when the fairies close one door they open another window or something like that

my cottage garden went up for sale in early october  2012

my nest did not empty as my son decided to stay here for his university education (theatre). at an astronomy event i accidentally found me a new husband who builds everything. the new house is the biggest best new box of crayons ever! 

i do not abide the shift key, boring landscaping, blah tan, grey and white interior design, or needless waste.

so i will be chronicling, sans capitalization, the evolution of our new garden,  an interior design that pops and delights while maintaining the best of 1967ness, and up-cycling everywhere possible with cast-off oregon shakespeare festival theatre sets.  

the new house comes with newly regained healthiness. after six years of feeling poorly i am once again skipping down the entrepreneurial path, with the square footage needed to produce my pressed flower and calligraphy art (aka 'in full bloom'), linoleum block prints, organic cut flowers for sale.

up first, some images and stories of the door we just closed:

 my garden and little home on the day i turned over the keys to the new owner

 the new house on our first morning

this last view of the willow arch i created from two bare root corkscrew willow trees, framing the dormant tomato raised beds, the raspberry and marionberries ripped my heart out.

this was to be a funky tool shed.  my husband built a cottage nicer than the house that sang with color.  the golden awning is from the set of 'the imaginary invalid' (2012 season of the oregon shakespeare festival), the black railings from osf's most recent 'merchant of venice'.

cottage interior with color wash blue walls that looked like clouds, an effect that was beautiful and accidental.  perfect bamboo floor.

view from across the street, where the mailbox took a sudden slouch  after 4  years,  to our next door neighbor's green house and ugly truck.  did they offer to move the truck so we could get the moving truck in?  nope.  we had to ask them to move it so our moving truck did not slide down in the ice and snow to smash that eyesore.  this pretty much sums up four years of interactions with those fatuous nincompoops (i just saw 'lincoln' twice). no matter how lovely my front yard became, that place was a dogrun with an uncontrolled yappy dog, mostly dead grass, and clouds of secondhand cigarette smoke.

the first tree planted was a nordman fir that failed as an indoor xmas tree when the root ball got saturated with cat urine.  it had failed as a tree, too, having several leaders which stunted its growth.  so the nursery, Plant oregon (it is a great place http://store.plantoregon.com/prostores/servlet/Search and this tree is the first plant on their list!) sold it off at a cut rate as an indoor xmas tree. it struggled and then thrived on some extra water and dose of chicken manure.  it was the first thing my husband and i planted together. someday it will be spectacular.  i could not bear to leave this tree.

the first sword fern i planted.   the 'green showers' boston ivy  that fried in the sun on the cottage was so happy to be moved to the north facing fence.  the tracery of it on thet all fence my husband built is lovely.  i finally got the trumpet vine twined through the trellis the day before we moved.

passionflower 'blue crown' in one season.  looking vibrant- this is in december.  it will be ok in the cold as it is sheltered under the eaves.  how rare and sweet it was to have blue sky on the last afternoon in my garden.  i left behind a jungle of vines.  my favorite place to get them is http://www.roguevalleynursery.com/retail-clients.html. it is not a super pretty retail garden center. it is a handful and people that really love plants, the know plants best for our area and take good care of their stock, which is affordable, too. 

my husband spends so much money on stones for me.  most women want  clothes and makeup.   i love rocks.  he hand carried in countless tons of stackers for the retaining walls.  if he did not regularly visit home depot for a load of stackers they called the police with a missing persons report.

since i did not get healthy with a massive sinus surgery til late summer, the garden was hit and miss.  i found the gladiolus bulbs had not been planted but i threw them in under the south facing cottage windows.  here is the last one in bloom, in DECEMBER.  just some half price walmart glads, of which at least half brought forth spikes of color just as we put the house on the market in october.  gardening brings happiness in unexpected bursts.