Category Archives: frost

Oct17

The Cold Hard Truth

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The Cold Hard Truth

I took cuttings from our philodendrons and ivies one last time. Then Dean and I brought our perennials into the basement, and herbs into the kitchen before the first frost, almost 2 weeks ago. Our plants are now ready for their first good watering indoors this cold season. Reality has set in with a hard freeze, the cold hard truth this morning, again tomorrow morning. Temperatures into the mid-20’s already. I rescued the two lone zinnia blooms to give them a few more days in a vase. We captured time at the parks with some of the grandkids these past weekends. I observed a little frog sunning one afternoon. Autumn decor decorates the door, porch, and house indoors. Extra quilts and blankets on the beds. I think we are ready for this 5-month cold weather season. Are you ready for the cold hard truth? What is that cold truth in your life today that is hard to face? I have a few of my own. God’s grace is sufficient for you and me. It has to be, otherwise, we could not continue. God is good to each of us, and His love surrounds us.

Sep12

September’s Shift

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September’s Shift

Summer has been long and August lollygag gelled around until finally September has appeared. September’s shift is focused on seasonal changes. Cooler breezes, the air crispier, green leaves beginning to yellow, frantically feeding hummingbirds almost ready for migration, and squirrels burying nutty treasures before the frozen months. Welcome to the prelude of autumn. School children busy about their studies, football games, band practice, parents carpooling, traffic lines longer, and work schedules tightening after a lazier summer season.

This week my regular cooking classes start up again with 5 adults’, 4 children’s, and 1 adult/child class ahead of me. I am teaching this semester with the community college’s continuing education program plus 2 Saturday classes offered at a new venue, a local lavender farm. See more about these classes and where to sign up on my culinary class page. This weekend I worked on a recipe for photos for my crockpot apple cobbler. My Dean surely doesn’t mind being a taste tester. After that all-time record 10″ rain one night in late July, we realized our gutters needed new facia put in. So, Dean finished up the gutter project this weekend, replacing old facia boards that should have been done when a crew was hired last year for a new roof and gutters. That took 4 full days over the past few weekends to secure our cottage from these pop-up storms we have been experiencing.

Autumn is showing up in our neighborhood homes and shops, too. A prompting to shift my decor this week, an autumn wreath placed on the door, a leafy-print runner, amber lights, and pumpkins gracing the buffet. The perennials thickened up over the growing season. A trimming is needed before they come indoors early October, another project for this week. I plan to give away a few pots of houseplants as we have more than plenty. If you live in the metro St. Louis area and need greenery to warm up your home this winter, please let me know if you’d like a green houseplant such as a Boston fern, asparagus fern, spider plant, or philodendron. Each are in showy ceramic or terra cotta pots.

Summer Taking A Curtsy

Lazy daisy, dandelion days of summer are taking a curtsy,

Making way for golden rod, crispy air, and blowing winds.

Soon a final goodbye to the hummingbirds, butterflies so flirty.

With nectar-filled blooms giving a bow and then final bends,

Flowerheads wither, seeds scatter, food for the birdies.

An autumn canvas with yellow, orange, and red blends

Come after September’s rains and sunny days with certainty.

Anna Marie Gall September 4, 2022

Apr29

A Finicky Finish With April

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A Finicky Finish With April

“Finicky”, “fickle”, “temperamental” whatever you want to call this weather, April has had it all! Ice, snow, sleet, hail, rain, windstorms, thunderstorms, tornadoes, rainbows stretching from one horizon to the next it seemed, the 80’s to the 20’s with the temperatures, and even a 2.8 earthquake felt this evening as I finish this blog post. The epic center was in the St. Louis metro area.

The miracle is despite the bizarre weather the gold finches and orioles have come back in full swing, nesting and feeding like crazy. I just heard reports of the hummingbirds’ return to Missouri. This weekend Dean and I will be getting our hummingbird feeder filled and hung on the hook near the guest bedroom window. I have the huge ceramic pot that belonged to my mother as well her shepherd’s hook to hang another hummingbird feeder in our backyard. Destined to be together, the pot will have wildflowers blooming from this weekend’s sown seeds, a double-attraction for those hummingbirds and bees.

We might be frost-free now? If the 10-day forecast tells us it is safe, Dean and I will bring the perennials out from their winter home on Sunday. Some of my herbs have started to get fresh growth while in the basement under those plant lights. The green life just needs fresh air, rainwater, and real sunshine for these next 6 months, just like you and me. Within a week, our perennials will be thanking us!

Our organic greens at the screenhouse are coming up nicely. Weekly watering plus the natural moisture making its way through the screen have been sufficient for growth. The occasional light frost has not zapped them. I look forward to a salad bowl filled with our lettuces and spinach in about a month. Volunteer arugula made its way through the soil again this year. I want a plethora of basil for my Stone Soup workshop in August. Fresh plantings may be started in the next week or so.

As the weather goes back and forth, I enjoy a cup of hot tea on the cool days. Warmer days, it is iced tea. Earlier this week it was cleaning up weeds, twigs, and leaves in the backyard. This spring afternoon, I find comfort writing while a mild thunderstorm brewed along with my tea choice of herbal vanilla-lavender. I find joy inside and outside. The sweetness of a fruit tisane and the relaxing tap-tap on the keyboard bring sheer delight to my senses. When stepping to the outdoors I see, hear, feel, taste, and smell the wonders of nature that surrounds me. Oh, the joy of living one moment at a time. I feel blessed and loved by our God who is still in control and is Omnipresent.

“Be happy in the moment, that’s enough. Each moment is all we need, not more.”

~ Mother Teresa

Oct31

Autumn’s Gatherings

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Every autumn comes the day to gather the perennials indoors for their winter home, the basement. Dean and I know it is coming, and make room in the basement under the plant lights. Some years it is sooner rather than later. For 2021, it is much later. The cool mid-40’s mornings warm up quickly to warmer, mild afternoons. The weather forecast shows a probable frost in the 3-day forecast. I pluck falling gold, orange, and red leaves from the plants’ foliage and take cuttings while the perennials are outdoors. The cuttings we propagate for next spring’s pots. I gather a variety of these cuttings in water-filled recycled mayo and jelly jars. Both of my daughters have a love for our green friends so some jars of cuttings will get passed on.

Our perennials grew lusciously this summer, such a long summer season with rain. Our showiest pot is a Kingston fern with a philodendron planted together in April. I trimmed that thing three times already! Now gathered greenery fills our basement under the plant light tonight, their home for the next 5 months. I need to harvest the lasting herbs of mint, thyme, basil. oregano, and parsley, so the pots gather on the kitchen counter for tomorrow’s project. Our last single ketchup and mustard rose gets snipped and put into a bud vase to treasure just a few more days indoors. My northern friend shares her last rose in an amber vignette saved before Minnesota’s killing frost.

A nephew’s wedding brought us to a few family gatherings this weekend. Dean and I found some Edwardian era reproduction hats while on vacation in September to wear to the costume rehearsal dinner party. I found a suitable dress on sale from Victorian Trading, and Dean wore a dark suit with a vest and skinny tie, and both wore feathers in our caps! A fun gathering to distract from my sprained ankle, caring for aging parents, and work schedules. This evening our front porch awaits a gathering of Halloween trick-or-treaters.

  • Fern Pot
  • Last Bloom
  • Amber Vignette
  • Herbs Gathering
  • Edwardian Era Costumes
  • Porch Welcome
Oct5

A Green Thumb With No Frozen Fingers

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A Green Thumb With No Frozen Fingers

The word “frost” came into the weathermen’s forecasts a couple of times last week. The late afternoon of October 1, Dean and I decided to move our perennials indoors while the colder air pushed its way into our town, but before a frost could lay its frozen fingers on our delicate green friends. We moved 20 planters of several varieties of ferns, lantana, lobelia, geraniums, swedish ivy, moses-in-cradle, philodendrons, and a Meyer’s lemon tree to the basement under a huge plant light on a timer. Two favorite perennial planters went upstairs in the house with us, along with 5 pots of herbs. It always amazes me how big the plants have grown over the past 6 months under mother nature’s care. Maybe I have a green thumb, but more so God blesses us with sunshine and rain at the right times. He reminds me when I can help with a watering can, pruning, and plucking the withered leaves and blooms. The frost finally gripped its frozen fingers on the cars, rooftops, and the earth very early this morning. But 27 pots of plants are snug and safe and sound in Deanna’s Cottage here in St. Charles, Missouri this autumn and winter seasons.

May10

My Haven Is Home

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My haven is home.  So blessed during this stay-at-home order Dean and I have been given opportunity to care for our home and yard.  Our home gives back so much more.  And spring has been so pleasant this year, very much like spring should be.  Sunshine, rains, a random storm brews up, cool mornings, and warmer afternoons.  We had a couple of days it felt more like summer, but it cooled down after the rains.  And then a few frost warning mornings, but it never came.  Better safe than sorry, we covered our annuals and perennials.  Kind of like the corona virus for us.  We take the precautions: masks, social distancing, and extra sanitation in our home and when we are out.

These mild temperatures and regular watering from the rains has provided such a green haven of leaves, grasses, mosses, and foliage.  Mid-spring the dogwood, azalea, clematis, irises and the flowering trees, bushes, and stemmed blooms are clothed in white or more showy colors of fuchsia, paler pinks, purples, blues, oranges, yellows, and reds.  The peonies are exceptional this year.  The song birds are plentiful.  Their songs divine.  The morning doves, robins, finches of purple and yellow, grosbeaks, cardinals, indigo buntings, nuthatches, and sparrows of many species come to our feeders and reside in the birdhouses or bushes.  Hawks and owls call out throughout the day and night as their homes are nearby.  Of course, families of squirrels and rabbits in the neighborhood are for the taking by these birds of prey.  Occasionally, it is a morning dove for a meal.

Stay, stay at home, my heart, and rest;
Home-keeping hearts are happiest,
For those that wander they know not where
Are full of trouble and full of care;
       To stay at home is best.

Weary and homesick and distressed,
They wander east, they wander west,
And are baffled and beaten and blown about
By the winds of the wilderness of doubt;
       To stay at home is best.

Then stay at home, my heart, and rest;
The bird is safest in its nest;
O’er all that flutter their wings and fly
A hawk is hovering in the sky;
       To stay at home is best.

Song by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Aug15

August Full Moon

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Last evening at the greenhouse was lovely.  Mild, a bit of a breeze.  Dean mowed as I weeded, watered, harvested a bunch of basil,  and then trimmed the tomato plants.  All the growing energy needs to go to the fruit, not all the leaves.  We may only have another 6 weeks of producing fruit before frost sets in.  As the sun sets, the owls hooted into the dusk sky and the late summer bugs hummed in unison.  And then the quiet.  I listen to the quiet, and the earth’s heart beat…  Leaving Boone Hollow Farm we were greeted with a yellow-orange moon.  The huge trees along the county roads seemed to glow yellow.  Was it from the moon, or is this the first signs of autumn? As we drove from the countryside in Defiance to our St. Charles home the moon seemed to get closer.  It is officially a full moon today, and it is called a “grain moon”.  Also known as the “green corn moon”, “barley moon”,

and according to the Farmer’s Almanac the August full moon is known as red moon based on its color illuminating in the hazy sky or sturgeon moon named after the large number of fish caught during this month in the Great Lakes region.  Here is a list of names for the moon from this internet source:  https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/full-moon-names:

North American full moon names by month:
January: Old Moon, Moon After Yule
February: Snow Moon, Hunger Moon, Wolf Moon
March: Sap Moon, Crow Moon, Lenten Moon
April: Grass Moon, Egg Moon, Pink Moon
May: Flower Moon, Planting Moon, Milk Moon
June: Rose Moon, Flower Moon, Strawberry Moon
July: Thunder Moon, Hay Moon
August: Green Corn Moon, Grain Moon
September: Fruit Moon, Harvest Moon
October: Harvest Moon, Hunter’s Moon
November: Hunter’s Moon, Frosty Moon, Beaver Moon
December: Cold Moon, Moon Before Yule, Long Night Moon

Nov7

Shelter

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My life is surrounded with people, animals, and plant life.  My home is shelter to the wandering soul.  “Happy is the house that shelters a friend”, Ralph Waldo Emerson is quoted. Midnight, Celine, Joe, and Pennylane … all adopted because someone else could not care for them.  Our furry critters are family.  Our Midnight wandered the streets of town late evening on Friday.  A construction or utility person must have left our gate open.  Thank God for the internet, digital photos, good people, and prayers.  A group of teenage boys watched him as he paced back and forth near a busy road, contacted one of their parents, and then brought Midnight to the shelter of their home. We were rejoined with our Labrador by early Saturday morning after a series of FB postings.  Well-fed and watered, he rather enjoyed is overnight stay at his new friends’ home.  The boys renamed him “Hercules”.

Saturday afternoon Dean and I prepared the garage for our potted plants to be brought inside. The first hard frost seems to be delayed, but may come this week. Geraniums, succulents, a lemon tree, bird-of-paradise, ferns, spider plants, and moses-in-the-cradle create a jungle our cats like to prowl in from time to time. Over the coldest months between November through March, my green friends are somewhat dormant under the high power plant lights, and most survive to be brought back outside with the warmer spring days. One green friend gets some special treatment going into 2017. My arrowhead plant grew lushly green and full over the summer.  Sensitive to the cold air, the semi-heated garage may not stay warm enough for it to maintain its brilliant green foliage. The arrowhead plant is sheltered near the mantel next to my palm until our room addition is completed.

 

Oct5

A Pot Of Green

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potted-microgreens

The “F” bomb will be coming to our neck of the woods soon enough. I am starting to think about improvisations to ensure a daily diet of greens. My palette has grown accustom to fresh organic arugula and lettuce since May.  I think a fresh pot of microgreens seeded every 3 or 4 weeks throughout the colder months will do it.  I have the ceramic tile floor in the kitchen to put my pot(s) with the patio door to provide light. My herbs feed me nutrients also. Smaller terracotta pots of herbs will be seated in the kitchen window.  The 480 square-foot room addition extending the kitchen into a family room and a small guest bedroom will give a new place for my green friends. There is always a place for green life in my home.  How about yours?  Where do your green friends stay in your home?

terracotta-pots-of-herbs

Oct18

Seasonal Home

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The threat of frost for two nights this weekend kept Dean and I busy moving plants into their seasonal home Friday evening. Deanna Greens And Garden Art geraniums, perennials, succulents, and tomato plants were placed into their cold season home, our semi-heated garage with plant lights on a timer.  Our countryside greenhouse situated on Boone Hollow Farm near Defiance still does not have electricity running to it; therefore, no heat or fans blowing.  Greenhouses are naturally designed for solar source, although not adequate enough for heat in 1300 sq foot during Missouri’s winter.  We still want to invest in solar panels for added heat and run fans.  The prices for solar keeps declining, so maybe in the next year or so we can justify the expense.

Seasonal Home

On Saturday I dug up our herbs in the greenhouse bed.  Terra cotta pots of chives, parsley, sage, and cilantro set in my kitchen for culinary use. We had two volunteer grape tomato plants thrive in our compost bin late this summer into the autumn. They are loaded with fruit. The bin is huge and sets just outside the screenhouse side of our structure.  Overnight Friday the frost nipped the upper branches.  While at our greenhouse on Saturday, we dragged the bin into the all plastic side, protected from the crispy cold frost.  It is to warm up again this week, so not quite ready to hide under our make-shift tall tent of clear poly.  With our gardening experiment, we hope to eat homegrown grape tomatoes all winter.  See what happens.  If it works, maybe next summer we can build those cold frames in the greenhouse with more homegrown organic veggies to eat throughout the winter.  Seasonal homes come in many forms.  In a few short days I will share about a seasonal home for Dean and I and our guests … Exciting stuff!