Time or Money

Do You Have One or Both?

Pat says she chooses between spending one or the other. How about you?

My friend Pat and I have known each other for years; we met as Master Gardeners in training (she’s one of my Magnificent 7 friends). We try to spend a fair amount of time together; I’ve helped her a bit in her garden and she’s helped me in mine. We’ve traded plants and cuttings. We are tight.

That said, I was always puzzled when Pat would choose to grow perennials, for example, from seed rather than buy them grown and potted up/ready for planting. She’d have these tiny little perennial plantlets in cell pots growing away mightily and I’d already have my perennials planted. At first, I thought it was because Pat likes to putter, and if you don’t know from experience, I can tell you that growing perennials from seed is a lot of puttering over many months. It’s one aspect of Pat’s approach to gardening that I had a hard time connecting with since I’m the see it/buy it/plant it kind of gardener. But, okay, who knows what she thinks of my approach, right?!

Finally, one day I asked her why. Why? At first, I swear she was surprised by my question, but her answer fits my Midwestern friend and her practical approach to life perfectly. She looked at me for a few seconds then replied that she makes her choice based on whether she has the time to wait for a particular plant to reach maturity or whether she doesn’t; if she doesn’t, she purchases the potted up/ready for planting specimen. She went on to say that most people have either time or they have money, but most don’t have both. And then she said,”That’s pretty much it and it applies to most of life in my experience.”

Wow. Now I understand.

As I’m sure you will agree, Pat has balanced her time/money equation beautifully!

And you? What do you prefer? Do you spend the time? Do you spend the money?

Would you agree that Pat's time is well spent? Just look at her window box!!

New Jersey Is Home

Just Like I Remembered It

Glad to be home.

We’re baaackkk!  Jamaica is but a memory now, although some of our family members have lingering illnesses and credit card theft issues to deal with since returning.

We returned to the news, not completely unexpected, that our old Ford Explorer – you know, the one my son Max crashed two days before we left for Jamaica – is too banged up to fix. We are down one vehicle. And that means car shopping has moved to the top of our ‘To Do’ list.

Smelly, smelly smelly.

We surely had some stinky clothes by the time we got home from Jamaica. I washed clothes for two days. My husband Mike’s running clothes were the worst. I had to wrestle them to the ground, stomp on them, then throw them in the washing machine and slam the door shut before they ran away. After a thorough washing and drying, they still smell piffy, but Mike won’t part with them.

My daughter Tory, she of the major throat closing illness, has been taking her prednisone. Two more days to go on that, but she still doesn’t sound ‘better.’ She hasn’t been keeping to her usual schedule of softball, volleyball, running and work in an attempt to ‘get better.’

The good news with Tory is that the blood work came back negative for mono and the strep test came back negative too. A nasty virus is what our girl has and it’s sticking to her like glue. I spoke with my nurse girlfriend Pat and she said Tory should feel better in 7-14 days. Tory growled when she heard the time frame.

Tools of my trade!

And me? Well, I’ve been reveling in working in my garden since we returned from vacation. You see, with Tory’s softball schedule I haven’t been out there weeding and tending in two months. The plants have been doing happy dances, spreading seeds and generally creating plant mayhem in my absence. I started with weeding my west side garden; it took two days of solid weeding, but now looks a lot neater. I dug up/potted some volunteer plants and put them at my curb with a sign “Free Perennials” and boy did those plants disappear fast!  Then I tackled the carpet roses that surround my gravel driveway. They are berserk, flopping here, there and everywhere. I have begun to cut them back so they don’t die from the inside out. It’s tedious work, but I’m up for the task. I’m heading out there now!

Results of my work so far.

Oops. I almost forgot. I posted the short video of my son Max diving off the high cliff at Rick’s Cafe in Negril, Jamaica. Listen to his Aunt Betsy commenting on his jump in the audio portion of the video.

Who Needs to “Work Out?”

Gardening Is a Sport in My World

Every year I pull out the strawberry pots and see what survived the winter in the unheated greenhouse.

I am an avid gardener. I don’t do grass though. Oh no. My husband Mike is the Lawn Ranger. I leave the mowing and grass primping to him. I am in charge of Everything Else: trees, shrubs, perennials, annuals, vegetables, urns, pots, tools, supplies. You name it. I care for it. You should see my hands. And you should see my Felco #6 pruners. We have some miles on us.

Some of my fav tools, particularly the Mud Gloves, which are great on cold spring days in the dirt.

Some of my friends “garden.” They put on a pretty hat and nice gloves and go out into their yard and snip. I garden.  I wear crappy clothes to garden: ratty too-short jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, a ridiculous looking hat, ankle socks and kneepads. I work outside for hours at a time (5 today alone), lost in thought in my dirty world.

Currently, I am working my way west to east across our front hill. It’s jungle-like out there. The roses are so big they flop. The hydrangeas need the dead wood removed. The azaleas need more light. The hostas and liriope need groomed. And I’m the woman doing it. The birds ignore me as they swoop and tussle. The rabbits hop around like I’m not there. I’ve become part of their landscape.

Empty raised bed; one of two built years ago. They are GREAT!

I put in the vegetable garden, or at least the beginnings, this week too. True, weeks ago when it was almost 70 degrees, I put in radish and wax bean and string bean seeds just to see if they’d sprout. And they have, albeit a little slower than I’d thought. And Friday night it was really cold and rainy so who knows how that will affect the two tomato plants and the basil. They could bite the dirt, so to speak!

The bunnies love the celery and the squirrels will dig up anything just 'because.'

Can you see the little green sprouts? Click on photo for a closeup!

I put in catnip seed weeks ago too. The local cats end up flopped in whatever container I put the catnip in every single year. Our Siamese Brutus loves fresh catnip. When I harness him up and take him for walks in the yard he always end up drooling in it!

2 kinds of lettuce, basil, parsley, radishes, 2 kinds of beans, eggplant, broccoli, zucchini and 2 tomato plants to start! Oops. Onions too. My favorite right out of the garden.

The Magnificent Seven

A Tribute to Important Women

It brought us together.

I am a Master Gardener. It took 9 months of classes, mostly once a week for 4 hours, plus field trips and studying for midterm and final, plus a minimum of 100 hours of volunteer labor in that first year. Needless to say, I spent a tremendous amount of quality time with my classmates, learning, laughing and working hard. I got to know them and they got to know me. I still keep in touch, almost five years later, with many of those classmates. They are a special bunch.

 Prior to starting the Master Gardener training my friends were mostly the parents of my children’s friends: fun, nice, supportive people, but I yearned to find my people, those who loved to work in the garden; people who got dirty and ached at the end of the day from all the gardening they’d done; people who knew how to grow trees, shrubs, perennials; people who could create beauty from dirt.

 I found my people in Master Gardener class: Ginger, Pat, Gail, Margaret, Lita, Jenny. These women – different ages, different careers, different kinds of families – we have a common thread that binds us: a love of gardening and a sense of purpose. These women have helped me with projects, offered advice, and lent support. They are talented. They are caring. And best of all, they are my friends.

 Ginger, steel magnolia, has a brain that works faster than anyone else’s I’ve ever met and she has a towering talent for design that matches the speed of her brain. She’s Thelma to my Louise. Together, we could take over the world and make it a better place. Or at least that’s what Pat said the other day!

 Pat, who never thinks a project is too large to tackle (including her massive new yard), is a rock, thoughtful and kind. She uses her hands and creates beauty: gardening, sewing, crafting, whatever. And I trust this Midwestern woman to always have my back.

 Gail, mover and shaker, balances her life, sons, more than full time business, husband, and 2 high-maintenance dogs without missing a beat or messing up her hair. She’s loyal and sincere and always willing to work hard and achieve stellar results.

 Margaret, creative and dynamic, is a talented landscape designer. She used her knowledge and skill to help me turn a massive run-down schoolyard into a showpiece. Gratis. I will be forever grateful for her talent, generosity and good cheer through the two-plus years of the project.

 Lita, thoughtful Lita, is a calm breeze in a windy world. She can cut directly to the crux of an issue, kindly. And with her razor-sharp pruners in hand and knowledge in her head Lita can take an overgrown landscape and turn it into a showplace, methodically and competently.

 And Jenny, talented and driven, started her own landscape design business and hasn’t looked back. She knows more Latin plant names than I’ve forgotten! And she dances, beautifully; Jenny, ballet and ballroom: perfect together.

 I am blessed. Tell me about some of your friends.