Smith College Chrysanthemums

  • Post published:11/05/2011
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Sometimes a chrysanthemum is just a mum, but sometimes a chrysanthemum is Art. Artistically grown chrysanthemums will be on display during Smith College’s annual Fall Chrysanthemum Show which will run November 5-20 in the Lyman Plant House. A $2 donation is suggested. On display will be the stunning chrysanthemum cascades and other skillfully pruned and supported chrysanthemums, some in pillars, and some trained to a single stem with a giant bloom. Like the spring Bulb Show the Chrysanthemum…

Autumnal Surprise!

  • Post published:10/27/2011
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This fall we have truly been having a 'golden season.' The weather has been relatively mild, if rainy, and the usual flame of the maples was muted. But a golden glow shone on every sunny day. But today we got rain - and a surprise.   This photo was taken around 4 p.m on Thursday.  

Bridge of Flowers – End of Season

  • Post published:10/26/2011
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Chrysanthemums were planted in September. We want the Bridge to be full of bloom all season. I am so happy to see roses still in bloom. I am also happy to see a quiet river behind these dahlias. The dahlias are important at this season. But the weather has been so relatively mild that even the begonias are still blooming. The gardens will be put to bed and the official garden season ends on Sunday, October 30.  Have…

Ashfield Firewood – Holz hausen

  • Post published:10/12/2011
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Holz hausen, a German system of building a fast drying wood pile. Click here to see an artful woodpile in  Hawley. Click here to see more Wordlessness on Wednesday. OK. Almost wordless.

Fall Planting Season

  • Post published:10/08/2011
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The gardening year really has two planting seasons, spring and fall. Spring planting season is all a-rush with excitement because you can finally get your hands in the dirt, carefully chosen plants are arriving and a casual browse through the local nurseries has sent you home with a truckload of new plants and plans. And then there is the bliss of working beneath an ever warmer and brighter sun. Fall planting season tends to be less exuberant, with…

Festival of the Hills – A Crop of Authors

  • Post published:10/03/2011
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The Conway Festival of the Hills is a grand autumnal event in our region. This year I got to share tent space with other authors like Marie Betts Bartlett (left in blue) who brought her book The (true) Story of The Little Yellow Trolley Car and Heidi Stemple (right oogling the baby. Heidi is the daughter of and co-author with Jane Yolen of many books, true, mysterious and delicious.  In the center is Jessica, owner of The World…

A Heathan Muse

  • Post published:10/02/2011
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On a Tree Fallen Across the Road by Robert Frost (To hear us talk)  The tree the tempest with a crash of wood Throws down in front of us is not bar Our passage to our journey's end for good, But just to ask us who we think we are Insisting always on our own way so. She likes to halt us in our runner tracks, And make us get down in a foot of snow Debating what…

The American Grove

  • Post published:09/29/2011
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Our house is surrounded by fields, and the fields are surrounded by woodlands.  Trees are an important part of the New England Landscape and I just learned that Massachusetts is about to join Connecticut, Vermont, Maine and 34 other states in an online organization called The American Grove. Their website is full of useful information about planting trees, even coming at how to choose a tree in an unusual way. We have planted trees for our each of…

Color in the Autumn Garden

  • Post published:09/24/2011
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The days are growing shorter. When I drive down my road I have begun averting my eyes from a maple branch that has burst into flame. Autumn is officially upon us. And yet there is a lot of bloom in my garden. One of the benefits of annuals is that many will bloom well into the fall. I have pots of snapdragons, petunias, osteospurnum and ‘Million Bells,’  a healthy blooming border of an annual salvia around the Shed…