Tag Archives: pruning

Homey and Rainy with Cookies

family, food and cooking, my garden,

Today Husband had the day off, and neither of us was sick! The forecast was for a few hours’ break in the rain, so our plan was to prune rosebushes. When the rain let up, we were ready, and pruned the two tea roses “by committee” as Mr. Glad said, afterward piling up weeds carefully pulled away from struggling ranunculus.

Then we brought in a fresh supply of firewood and re-positioned the tarps that always get blown off in storms. Little patters of rain came on just as we were finishing that job, and I thought our yard work was finished for the day.

But no sooner had I got a good fire going, and iced my aching elbow, than the sun came out! I ran out to at least get a start on the climbing roses. They seemed to take forever the last two winters when I carefully cut and trained their branches.

Today I was gleefully shocked to get them both done in an hour or so–before the rain began again! Maybe it’s because I am more ruthless now that I’ve seen how the later growth is always so lush. It seemed like such a gift from God, to just have a “normal” day without sickness or weather standing in the way of my work.

We were expecting Soldier son, coming from the airport with his Special Friend just in time for dinner. And Husband had been hinting around about how some people like to bake cookies on rainy days. So I got on the ball and made cookies, soup and toasted almonds, all while keeping The Home Fires Burning. Wheee! I felt sorta like my old self.

I decided to make the cookies with some of the non-wheat flours I have around. They are wheat-free but not gluten-free, because spelt flour does contain gluten.

Wheat-Free Mocha Chocolate Chip Cookies

3 cubes butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon walnut flavoring
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cups white spelt flour
1 cup whole spelt flour
1 1/2 cups oat flour
1 12-oz package chocolate chips
3 tablespoons finely-ground decaf coffee beans
1/3 cup cacao nibs
1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts

Mix as for any cookies. I baked them about 13 minutes per insulated cookie sheet, at 375°, but I think I might try 350° if I make them again, to see if I could get them to be a little softer. They had a slight crispiness to the outside. The flavor was wonderful, and everyone loved them. I used a normal white-flour recipe I’d used before and changed and added things this time, cutting back on the sugar as well as adding all those crunchies. If you make it with white flour you might not need as much; I had increased the flour by 1/2 cup because they say that spelt flour doesn’t absorb as much moisture.

Crazy About Roses

my garden, other gardens,

This week I spent a good while pruning roses at church, which reminded me how much I love those flowers, and I decided to prolong the feeling by writing about it a little and looking at pictures with you. The photo above is of our two climbing roses we have at home, Cécile Brunner and Golden Showers, taken last spring, which I think was the first season after being pruned properly.Here they are this year. The C.B. at least is a little bigger. It’s quite a bit younger, and is the first plant that has worked to sort of fill up that corner of the yard visually. Note in the second picture the change in the background–the neighbors’ messy palms! Oh, well, I usually have my nose in the blossoms or am looking the other direction trying not to get poked in the face while I cut dead blooms, so that I don’t see what’s over the fence.

Here is a close-up of the Golden Showers, a rose I bought with a Jackson & Perkins gift certificate that my fellow-gardener sister K. so thoughtfully gave me for my birthday one year. Now it always makes me think of her.

This lovely flower that the Japanese beetle is enjoying is a tea rose in the front yard; its name is Pristine. (We have another rose bush out there for which I can’t find a photo at present, but I’ll show you in the future.) Pristine is a gem.

At church we have about 50 rosebushes. When I was tending them earlier in the week, deadheading, pruning a bit, watering, I didn’t want to stop, though I didn’t finish the job. I never do finish at church, because there is enough work there for at least one full-time gardener, and we don’t have any. It is a challenge to stay focused and enjoy the task of the moment; the mind wants to race ahead and dwell in the problems of the future–as in, How will I ever get half of this work done?

But somehow, that day, I was able to take a few minutes of the many and think how marvelous it is that I can do such sweet-smelling and satisfying work, loving Creation by ministering to the needs of these beauties. They can’t help it if they poke and scratch me, and the aromas and velvety petals and rainbows of colors make up for the pain.

Who would have thought I would like an orange rose? The two at church are on either side of a sidewalk intersection, and not being the same variety, they complement each other in their different tones of orangeness. This one is Ginger Snap, and the one I have pictured at the top of the sidebar, in two tones, is About Face. I am very fond of both.This is “merely” a gorgeous red rose that gives glory to God there on the church property.

My favorite at church is this pink climber that is also my special pet. It is at a spot where a lot of people see it, next to the parking lot. Last fall Mr. Glad helped me to drive a large redwood stake into the ground between it and the pillar that is concrete on the bottom. Then I wired the stake/post to the pillar, so that when I anchor the rosebush to the stake it won’t get pulled over, and the trunk of the rose will be closer to the redwood part of the pillar, where I hope to train it. A long process. But it is a climbing rose, and last year it kept reaching out away from the pillar. It’s doing better now with some discipline.

Now that May is past, many of the roses will have finished their biggest show. There will be plenty of rose work to be done, or left undone, all summer long. But let me not miss the immediate and rich rewards.

Pruning and Cats

my garden,

Last year at this time we still had Kitty Zoë. Here she is beautifying the prunings from the cherry plum tree. That tree is the most vigorous grower of anything on the property, which means that my husband has to climb up in the branches and prune it back with a variety of tools. I hate it when he does that; I usually stay in the house and pray.

We had only had Zoë and Gus for a few months when she was hit by a car. Gus then had a personality change and became a wonderful guy. Until that point he had let Zoë be the charming one.
The sad thing is, he has no one to play with anymore, and we don’t get to watch the two of them scampering and scuffling together. I’d kind of like to have a second cat, in hopes of having that experience again. But that’s greedy; Gus does the job of keeping us entertained and making the house a more warm and lively place, now that there are no children here. A baby in the house is the best thing for keeping one’s priorities straight, for slowing a person down. But a cat is second-best.

One last picture of Zoë as she was decorating the Lambs’ Ears. I haven’t been able to catch Gus in the garden, as he is always chasing leaves or butterflies. Say, perhaps I do require another cat to fill that role!