tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-187133512011-04-21T17:01:30.380-05:00gardengirl63http://www.blogger.com/profile/07902274125592305774noreply@blogger.comBlogger331100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18713351.post-1150251342781885752006-06-13T20:37:00.000-05:002006-06-13T22:25:00.696-05:00

Late fall, 2005:Unfortunately, this blog is fighting with current life. When I was entering posts in the winter I had the incentive of seeing and writing about the summer while deep in snow. But going the other way, where now we are in early summer, writing about fall and winter past is a bit of a losing battle. But not fair for the reader by a long shot.I recognize another aspect in my extremely

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Present day, so out of context with the nature of this blog but I've been stymied with updating this blog so maybe its ok to break from tradition.I'm driving home tonite, from work, its raining and the road has been graded so there's the thrum, thrum of the tires over the uneven surface. I'm listening to CBC's Tapestry where a man with the nicest calmest voice is taking about a book tour he's on

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September, 2005:Trees in the forest with their true colors showing.The demise of summer, the onset of autumn. This had previously been my least favorite season as I had felt summer only brush once or twice upon my arm. Perhaps because of choices I had not taken advantage of summer before, or was too busy with work to dive into the loveliness of the warmest season but in any case, fall always

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Fallen apples from our sole tree.August, 2005: As if there are not enough things to take care of, I've gotten into root hormone. Not literally but keen to try it on any cutting I make. Heck, I'd even try it on a weed cutting to get a sense of magic. I mean, it doesn't seem right to take a grown plant, cut a bit off, stick it in this powder and voila, new roots. What would this do on a cut on

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Late July, early August, 2005: If Finnie's theory of trying everything once, also applied to vegetables, we would be encouraging this eating of Black-Eyed Susans. I suspect they are bitter to taste. Not so ice cream. Again, funny how you don't need to entice children to eat sweet things, even when they had never tasted them before. They just know that they want it, some extra sense that wears off

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So....today we bid farewell to Allie Baxter, brother of Wyatt and Mouse. Never a claw or tooth put to anything but food and scratching posts, his nature was only capable of kindness and faith in us clumsy humans. From a rough start in the bowels of a old volkswagen bug to life in our new home in the country, Allie has been my constant. He's a swirl in the cross-section of my adult life.15 or so

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Tim and Finnie leaving the forest.July, 2005Not sure if everyone has an image, but I have one very vivid image when I want to call upon quintessential summer. I can remember spending lots of time on a farmer's property that backed onto a horse trail through a forest near my parents cottage in Georgian Bay. I was a kid of about 12 or 13, I guess. I can completely hear the bees droning and the

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Late June, 2005Knock, knock.Who's there? Pee.Pee who?Pee coming out your ears!!!!!!! Owen surveying the outdoors. Someday this will all be yours. Imagine myself saying this to him and Finnie.Ok, not my brand of humour but to an almost four-year-old, and to all four-year-olds, this is gut-splittingly funny. Maybe I'm missing something, I don't think as fast as him, I'm more formed in my opinions.

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Tim and Owen looking out the dining room windowMid-June, 2005I've noticed the last couple of posts are unfocused. I realized that I was approaching them differently than before. Before I wrote, then looked for images that coincided with what I had written. Later I started looking at images first and got greedy and wanted to put them on and find words later. Doesn't work well for my train of

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June, 2005Finnie and the crows shared a love of the birdbath water. We could hear the crows cawing over the right to sit in the birdbath. This was a bird I had previously thought a quite cool and interesting bird. I would come to think of them as somewhat malevolent as I would see them tormenting smaller birds and occasionally taking young from their nests. Desperate parents tried valiantly to

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June, 2005Someone's staircase found in the woods. That a tree would offer a perfect incline to allow one to just walk up it is so darn nice you just have to laugh. Stairway to where? To a place one wouldn't be able to access under normal circumstances, I believe and precisely because of this, worthy of the work somebody put into it. Why haven't I tried climbing it yet, I wonder?I adore lilacs and

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Late May, 2005So, as to the light the moth is drawn, so were we to the field. Tim talked about having a back door that made that distinctive wheeeeee.......BANG as the spring stretched and then recoiled. We needed one here since the door opened so much. Partially I would want to recall that eeeeee.....BAM in the winter time. An auditory connection to the summer. Tim made a lower handle for the

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Finnie and Owen with the rhubarb stalks from the six, count 'em six, rhubarb plants we found on our land.May, 2005Since I was taking care of the children while Timothy was at work I was with the kids always. 24/7. I have not been away from either of them overnight, other than when my parents, Jean and Murray, took care of Owen when Finnie was being born. And that is how I like it. I guess, a bit

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May, 2005Dandelions took over our field. Hard to not redefine one's image of this "weed" when it gave us such splendour, such riot of colour. Finnie liked to rip their heads off and mush them between her fingers. She would learn quickly the butter test. Owen at the door of the barn. The chariot awaits. Our three wheeled bicycle stroller would take the kids behind us on many trips to the Bondhead

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May, 2005 Kåre planting some basswood seedlings culled from the forest.Some basswood seedlings and cotyledons in the pot. May, 2005For all the abundance of plants and trees indigenous to our land I found myself bringing still more to our place. Small bedding plants for the new flower garden either bought or culled from others' gardens. Many brought plants for me just knowing I was starting a

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Finn, almost consumed, by the gigantic ferns in our forest.Sunday mornings are good times where pajamas stay on and rushing is cancelled.The back door again, with its original glass knob. Later in the summer Tim built a screen for this door so it not only enticed us visually but also by the smell of freshcut grass or the sound of bees droning outside.

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Our "Tarzan" tree. Even though largely horizontal this tree flourished and was a great spot to climb and pretend.Because of all the culling only probably a sampling of what we'll see next year came up. A different variety of fern resides down by the creek and grows to one's armpits. It feels so primordial you would not be too surprised to see a brontosaurus raise its head with a mouthful of them

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April, 2005So why had we moved from the city? We lived in a vital and changing area, close to the beaches so we had the amenities, but not the price tag. Stroller distance to the boardwalk and half a block to the Queen streetcar, lots of daily options were available to us. But we'd had the house broken into and methodically removed of specific things, the car broken into twice, and we did not

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Our piddly creek became torrential this spring, with the water rising so high that we could not see our "bridge" for some time.

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April, 2005I knew I liked getting my hands dirty. When we had lived in Toronto I had taken our front lawn, rather front patch, and ripped up the grass and laid a path with the help of my friend, Chantal (neither of us knowing how to do this) and planted flowers and bushes in its stead. That little spot of land kept me occupied for hours and gave me a wonderful feeling of contendness. I was

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April, 2005The back door off the kitchen was a magnet for us. We were always looking out here to see if things had changed. The view from here and the window over the sink never let us walk by without looking out of them. Never in the city could we look out a window and see, basically a park, that was ours to maintain and foster. Massively addictive this land was. I realized that when we had

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March, 2005

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March, 2005Finn and Owen hugging in our front field.

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March-April, 2005It never fails to amaze me how, every year, regardless of the severity of the winter, the mantle of snow and ice does fall away, revealing tiny, fragile signs of life. Every year. You'd think I'd get it but every winter I have to fight back thoughts that there is simply no way that life below ground could have survived that clamp of Jack Frost. Well I don't mind being shown that

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February, 2005Colder than a icicle on a penguin's nose.

gardengirl63http://www.blogger.com/profile/07902274125592305774noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18713351.post-1131892362316664952005-11-13T08:31:00.000-06:002005-11-20T13:30:21.946-06:00

January, 2005 Our son trekking through the field.

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February, 2005So, you can see that level ground is a MUST.

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February, 2005So, if you could only fast forward when you are in a bad patch. But what would really be the result, probably not the bliss one might suppose. Of course, you'd never properly appreciate the good times if you didn't have the comparison. You would be as weak as jelly on a hot day, without being toughened by the tests of life, and you wouldn't have much to say cause people'd just walk

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Late January, 2005Luckily, our winter fun was not limited to the ice rink I attempted to build as it all flowed to one corner and sat not quite freezing, for quite awhile. Apparently, level ground is a must when deciding where to build a skating zone. My husband and the kids were cajoled to come “play” on it a couple of times but since four bodies quite filled the only frozen space you could only

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December, 2004 As you can see, the trains pass quite close. We found this comforting, like a link to the outside world when this place seemed so remote. If we were outside we would wave our arms off trying to get the engineers to blow their horns. They often appeased us with a loud blast which always made us laugh a bit manically.

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January, 2005This was my view from the "ice rink" at night time.

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Early January, 2005So, needless to say, we kind of muscled through last winter, never quite catching our breath, but keeping the family together through what was the penultimate test of the strength of my relationship with my husband. Kind of walking into walls with the amount of change, arranging for electricians to rewire the house, contractors to renovate the 2nd floor, plumbers to replumb the

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November, 2004My mom, Jean, with Finn, getting to know our land.So, unbeknownst to me earlier today, I am starting a blog tonite. Tried to respond to a friends blog and here I am. Here in the country that is. That is also very new to me. Having grown up in the teeming metropolis of Toronto, only deviating for university and post university travelling and the occasional trip somewhere cool and

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