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| Many shades of green in a garden in Albany, CA |
What a thrill to open an email and find your response to a question that I pose. I've received some awesome examples of Green that I want to share with you.
Deborah Hansen, a friend, fellow blogger and artist, sent me these:
Deborah uses an iPad to design much of her work as well as taking beautiful photographs.
You can see more of Deborah's work at her website: http://www.deborahrydellhansen.com/latest/0ccatnsyy8t0dozwslckyqxggt9y7z
Bill Slavin, a photographer as well as my husband, gave me these:
So many variations of green!
If you like Bill's work, send him some encouragement by leaving a comment on this posting.
If you like Bill's work, send him some encouragement by leaving a comment on this posting.
Another aspect of Green appeared while I was driving home today. The last four years of drought wrecked havoc with my community's intention to have serene green lawns. Many lawns became brown or patchy when we turned off the sprinklers in the dry heat last year. No one bothered with the usual weed killers and other 'additives' that we often use to get a perfect green lawn. The rains this winter brought our green lawns back. But to my surprise, dandelions popped up in the grass all along our street. I haven't seen a dandelion growing in the lawns in our community for a long time. Now with a little neglect, our yards turned more natural with the yellow heads of this tenacious flower dotted across the grass. Dandelion leaves make good salads too! Maybe the appearance of dandelions will push us finally to find alternatives to the green lawns we love.
Do you remember picking the fragile Dandelion seed heads and blowing them into the wind? I also remember what we called 'scissor plants' and pulling petals off of daisies. What other plants did you play with when you were young?
In the summer we lived in a cottage on a lake in Upstate NY. Our home abutted an Iroquois Reservation, the first place oil was found in the country. No one lived there any longer so we were free to roam. Queen Ann’s Lace lived in stately wonder in a field of wild raspberries. One of my many aunts suggested that we dye them and sell bouquets by the side of the road. My brother and I thought that was a great idea and pooled our limited resources to purchase bottles of ink in various colors ( remember those?). We diluted the ink in water and placed the stems in the “dye” vats hoping the color would rise through the stem. This experiment had limited success so we dunked the flower heads in the colors and let them dry. The sale of our bouquets was not robust but the aunties came to our rescue and bought all the stock we had left over. Still I never pass a cluster of Queen Anns lace without a smile! joan
ReplyDeleteThank you, Joan, for this memory piece. I remember seeing ‘dyed’ flowers — they never quite looked as good as the original. Good thing for aunties!!
DeleteQueen Anne’s Lace reminds me of summers in Minnesota. They are abundant by the roadside there.
Was so busy last week that I missed this...loving the green! My garden is exploding with color.
ReplyDeleteYes, your photos are terrific! This year seems to be a special year in the garden.
DeleteIm so glad you finally have green, even with dandelions. I always think of Peter Rabbit's mother who said, "feast your eyes on green my children."
ReplyDeleteI didn't eat dandelions but I did eat clovers and some other unknown weeds. Mostly, I remember just sitting in a clover patch on a hot humid summer day and one by one pulling them apart looking for that lucky four leaf clover.
I do enjoy your art, and your husband's photos. The colors and textures are amazing.
I like the Peter Rabbit reference. My grandpa used to tell me stories similar to Peter Rabbit. Ah, clovers! I remember when I was 3 or 4 sitting with my sisters while we looked for 4-leaf clovers -- never did find one, but I spent a lot of time looking for them. I think that was their way of keeping me busy and out of their hair!
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