Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

checking in post equinox

Friends, happy springtime. We made it! Barring the very real possibility of a frosty morning here and there, Oklahoma is on the cheerful upswing towards warmth and rebirth. Today we are drinking in a much needed gentle rainfall, windows open and a cleansing breeze combing through our senses. Clover patches are overtaking the dead lawns. Trees have leaf buds dotting their naked branches. Daffodils assure us that Old Man Winter had his rightful turn and is once again retreating.

Gardeners everywhere are either tending tray after tray of seedlings in their warmest interior rooms or already raking clean their flower beds and ruminating over their raised gardens for planting this year’s treasures. Will food prevail in 2022, to combat the price of groceries, or will more people grow flowers to celebrate a return to life and liberty? How will you pursue your gardening happiness?

((basil sprouts indoors, grown from last year’s seed))

For me, the answer is both, with a heavy lean to all things kitchen. I am also very excited to be actively mentoring a few friends plus Jessica and Alex for a big round of first time garden growers. This is a life pleasure I never knew to anticipate! Maybe the only thing more fun than growing my own garden is helping loved ones grow theirs.

I hope you’ll tune in again in the next few days. I have some stories to share about Miss Scarlett, our rescue calf. I have been sharing quite a bit about her on Facebook and Instagram, but right here on the blog will be a fun place to record more detailed updates for posterity. I also have a brand new interview to share, this one not about Pandemic, and the subject is our very own Handsome, aka BW, aka Farm Daddy, aka Director and Sir and brother and friend to so many. My husband!! I am so excited for this project, but I want it to be clean and sooth when I share it.

Until then, I will be writing stories and potting up seedlings, cleaning oak-leaf-filled garden beds and scrubbing dirty concrete floors. Feeding chickens and filling compost boxes, definitely making bottles for an unbelievably sweet baby cow. Keeping Klaus entertained but not reading much, not this week. In spare moments I have been rereading highlights from The Well Gardened Mind and drawing all kinds of fresh inspiration from that. I’ll find a new book once these two writing projects are complete.

((scarlett and her milk bubbles mouth))

What are you up to this week?

“The return of spring each year
can be endlessly relied on,
and in not dying when we die, we have a sense
of goodness going forward.
This is the garden’s most enduring consolation.”
~Dr. Sue Stuart Smith
The Well Gardened Mind
XOXOXOXO

tuesday as winter throws its final tantrum

As I sit down for a few minutes to write this, we are bracing for one final cold snap, a late one by some measures but also weather that is completely on par with… (gestures widely to the entire past year). The overnight low in much of Oklahoma will likely flirt with 32 degrees for an hour or so, which is enough to trigger damaging frost. So I am happy to have not yet planted any tender tropicals. Today I spent a few hours moving soft, sweet smelling compost in gentle heaps and pillows to all the roses and brassica vegetables, plus the few cannas that have broken ground already. Fingers crossed for all my hydrangeas and viburnum; they are way to big to cover without letting the cloth touch the foliage. Nothing has bloomed yet, only leafed out, so that seems good.

Both yesterday and today while flipping and moving compost, I spied a baby snake. It is a silvery grey thing, narrow and shiny, fast as lightning. Had I not seen its tapered tail I might have guessed it to be an overfed earthworm. This is the time of year for both fat earthworms and skinny snakes. And they are both likely to be found in the compost.

The compost heap also produced a trio of humble, cheerful little squash plants, a wonderful surprise. I lifted them out of the fertile ground, along with some of that magical black stuff, and potted them up for transplanting soon into the proper garden. They will have a head start on all the other squash plants and maybe thereby escape the scourge whose name we dare not speak.

These are probably spaghetti squashes, based on the giant petrified skin I found nearby.

The strawberries I have been growing just for fun in small pots are, to my surprise, actually growing. And ripening! Look at this sweet pink baby.

About 2 dozen of these are growing in pots. Should I leave them, or put the in a garden bed?

Klaus kept me company all day while I moved compost and pulled wild greens for the chickens. We now have four big raised beds clean and fed in advance of planting this weekend. He played hard with Meh and Little Lady Marigold, then he came inside with me, visibly exhausted. He napped hard for about twenty minutes while I ate lunch and caught up on messages. Then we went upstairs to the Apartment to do the ironing. As I got started, he perched himself dramatically on the guest bed there and gave me the most pitiful face. Clearly, he had rested plenty and wanted to be back outside with his brother Meh. Or, and this is a legitimate possibility, he wanted Meh to come inside with us and play babies in the Apartment.

Can you see Meh far in the distance?

We are having soup tonight at the Lazy W, a cozy dinner to thaw our bodies, round out a hard working day, and embrace what will hopefully be the end of very cold weather for a very long time. I feel my heart thawing in so many ways, too. I feel the loosening of this vice grip of worry for our kids, and I feel the swell of peace and the energy of joyful work. All of it flowing.

“Well being is the only stream that flows.”
~Abraham Hicks
XOXOXO

hello, happy march!

I am so deeply refreshed to be in this third month of the new year, teetering giddily on the knife edge of springtime. The farm has thankfully survived every brutal winter storm that has come our way since last October. Our family is thriving and reaching warmly, patiently, towards brand new miracles. Every day I feel more of that old, familiar, vernal energy thrumming against my bones. It feels the way dirt smells, and it enlivens all my work. It makes everything seem not just possible but also purposeful. That’s beautiful.

Last week, on a whim, we hung LED lights around the outside edge of the yurt. It’s one more quirky layer added to the structure, wildly imperfect and sparkling and welcoming. Hopefully we will soon be filling the yurt itself with people.

Also last week, I finally took time to start a few trays of seeds, and before the weekend arrived they had already sprouted. All of them! So I planted more and eventually hung a bigger sun lamp. I never get tired of this miracle. Genovese basil, several beautiful kinds of tomatoes (especially excited about the tie dye variety) and sweet peppers, Queen Anne’s Lace, Bergamot, tomatillos, and more. I have lots of gourmet lettuce blend growing, too, in those large plastic clamshells you buy filled with fancy salad mix in the produce department. I find this clever repurposing, well, clever. It’s the best tiny greenhouse money doesn’t even have to buy (twice).

I want to prune and clean the gardens hard, but expereince tells me to wait a few more weeks, maybe into late April this year. In the flower beds and herb garden, I have only scooted away enough oak leaves to enjoy the early-blooming tulips and daffodils. That much is safe. But overall, we will have to endure the widespread, messy, sepia dormancy a while longer, for the safety of all those perennials and shrubs still in hiding. Happily, I do see feathery, ruby colored buds on my hydrangeas and hints of electric green in the deepest twigs of my boxwoods. Just like hope, the beginning of springtime is quiet and shy but certainly there.

Last Thursday I launched a story-telling-slash-interview project to commemorate one year in pandemic. My heart’s desire is to collect and share as many varied stories as possible, to capture our collective and individual pandemic memories. Such a time in history! It will all eventually be printed into a booklet, for our time capsule. I want the good, the bad, the scary, the historic, the funny, all of it. Friends and family volunteered quickly, and as of today I have nine interviews completed with seventeen in the wings, ready to Zoom. The stories are all so interesting, I love it. And I love you all for sharing. Stay tuned for each of those to appear individually!

On the topic of interviewing people, if you are fortunate enough to still have your parents alive and in your life, I strongly encourage you to ask them questions as if they are normal people. Very interesting. Who knew parents had so many original thoughts and ideas? Amazing.

Closing up for tonight, friends. I hope you are feeling some of the refreshment of early spring. I hope you are enjoying the slightly longer days and the noticeably warmer skies. Do you want to participate in the pandemic interview project? Drop me a note! Everyone is welcome.

“Behold, my friends, the spring is come;
the earth has gladly received the embraces of the sun,
and we shall soon see the results of their love!”
~Sitting Bull
XOXOXO

an easter week we will never forget

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday, easily my favorite holiday of the year.

Easter represents world-changing miracles and promises kept despite every opposition. Easter means new life. The best life, in fact, springing from absolute grief and apparent defeat. Easter is the resurrection of every good and pure thing, a celebration of the immovable power of Love.

Traditionally, Easter is fresh flowers and home cooked food, baskets filled with chocolate bunnies and colorful gifts, egg hunts and gingham and lace.

(a lifetime ago)
(one of our passover traditions)

Holy Week is also somber remembrances and Bible readings, “blood” around our front door, and white cloth on the cross. This holiday week has always been  busy with church activities and family gatherings, and the details sustain me. They all bind me together in deep places, providing that rhythm of renewal that we need over and over again. (There is no shame in needing renewal, by the way. We are designed for it.)

In many ways, I love Easter more than Thanksgiving and Christmas and the New Year, combined. Now is when everything actually feels new.

Easter is different this year, in quarantine, but it’s different in some magical ways. I feel it and smell it and hear it coming like birdsong at daybreak. We are renewing ourselves more than ever, despite the changes and limitations. Maybe because of them?

I hope you sense it too. I hope you are able to rest and breathe deeply, still capturing the essence of this special season. I hope you take all the time you need to distill and celebrate the best gifts, because they are still being offered.

(apple blossom)

I am not too upset by missing out on some of the man made trappings of Easter weekend. Traditions are, after all, just outward expressions of what matters to us, physical things we do to rekindle emotions we hold dear. We are all more than capable of accepting new circumstances and applying our imaginations and resources in new ways, to still conjure up those feelings. Maybe even amplify them. Maybe build some magic in brand new ways.

(our dessert tomorrow, for just the two of us)

How are you holding up? Or are you, actually, thriving in this weird time? On a cellular level, safe and hidden from the news cycle and statistics and angst about what is temporarily lost, are you at peace? Are you encouraged and nourished by what is being offered to us, and happy about what is right around the corner? I am. I feel it, like a heartbeat. I am breathing it in, like ozone and honeysuckle and fermenting sourdough. I see the green shoots of New Life bursting through clay and unfurling, silently. Surely. Right on time.

“Heaven took a deep breath and held it,
because everything was about to change.”
~Bob Goff
XOXOXO

would you rather, gardeners’ edition!

Friends, I am shin-deep in pruned off rose branches and dried pampas grass clippings. My ponytail is full of shredded oak leaves and dried manure, and all my jeans are loose from excessive wear and grimy from, well, everything. Seed trays, still devoid of green sprouts, are filled with what looks like brownie batter and are also wrapped in plastic, coaxing all that sunny-window magic they can to germinate tomato seeds and other treasures. Sugar snap peas have soaked overnight and are ready to find a spot outside. Potatoes are soon to follow.

My trusty work gloves are getting as much use as my best kitchen apron, and I love it all. I am giddy from it, and the season is just getting started. My imagination for the outdoor spaces is in overdrive this year. I have more construction ideas and growing inspiration than ever before, or maybe it always feels that way?

Let’s play a game! Let’s play “Would You Rather, Garden Edition!”

Please share as many of your answers as you can. I love to hear how other gardeners think and feel!

Would You Rather…

Rehabilitate on old, overgrown garden… or start with blank earth and design your own? (I always want to rehab spaces. Driving around neighborhoods and small towns, especially abandoned properties, I cannot resist visualizing how I would change things. Rip out old shrubs, prune trees, double dig weedy flower beds, what would grow here?  How could we change the eye line? Etc.)

Would You Rather…

Grow only food… or grow only ornamentals? ( I would choose food and edible flowers and herbs, but grow them in artful arrangements.)

Would You Rather…

Win a huge lottery-style budget to spend all in one gardening year… or win free, unlimited garden labor for that year? (I would choose the budget win, and spend it on long term investments like trees, perennials, and masonry supplies. Because I love working outside and Handsome does pretty much anything I cannot do, physically.)

Would You Rather…

Have access to unlimited flats of healthy annual color… or have perennials guaranteed for life? (This question pops into my head every time I visit places like Six Flags, where their annuals beds and baskets are overflowing every single day, and I just know they have greenhouses full of replacements for the inevitable losses. Still, I would choose perennials that never fail.)

Would You Rather…

Grow all the roses… or all the hydrangeas? (Hydrangeas for me, only if you force me to choose! I have several of both at the farm.)

Would You Rather…

Grow only old fashioned, stand by heirloom vegetables… or only the new, fun hybrids, bred to solve modern problems?

Would You Rather…

Have a gardening mentor… or be a gardening mentor?

me with my mentor and my mentee xoxoxo

Would You Rather…

Invest a windfall amount of money in statuary or other garden art… or invest it in gardening machinery? Tell me what you would buy!

Would You Rather…

Spend your November cash on paper whites and poinsettias for the holidays… or spend it on tulip bulbs for spring? (I always spend my winter gardening money on immediate gratification then regret, come spring, that I did not buy at least a few tulip bulbs. Every year I resolve to plan better. Including this year.)

Would You Rather…

Use chipped wood mulch… or well rotted organic compost?

Would You Rather…

Wear boots or golashes… or flip flops?

(…or maybe your Grandpa’s old leather boots?)

Would You Rather…

Work outside in the morning… or in the evening? (Tough call. I feel extremely lucky that most every day I can flit form task to task at my liesure, more or less following the sun. If I had to choose, though? Morning.)

These are fun to track in wild thought, and they can help us refine our wishes and priorities; but how wonderful that we rarely have to choose. We can grow and design and indulge our senses in myriad ways. We can do things differently every year if the mood strikes us.

What projects are on your early March calendar? Tell me everything!

“And forget not that the earth
delights to feel your are feet
and the winds long to play with your hair.”
~Khalil Gibran
XOXOXOXO