mediterranean). In other milder microclimates of the Bay Area where there is more fog and overcast days camelias grow in full sun. Regardless, in February there is a profusion of wonderful white, pink, and red camelias in many Bay Area gardens.

When I was attending Mills College in Oakland to obtain my Bachelor of Arts degree, I was amazed at the giant camelia bushes that grew next to the music building. The bushes were 2 stories tall! And in February they would be just covered with blooms! It was such a wonderful sight that I can't even begin to adequately describe.

So you can imagine my delight when we moved to Rosehaven Cottage and found a very mature red camelia bush growing in the narrow 5 foot garden on the north side of the house. Although the bush had been poorly pruned for a number of years, it was not beyond help and it was quite healthy and happy in its location, standing at a height of about 5 1/2 feet.

Since that strip down the side of the house was the only location on our property that could serve as a shade garden, I decided then and there that I was going to add more camelias and have them be the star feature in a gorgeous line--one under each window on that wall. I had (and still do have) visions of them being just as tall as the bushes I loved so much at Mills College.

Why is it that I am so enamored with camelias? Well, I am really drawn to their thick waxy green foliage. The leaves are such a beautiful shape. And the glossy texture is so wonderful to the touch. Even when the camelia isn't in bloom (which is large part of the year) the foliage is still so attractive to me. I also love the buds. They are such perfect symetrical little orbs looking like eggs ready to hatch. I love to see the the petals of the future blooms peeking out of the top of the bud. It means that February's show is about to begin.

The first growing season that we spent here at Rosehaven Cottage was 7 years ago. And the camelia bushes for the shade garden were one of the first major acquisitions I made. The camelia at left grows just outside our living room window. I anxiously waited year after year for it to get tall enough so we could see its blooms through the window. Last year we met that major milestone as one bloom peeks its colorful pink head high enough for us to see it. Last summer it experienced a major growth spurt so that now we are able to see most of the blooms from the window.

When we had the house repainted in the fall of 2006 I was so worried that the camelias wouldn't like being disturbed by the painters' activities. My worrying was all for naught. The camelia didn't care one bit. And just to prove me wrong, it had that big growth spurt I mentioned above. I love how the deep green foliage looks against the butter yellow of our house now. It looks like that's the way it always was.

The one mistake I made when I first started gardening here at Rosehaven Cottage, was to not properly catalogue and journal my plantings. I wish I had. The tags that I left on the camelia bushes are long gone, and now I haven't got a clue what variety each one is, which is really pathetic now that I'm writing a garden-related blog. It's even worse if anyone asks me what variety one is so they can get one just like it. I end up having to fess up and looking rather silly.

I just chalk it up to gardening inexperience. Aside from the small patio garden we had at our apartment prior to moving to Rosehaven Cottage, I had never had a garden of my own. Who knew that I should be writing this stuff down? Now, whenever a beginning gardener comes to be for advice and tips, I try to remember to tell them that they should really keep a garden journal of some sort as they plant their gardens. That way they don't end up with unidentified camelias and rosebushes like I've got.

So with that BIG disclaimer, here is a closeup of this lovely deep pink camelia that grows right outside our living room window. Isn't it gorgeous? Sure wish I knew its name. Sigh...

Regardless, it looks to be well on its way to being one of those huge tall beauties that I wanted even though most of the others I planted are remaining smallish. At least this one and the original camelia at the opposite end of the house are big and beautiful. They'll be like big camelia bookends someday, I hope.

More Springtime Warmth in February

I know that it's a warm sunny day when I catch a kitty laying around like this in the garden. This is where I found little Oreo, the feral garden kitty--lounging under the Breath of Heaven bush in the front garden. Today was such a beautiful day, with a high of around 67°F (19.44°C) according to Hubby (my personal weatherman).

Oh no... I can almost hear the groans from my friends in colder climes. I'm really not doing this to gloat. I'm hoping to somehow spread the sunshine in some way to all of my blogging friends with cold toes and noses right now.

So many of my blogging friends are fellow rose lovers. And many of those fellow rose lovers are missing their blooms right now. So let me share with you the few lovely roses that are in bloom at Rosehaven Cottage. The Joseph's Coat rose (above left) has one solitary blossom reaching toward the sky amid leafless lilac branches with buds on them. The Tahitian Sunset rose (above center) also has one stalwart solitary blossom that I couldn't bare to cut when I was doing all the rest of the rosebush cleanup in preparation for the new foliage. And the pink "mystery" rose (above right) has a few brave tight little buds spearing toward the sky like cupid's arrows--perfect for Valentine's Day.

I can't think of a better way to warm some of you up than to share this gorgeous lemon with you! It is one of many on this lemon tree that is only a few years old. This is the first good crop we've had, and I'm so happy about that. Hubby picked a couple lemons today to bring in and cook with. He is amazing in the kitchen and can do wonders skinless chicken breasts, spices, and a fresh lemon or with a lemon, vinegar, and some spices over some fresh greens. Yum!

Speaking of greens... we have some of those too! The broccoli (above left) is looking almost too pretty to harvest. And the perennial brussels sprouts in the front garden (above right), although not tight enough to really harvest for eating, are filling in nicely to serve as a great aphid decoy when the roses send out their new foliage soon.

And finally, the lovely soothing blue of a vinca major blossom that I only get to see during this time of year. During the summer months, it gets too hot and dry for the vinca to be happy enough to flower. So I enjoy it in the spring before it goes away by the time June rolls around. That will be about the time when I will be enjoying the wonderful blogs of all of you in cooler climates that will have amazingly lush summer gardens when mine is past its prime and I'm camping out inside in front of the A/C to somehow get cool. It all evens out somehow, doesn't it?