after rain

"Distant Drums" shows its odd, subtle coloring well in this cooler weather, and drops cling to the blossoms of a native sunflower .

The Garden in Fall

I haven't posted photos from my own yard in quite some time it seems, and it turns out to be Garden Blogger's Bloom Day, too!










(click over to see what's blooming in gardens across the country, & in fact world)

1 mums on the front steps.

2 Roses! "Hot Cocoa",

3 "About Face",

4 "Distant Drums"


5 mums again


6 helianthus august-ifolius, aka swamp sunflower

7 "sneezeweed", helenium

8 a blackberry vine-- not technically IN the yard

9 Rosa "Yankee Doodle" against the sky

10 out front: 'Blackbird' euphorbia against limey greens, & smokebush


11, 12
scenes off the back deck, looking towards studio

13 not quite as big as he looks, but these guys are busy all over the yard.
click to enlarge him if you dare!

Monarch Migration... & movie

I just finished reading a book called "Four Wings and a Prayer"-- about Monarch Butterflies & their migration. So I was particularly interested when I started seeing more of them around, over the past 10 days, say. I took a look over on Monarch Watch, & it turns out we've been in the peak migration window for our latitude.

Nova has made an excellent film about the migration phenomenon, and you can watch it here online.
(It focuses on migration east of the Rockies, which is different than the West Coast Monarchs.)

Butterfly at left was in our garden mid-September of 2007.

Graton Day Montage

...a smattering of photos from this year's small-town extravaganza!

(click as always, to enlarge)

our house in history, # 3

Look at our house, looking so shiny! so new! in 1936. .. note the absence of sycamores behind, where instead there are barns; the 2nd chimney to the right, the double-hung windows, the different driveway configuration. The tiny trees-- is the one on the left the Walnut tree now in Eric's yard? And an earlier resident, Phyllis; raised in this house, her little footprints appear in our hearth. Photos courtesy once more of Ron Welsh; Phyllis is his mother.

a succulent in bloom

Not August

When I read about the theme of this month's photo contest challenge over at Gardening Gone Wild (photos taken from 'down on your knees')-- this is the photo that came to mind-- 'cuz I know I was down on my belly when I took this one. In a rainier,mossier season.
Click on over here to view all the entries so far!
(and click on the image to enlarge for full effect!)

P.S. Thanks for your comments thus far... I know I was inspired to look closer (& take this pic) by flickr photographers like this, this, and this.

Do quails enjoy sunsets?

I think they do.
On three separate walks recently, along the bike trail at sunset, a quail has been sitting atop this same post, looking west into the sunset.

World's Oldest Potted Plant

via SFGate, this just in:
This plant has been in the same pot since 1770...?
(click on image to read larger)

The July Garden

We've been out & about, taking lots of pics, just not posting many here, alas. Here then is your July garden update...














1) a view from the studio

2) hollyhock, with studio behind

3) helenium, aka 'sneezeweed'-- when not in bloom, it doesn't look like much, but this time of year, couldn't recommend it more highly.

4) I re-planted some pots. They seem to be happy about it.






5) sunflower, bees. The sunflowers we planted are WAY behind a lot of others we see around. Hasn't been a very hot summer at all. And I guess we were late.



6) peach. homegrown.



7) echinacea aka coneflower, ready for it's close-up.



8) Dahlia! Usually, not too successful for me...






9) Our new pet, Spot. He's very quiet.




10) This strange-looking bud is very soon to become something like
11) this (taken at Mendocino Botanical Gardens)

More History of our House

Here's our house in '52, with it's builder, Jack Robertson, center, and his wife, Alice, & his parents.

You see that nice craftsman-style window? Gone. Why? We don't know. Also note lawn where we now have sidewalk & driveway. (I'll have to get you the 'after' photo-- when I've moved the truck...)
We're thrilled to have access to so much history of our house-- in this case, via Ron Welsh, grandson & great-grandson of those you see here, and still in the real estate business here in Graton!

Russian River Rose Co.

(a bit of retro-active blogging here-- these pics come from from an earlier, less bloggy period!)

We'd heard of this place in Healdsburg-- (open mostly on weekends in the spring) but somehow had never gotten there, so I made up for it by going twice in one week back in May...

If you like roses, or gardens at all, or vineyards even, try to go! Also lots o' irises, in the season.

I know that Butterscotch, (the unusually-colored bud, below) lies in my future, & I purchased Distant Drums, another slightly quirky-colored one I'd been seeking for a while. (last two photos)



That day we also visited the Dragonfly Farm, very close by, which is mostly a cut-flower business, although they allow visitors to wander their lovely flower fields.

lavender in bloom!

It's that time of year, the height of the lavender bloom at Matanzas Creek Winery (their phone message says the harvest has begun and will proceed gradually through July, so the time to go is now!)
I wrote about the lavender when I first visited 2 years ago.
Yesterday, we took a small picnic & some wine-- (that's my painting on the delicious bottle of Eric Kent Chardonnay!) early evening when the shadows were long, and it was glorious.