It has a been a while since we last posted and I think we just needed to take some time off from the daily rigors of the summer/fall months. The snow is on the ground now, and our attention turns to relaxing, making decisions of what we will plant next year and sourcing suppliers. I found a couple of new suppliers for dahlia tubers in Canada. Ferncliff Gardens is based out on the west coast and they have a very large selection of dahlias along with peonies, irises and a few other perennials. I put an order in yesterday and am looking forward to new bloom colours next summer. Focusing on a couple of colours that I can't get from my wholesaler, purple and orange and variations of them. The seed catalogues will start arriving this month and our orders will be placed with them by January.
We have been doing a lot of walking the last couple of weeks enjoying the warm weather, checking out the various animal tracks in the snow. We seem to be playing host to a couple of vegetarian coyotes. They tend to visit our compost bins almost daily checking out the array of vegetable scraps that we are composting and enjoying something or other. Maybe there are mice living in the piles. We have a group of Pine Grosbeaks in the yard eating the lilac seeds, crabapple fruit and the sunflower seeds.
The Tomato Jam we made this summer, is being eaten as a condiment in place of ketchup and I know we will not go back to plain old ketchup again. Another item we don't have to depend on buying from the grocery store, which is made with wholesome ingredients we grow. I had the opportunity this fall to pick the Sea Buckthorn berries before we received a hard frost and made a batch of Sea Buckthorn Jelly, which turned out very well. They are such a beautiful orange colour and very healthy.
Including a few photos of the gardens taken by our daughter Mandy.
Love Grass
