A Weekend Away

These Northwest beaches are nothing like the ones I knew when I was young.  My family would drive down down down the mountains to scorch our feet on the blistering hot sand and frolic in the frothy waves.

Here there are more rocks than sand and the water is cold enough to freeze the breath inside you.  Even so, the sea is seductive and I am very happy to don windbreaker and rubber boots for a walk on the beach.

G and I did lots of beach walking this weekend.  We drove just far enough up the west coast to lose cell coverage and feel distant from the every day.  The shapes of the trees suggest that a bracing wind is the norm here.

But we escaped the worst of it by sitting right down on the rocky beach.

Selfie time.

The waves blow in then roll the rocks around on the inhale.  My favorite beach sound.

This big guy flapped past, harried by some seagulls.  Was he stalking their nest?  Stealing their fish?  We stalked him back -- through three perches until the light and angles were right for portraiture.

A rope swing on the beach.  Oh yes!  It was an erratic ride between the bouncy tree branch and all that wind, but no one smashed into the tree trunk so it was fun.

Finally a cozy retreat.  Rustic but comfortable.  Close enough to the water for the waves to flood our dreams.

Pink and Yellow

On our walk this morning Miss S and I passed along this bit of sidewalk.

Lovely, isn't it?  These trees turn bright orange in the fall and glow with twinkle lights in the winter.  As you can see, they sing choruses of pink in the spring.  Walking under them, pushing a stroller with one hand, clutching coffee in the other, has become one of my favorite small indulgences.  This is the way to the library and the playground, but not for long.  I'm going to miss having such ready access to the town centre when we move.  

Closer to home, other things are blooming.

Miss S called them Dandy Flowers, and I think they're her favorite.  I'm pretty sure the new house will come with a few of these.

A Spring Outing

A Garry Oak reaches, gnarly and solid against the somber sky.  Below it, a drift of Magnolia billows and blows.

Signs of Spring are everywhere in Beacon Hill Park.  Flowers bloom.  Ducks beg for (and often receive) handouts.  Peacocks strut.  Best of all, goats at the Children's Zoo sit patiently to be brushed by adoring, but not always, gentle little hands.

Somewhere New

In a city that draws bus-loads of tourists to Butchart Gardens, you might understand how the Horticultural Centre of the Pacific escapes notice.  I had never heard of it, and certainly never visited, until last weekend. 

Perhaps I would never have visited had Miss S not been invited to a birthday party there.

A flock of pre-schoolers swooped and swirled through the mazy pathways in search of treasure (chocolate coins and dollar store bead necklaces) before settling down to a feast of cut veggies and cake.  What fun!

But not the best way to take in the gardens.  I did notice an abundance of Heather and Hellebore.  There seemed to be a Japanese garden with a steam and a bridge.  I got off a very few photos, chalked the Horticultural Centre up to a delightful discovery and resolved to return soon on my own terms.

Have you made any new discoveries this spring?

Leaving

Part of the swirl that I've been caught up in these months has to do with an impending move.  It was never the plan to live in our current house forever, but the week after New Years we found a notice in the mail box that spurred us to action.  We renovated, spruced, listed and sold.  We explored neighbourhoods and looked into schools.  We hunted, pondered, wondered and finally bought.  All in just nine weeks.  We're exhausted.

As I wandered the backyard yesterday, it hit me.  This is the last time I'll see the blue Muscari under the apple tree.  That young plumb tree might fruit for the first time this year, but someone else will (I hope) harvest its fruit.  When I trimmed back the peonies last fall, I had no idea that I'd never see those deep pink blooms again.  Suddenly all the spring blooms and early green shoots are even more precious than usual.

There will be a new yard, a blank canvas.  But this was my first garden.  I know the ways the light dances through the leaves and I will miss it.

Joining the Sunlit Sunday fun at My Little Home and Garden.

The Amazing Thing About Spring

The amazing thing about spring is that it comes whether you want it to or not.

When the inner landscape is grey and drizzly, spring explodes in sunshine and cherry blossoms.  It's a good thing too, because it's hard not to be drawn out, to feel the warmth and smile at the exuberant green.

I took a walk, yesterday, past a naturalized lawn all a dazzle with blue Scilla, spotted with pink Shooting Star.  The flowers and the beautiful morning sang together of fresh beginnings.  Miss S and her Nana walked ahead of me here, hand in hand, seeing the world together.  The loveliest sight of all.

An Explanation

January dawned with such expectation this year.  It always does, but this New Years Day I had an idea of what the coming year might hold for better or worse.  Either way, it was not going to be a mundane year.

How little did I know.  Things have really snowballed around here.  And some of these snowballs came completely out of the blue.  So please understand if I don't post for a bit now and again.  I'll be back.

Yellow

I looked out the window this morning and something yellow caught my eye.  I almost dropped by tea.  A crocus.  Just one, sunning itself in a sheltered corner.  Naively stretching up and open like a toddler, up far to early in the morning.  Even here on the west coast this is an unusual sight for January.

I'll be linking to Sunlit Sunday, hosted by Karen at My Little Home and Garden.

Peonies

We've been doing a little landscaping this spring -- a little re-landscaping actually.  It's not the kind of project that thrills gardeners, but believe me, it's necessary.  We're turning garden beds into grass.  Just a few.  It  has something to do with a little girl who likes to run in the grass and her mother who would rather join in than pull weeds.  Priorities shift.

Deciding which garden to plow under took a little thought.  I found myself wandering around the yard, noticing my emotional responses to the different plantings.  The veggie beds fill me with pride.  The raspberry canes made my mouth water.  The hostas on the shady side of the patio have grown to the sound of ice clinking in iced tea glasses and the chatter of many gatherings.

I stopped at the peonies.  The peonies that bloom deep and dark and lighten to pink.  The peonies that survived an ill-timed dividing off from my mother-in-law's plant and several ill-timed moves around the garden.  They're flourishing now, in the part shade of the apple tree, reminding me every spring of a baby shower two years ago.

The hostesses went to great trouble over that one.  Food.  Decorations.  It was lovely.  But I don't remember much.  I walked in, an overwhelmed four-day-mother, and the room was filled with peonies.

Memory is a funny thing.  Has anything triggered yours lately?

Growing

Warm weather has arrived sooner than expected.  I'm not sure if that has more to do with an early summer or conservative expectations.  Either way, I can feel the tingle of the sun all the way down to my toes.  Happy days.  

Busy days too -- in the very best ways.  Being outside is a pleasure when the sun is warm and the wind cool.  So are long walks to distant playgrounds and lunches on the grass.  Somehow the essential work is getting done.  Laundry.  Supper.  But I try not to fuss too much.

Just for a moment, I'm living in the moment, wondering which is growing faster, my garden or my daughter.  Both are pure joy to watch.

Inspection

The days of daily garden inspections are here.  Sometimes I make an excuse -- that compost bucket on my counter is full again.  Sometimes I slip into shoes and make the rounds for no good reason save the pleasure of watching plants grow.  I circle slowly past the strawberry bed and the pear tree.  I bend to gauge a peony bud.  I lift rhubarb leaves and smell future treats.  Fiddle heads unfurl.  Miss S follows and imitates and dances in the grass.  What joy.

This Week in My Kitchen

Cooking inspiration runs a little slim this time of year when I see the garden begin to grow, but there's nothing to pick save for kale, chives and tulips.  But being forced to dig a little deeper isn't a terrible thing.  This week, inspiration came . . .

. . . from a a conversation with my mother.  She served fish cakes this week and that sounded good.  These are salmon and potato cakes, waiting to be dredged in flour and pan fried.

. . . from a library cook book.  This kale panini with feta cheese and zippy banana peppers is sure to appear on our table again.

. . . from the pantry.  There's nothing like cracking open a jar of last summer's tomato-y goodness to enjoy over pasta.

And finally, inspiration came from a string of sunny days and a few spring showers -- reminders that the abundance of summer will come soon enough.

What's cooking at your house?

I'm joining, for the first time, This Week in my Kitchen at Beauty That Moves.  This blog hop is all about capturing a love of whole foods, combined with the activity of a bustling kitchen.  A weekly collection of photos from the centre of my home.

A Personal Photo Challenge: Up Close

I've been noticing some teeny tiny blooms this spring.  Lichens and mosses cling to rocks and walls and trees and put on their own itty bitty displays of colour.  They also sit still longer than my toddler so they make excellent subjects for a little camera experimentation.  Specifically, I'm learning how to control depth of field in Aperture Priority mode. 

These lichen were tricky to photograph, partly because they're so small (about a centimeter tall) and partly because I had to all but crawl off a rock face to get down to their level.  No tripod here, but I think I held my breath while I squeezed the shutter.

These ones where more accessible.  In fact, they appeared right at eye level as I came around a corner in the trail.  I really like all the different textures and colours here.  I count at least four (maybe five) different kinds of lichen and moss.  Does anyone know what they're called?

Finally, a satin flower from my recent wild flower spotting expedition.  I especially like this picture because it includes a sense of the flower's setting.

All photos are taken with my Nickon 1J2 in aperture priority mode.

I'm participating again in Donna's Personal Photo Challenge.  Every month I learn something that helps me take better pictures, and it's fun, of course, to see what others are up to.

Wildflowers

The wildflowers are blooming on M Hill.  That's what a friend tells me.  So I scramble over rocks and up dry stream beds.  I have a camera around my neck and a toddler on my back -- a bit ambitious perhaps, but how else will I see these seasonal beauties?

From the parking lot I start along a forested trail, but it doesn't take long to climb up from the fir canopy into meadows of moss, punctuated by outcroppings of bare bedrock.

There's little soil here, so trees grow small.  Arbutus, twisted and red, was the first coastal tree that I learned to identify.  Garry Oak are less showy, but utterly unique to this region.  These trees are survivors.  Stunted and gnarly, they look it.

But it's the flowers I came to see.  They're subtle, small enough to be missed.  

 

Fawn Flower.  Shooting Star.  Satin Flower.  They sprout from the shallowest of earth and fling their fragile hearts open to the spring blusters.  What brave souls.

I lean over a rock, sprawl on the damp ground, contort myself around a shrub to meet them.  They drip dew and quietly conjure the sun out from behind the clouds.  Hello spring.


Linking, for the last time this season, to Sunlit Sunday at My Little Home and Garden.  Thank you for hosting, Karen.

Sunlit Sunday with Real Sunshine

It's raining again at the moment, but the sun shone this week.  All week.  I'm not talking about a metaphorical sunniness or a symbolic scrap of yellow, not a transitional breath of light between showers.  The sun shone.  All week.  Temperatures crept up.  Spirits soared.  Croci opened wide in their last hurrah and I, shovel in hand, inhaled the aroma of fresh soil and the food that it will grow.  Hallelujah, it's spring.

I'm joining Karen at My Little Home and Garden for Sunlit Sunday.