Little Things Here and Rhizomes

*It was silver with a blob that had remnants of hands and feet. I found a painted rock on a shelf in a store as I was browsing the shelf. I almost moved the rock to see what was behind it. Finally, I focused and realized I had found a Halloween rock. I believe it was a ghost. Cute. This is my fourth rock. It really makes he happy to find one of these painted rocks.

*Finally, someone helped move things so I could turn on the heat. It has not been so cold in here as it has been damp to the bone. I hung up a pair of pants in a doorway, and four days later the pants were still damp. Now, it is comfortable in here. The heat is as low as it will go.

*On Thursday, I saw a tree that had turned. It was the most brilliant yellow. Since then, a few more around town have turned. Mine are still greenish.

*When Tommy was here on Tuesday, he asked me about my having caramel corn and where I got it. Since I don't have any caramel corn, I got up to see what he was talking about. It was a bag of onions to plant. We had a good laugh. I had started out the back door to plant them and went to bathroom and did not go outdoors to plant them.

*Stupid little chipmunks! They eat anything. I will have to leave all pots of flowers and Hosta on a table to keep them from have lunch on my plants. Maybe I will have to plant things in a combination of dirt and gravel. 

*My reduced mums were doing fine and blooming. Then, I fell behind on the deadheading. If I did not deadhead, I would not have more flowers. I just grabbed my kitchen scissors and gave the whole thing a haircut, cutting about four inches from the whole plant. Then, I watered it. Maybe this will work. What do you think?

*I spotted a "free" box and looked into it. I had to ask what was in the box. It was just a lot of dirty looking stuff. It turned out they were iris rhizomes. The guy told me it was flowers. I got two and he told me to take more, take all I wanted. I grabbed a handful and it turned out I had six rhizomes. They are now planted and greening up on top. I just pushed them down sideways and pushed a little soil over them. It worked. I really do know iris rhizomes, but these had the tops cut off, the roots still attached, and just a bunch of trash from the yard. I did not lean over or touch the rhizomes before I asked.

*Have you ever wondered what was the difference between bulbs, roots, rhizome, and corms? I know I have, but this article will help.

I found a rock!

I went to Publix to find reduced Christmas ice cream and maybe some Thin Mint ice cream since it is that time of the year and someone, maybe sluggy, said it was on sale.

There is a station in Publix where a woman cooks and serves samples. She was not working at that time, so no samples. I was looking at the recipe she used today. I put my hand on the counter and was puzzled by a heart cookie decorated and sitting on the edge of the counter. I gingerly touched it. It was a decorated heart-shaped rock. Someone had taken a foam heart and put a heart sticker on it and glued it to the rock. It looked just like a Valentine cookie.

Finding the rock made me so happy. I imagine a little kid wanting to paint a rock and the mother saying, "let's just decorate one with stickers.

There was no clearance Christmas ice cream and no Thin Mint ice cream. At least I had something to bring home, make me smile, and forget how much I wanted ice cream. This is my second rock I have found. I lost the first one and was sorely disappointed.

Your turn
Have you found a painted/decorated left for someone to find rock lately? Or ever? Do you paint rocks and disperse them for people to find? Do you skip rocks on water? Tell me your rock story...lol...seriously.

Five Pounds of Tiny Rocks

The cashier had to come around and take a plastic container of rocks from the basket of my electric cart. AND, she picked it up by the top because she could. The plastic lid came off the plastic container making a mighty noise and startling her as it fell and the lid came off. Well, lots of people looked and questioned her.

Rocks flew everywhere as the container hit the ground! Most landed right in front of the cart, but a few were ten or more feet away in an area where people would walk. I suggested she get the ones people could slip on. She curtly replied that was what she was doing. "No, those lone rocks in the aisle might cause people to slip." She looked annoyed and went to get them.

I have a project in mind, and it's not painting rocks. I had no idea that a container about the size of a pint jar could weigh so much. The earth must be heavy...ok, being silly.

This is called planning ahead since this project will be a County Fair entry next September. My mind races when I consider my entries planned for next year.

Do you plan artsy projects a year ahead. Garden plans are in the works, too. I have seen the vegetables on display and think I can do as well, hopefully better.

Now, I will have to wash five pounds of rocks.

Rocks in Nashville

While I was in Nashville waiting for totality, I found rocks for painting like Lorraine does. I walked up to McD's where we used the bathroom and was waiting for exbf to slowly walk there. There were landscaping rocks by my feet. I really wanted to take a couple to paint. However, I resisted the urge, knowing it would be stealing.

Somehow, I lost the rock I found on a shelf at WM.  I think J threw it out or J vacuumed it up. Bummer!

As I typed the title to this post, I realized I need a rock to memorialize Totality for me. Of course, the memory is better than a rock! Lorraine, an idea--Totality Rocks because Totality rocks.

 In a post somewhere there were rocks for plant markers. The plant names were in very plain print and had little dots around the outside of the rock. It seems the universe is showing me rocks I can emulate...lol.

I am getting up my nerve. Now, I need to get rocks without stealing them.

Your turn
Has anyone painted rocks yet? Am I behind? If you are painting rocks, are they on your blog? Okay, I know Lorraine is painting rocks.

"I Found a Rock"

People in Walmart heard me as I gasped with surprise while saying this. Then, I had to explain about painting on rocks from Lorraine's blog. The other day, I found a rock painting site on the internet for this town. Sooo, now I have a painted rock.

It is only about 1 1/2 inches long. about the size of my first joint on my thumb. I think a child painted this little rock. Maybe it was a non-painter adult. This was such a surprise to find on a shelf in Walmart!

I cannot post a picture, but some day, I will.

Your turn
Do you paint rocks? Have you heard of this popular activity with many websites for the painters. Have you ever found a painted rock? Where? Do I need to post this so the child will know it was found and appreciated?

Trembling Enchantment of Green



"He who loves a garden still his Eden keep" A. Bronson Alcott


Don't get me wrong. I never wear green. Nothing in my house is green--no walls or furnishings. Green of nature enthralls me every year as though I had never seen it before. As I grow older (almost 63 now), it seems I appreciate it more....not sure why. The life I see in green is something Thoreau would appreciate. Nothing else seems to hold the peace and promise of green trees, foliage of yard plants, and the grass. Maybe it's just me. My St. Augustine grass has a depth to its green that is lacking in other grasses that I have observed. By no means have I experienced all the greens and grasses of the earth.

As I drove the back way from Huntsville, south to my home, avoiding the interstate, about 6:30 pm last Saturday, I was struck by the majesty of the land around me. There were few houses, a little mountain foothills  range, and absolute quiet. People must be at home eating, tending the last bit of their garden, or getting ready to go out on Saturday night, I thought. This road normally has many cars. Not so when I drove the 30+ miles home this evening.

Since I had the radio off, the drive seemed especially serene. From now on the radio will be off so the noise won't interfere with the green experience. I could not see green for the cacophony of my favorite music (60s and easy listening).

I passed the old barn right beside the road with the little stand for selling produce. No one has sold produce there for the last 25 years. The old man died. His widow insisted on raising and selling gourds. Maybe that is produce. Her son raised gourds just for her and filled a 6' x 6' x 4' high lattice bin, made just for her and her gourds. The bin has a nice roof and overhang for shoppers and gourds to stay dry and shaded.

One summer day, I saw her, bent and walking slowly. She wore a faded, printed cotton house dress, topped by a faded apron. She had a bonnet on her head and old knee socks scrunched around her legs. For years there was never anyone at the stand. The one sighting of her and a later conversation with a very young, respectful relative were the only means of communication except for the locked money box in which to deposit money to pay for gourds. Laughing gently, the relative said the old woman had the only key and checked it regularly.

Now, there are only very old gourds in the bin. It does not look like they raise gourds any longer. The young relative had pointed them out to me, up on the hill near the woods. Did she die? I wonder. Everything was too quiet and green to stop and inquire.

Even the dogs seemed to honor the peace of the green afternoon, soon to be dusk. All their masters must have mowed the lawns because every lawn was freshly cut. The scene was not marred by a jarring note. Mowers were gone. No cars were in sight in the yards and few were on the road. Nature, even subdued by a lawnmower, seemed to be in charge. For one moment, I wondered if it were this quiet a hundred years ago. Home awaits me.

Late Spring has given us over a week of rain which seems to have added another dimension to the green world. As I stood in the backyard today, hanging clothes on the line, I was struck by the fact that I could see only green as I gazed round me. Only the clothes, the chicks and part of the back of my house broke the green spell. The sky was blue with clouds. The 6 foot back fence was obscured by scuppernong vines and wisteria. Even the trunks of the trees were gone, hidden by privets that reached up toward the branches of the hickory nut trees and bowed to the ground, touching the grass. The low-growing limbs of the tree hid my car and the house next door.

The diffuse, trembling green of Nature seemed at her best. Green must be female, tantalizing us each day to play with her, to interact. Green has many agendas and roles--nurturing, playing, birthing, tending, feeding, burying, cleaning, listening, hiding. Green is there to discover as I increasingly have the last few days.

It all seemed too perfect, punctuated by two bright petunia plants, rescued from brown doom at Lowe's. I nurtured them back to their green and pink state. The old-fashioned roses on the back fence have faded, and I won't cut the vines until I see hips. Maybe I will have hips.

For a moment, I felt as if I were in a secret garden, seeing nothing and hearing only the birds and chicks. Sometimes, it is hard to tell them apart just by listening.

I had no horizon, only walls of green on four sides and a blue ceiling. The house is there, but from where I stood, I could not really see it. The blaze of the sun, though blinding, kept me focused on the green. Weeds grown up over my rock garden hid even the heat of the rocks so nothing emanated. It was all green, just green.

This feeling comes over me every year. Today pulled all the green I feel from the depths of me. I never told anyone before.

"He who loves a garden still his Eden keeps."  (sign in my yard)
A. Bronson Alcott

(Written on June 22, 2009, ten days after I had no TV)


(Note: June 22, 2011: I still have no TV. I can tell the chicks (now hens) from the birds chirping in the trees. Neighbors cut lots of green privets and put up a fence which the wisteria is starting to cover again. I will be 65 in two months. Today is the same green month and day as when I wrote this. )

Your turn
Does the green of nature touch you deeply? Does green, lush foilage renew you as it does me?