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Hospice gardens need volunteers

Wise, however, can’t work in the gardens like she used to, and she’s concerned about the grounds she has cherished for so many years. One of the gardens was created in honor of her daughter, Amy.

The gardens are at risk, she said, as Four Seasons hospice doesn’t have funds for a landscaper. Donations and volunteers are necessary to keep the gardens as beautiful as Wise built them up to be.

There is “tons of mulching” to be done, she said. There’s also trimming and weeding. Monetary gifts are “desperately needed,” she added.

“There has to be a leader,” Wise said.

The gardens are dependent on donations and volunteer hours to keep them vibrant, and Wise has been the cog in that machine. Before she started working at the gardens, they weren’t nearly as colorful, Four Seasons CEO Chris Comeaux said.

“There were just grass and dirt in a lot of cases,” he said.

The scenery has been transformed in the last 11 years, and the gardens play a large role in what Four Seasons is trying to accomplish at the Elizabeth House, Comeaux said. The hospice is trying to create an atmosphere to comfort families and clients during one of the toughest moments in their lives.

Wise could be seen daily working in the gardens with her white lab coat on. Clients and their family members would watch from the windows as she breathed life into the gardens. Often people would come out and give her donations. Those donations would sometimes be $50 or even $100.

“They would walk out and watch me work,” Wise said.

Clients weren’t the only ones looking out for her. Comeaux and other hospice employees loved having Wise there on a daily basis. Wise, with her garden tools and a smile, was a welcome sight, Comeaux said.

“It’s kind of like one of those moments when you know everything in life is okay,” he said about driving up and seeing her in the gardens.

Wise’s father took her to a flower show when she was 17. She spent days with her grandmother, who instilled in her a love of landscaping.

“I’d make a beeline to her shed and get an old mower out,” Wise said.

She spent decades learning the craft of vibrant landscaping. In 2010, her home at Lake Pointe Landing earned the Residential Landscaping Award from the city of Hendersonville.

“She has a gift,” Comeaux said. “When Ardy gardens, it’s her passion. It’s who she is.”

To donate or volunteer at Four Seasons Hospice and the Elizabeth House, visit www.fourseasonscfl.org or call 828-692-6178.

Reach Millwood at 828-694-7881 or at joey.millwood@blueridgenow.com.

Maine’s Capitol Park to have ‘edible landscaping’

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AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) — Fruit, vegetables and herbs will soon be planted at Capitol Park near Maine’s State House, under a new state law.

The law that went into effect last week directs the state to plant edible landscaping in the Augusta park.

Democratic Rep. Craig Hickman of Winthrop was the bill’s sponsor.

Hickman says in a statement that the landscaping will be paid for through private and public funds and will be added as the money becomes available.

The Paris Farmer’s Union is donating seeds and Hickman’s farm fields in Winthrop will provide edible perennials.

Hickman hopes the edible landscaping will raise awareness for the local food movement, encourage others to plant their own food gardens and educate children that visit the State House.

Landscaping is expected to begin next spring.

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October gardening tips

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Planting garlic for next summer’s harvest, cutting back Brussel’s sprouts, and digging up dahlias are some of the gardening activities for this month.

Now is the time to plant garlic for harvest next summer. Purchase garlic sold specifically for planting, or buy organic garlic. Commercial, non-organic, supermarket garlic may have been treated to inhibit sprouting. Plant individual cloves, root end down (pointed side up), 2 inches deep and 8 inches apart, in well-drained, compost-amended soil. Once the ground freezes, cover the garlic bed with 6 inches of straw or shredded leaves for winter protection.

To get the sprouts to ripen faster, pinch off the top couple of inches of your Brussel’s sprout plants to direct their energy into the sprouts that are already developing along the stem. Clip off any lower leaves that have yellowed, and keep plants watered if fall weather is dry.

When frost blackens the tops of dahlias, cut the foliage back to 2 inches tall, then dig up the tubers. Let them dry for a day or two, but not too long or they will start to shrivel. Brush off any loose dirt and store in a plastic crate or cardboard box, lined with perforated plastic, and filled with dry peat moss, wood shavings, or other similar material. Keep moist but not wet or they will rot. Store in a cool, dark area between 35 and 45 degrees.

When cleaning up the flower garden in fall, leave some the seedheads to feed the birds. The seedheads of plants like purple coneflower (Echinacea), black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia), coreopsis and cosmos will provide a tasty treat for birds such as goldfinches.

Keep watering trees and shrubs, especially evergreens, which were newly planted this growing season until the ground freezes. Although the tops of woody plants may be dormant, their roots are still active until late in the season.

Weed your perennial gardens and shrub beds thoroughly in the fall and you’ll have fewer weed problems to begin the following year. It’s also a good time to edge beds.

The foliage of evergreens can be injured over the winter by the drying effects of wind and sun, especially if they are planted in a southern or western exposure. Protect plants over the winter with burlap screens.

If you test your soil and add any needed amendments now, the soil will be ready for planting when you are in the spring. Contact your local university extension office for a soil-testing kit, also available at many garden stores. Since your soil can vary from location to location in your yard, if you notice different characteristics of the soil in different beds, test them separately.

All you need to “force” bulbs indoors is a place that stays cool but above freezing (35 to 45 degrees is best). Pot up daffodils, tulips, hyacinths, grape hyacinths, and other spring bulbs that need such a cold treatment, and water them well. For the best show, don’t mix different types of bulbs in one pot unless you’re sure they bloom at about the same time. Then place the pots in cool storage for about 12 to 16 weeks. Check on them periodically and water when the soil is dry. Unlike the spring daffodils, paperwhite narcissus don’t need a cold treatment.

Other gardening tips for this month include checking and replacing faded garden labels, carving pumpkins, visiting a local apple orchard, and baking fresh apple pies.

Robert Llewellyn’s photo tips

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Posted: Sunday, October 13, 2013 12:00 am

Robert Llewellyn’s photo tips

“While a painting starts with white and adds all the stuff you like, a photograph starts with everything and you eliminate stuff to get to what you like,” Llewellyn said. He also shared these tips for the best macro images:

Try the “else-ness” exercise, experimenting with how else you can photograph an object using different angles, lighting, etc.

Use a controlled background with close-ups, such as a full white background for outdoor shots.

Envision the whole frame, not just the object being photographed.

Never shoot just one photo.

Robert Llewellyn Photography seeks distinctive or odd-looking seed pods for potential inclusion in the upcoming book “Seeing Seed Pods.”

To provide a seed pod for consideration, email Robert@Robert

Llewellyn.com.

Specimens in clear, sealed bags, preferably identified by common or botanical name, also will be accepted from Oct. 14 to 31 in the Lora M. Robins Library at Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden. Seed pods will not be returned. For more information and the necessary form, visit http://tinyurl.com/LGBGseedpod.

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West Roxbury Evening Gardening Club offers tips

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You’re looking out your window right now and there’s nary a bloom in sight. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Your garden started out with such promise. Let’s rewind and review a simple plan to avoid repeating this scene next year.

Does this sound familiar? It’s early spring and you’re at the local nursery buying up blooming beauties by the cartload, convinced that this will be the year for that gorgeous garden you’ve been pining for all winter. How can you resist? Back home you plant and fertilize and admire your handiwork as your flowers bloom gloriously in the garden. For about a month, that is, and then it’s over. Your garden devolves into green leaves or worse, brown sticks. What’s a budding gardener to do? It’s simple: Stop the insanity! Do not buy everything you can get your hands on at the first sign of spring.

Step 1: Use a bit of restraint.

First, a quick run-down of what you’ll find at the garden center: Annuals, perennials, shrubs and herbs. Annuals may bloom all summer, as long as you fertilize and remove spent blooms, but do not come back the following year. Petunias, impatiens, and geraniums are typical annuals. Perennials bloom once a year for a short period of time, usually 2-3 weeks, but come back every year. Flowering shrubs bloom once a year. Herbs can also flower but are not grown typically for that purpose.

You can plant annuals every year, but it’s a lot of work and can be costly. Shrubs are nice accents in the garden to anchor the landscape but may not provide enough color to go it alone. Perennials, on the other hand, are the best route to a more economical, trouble-free, yearly repetitive and colorful garden.

Getting a garden to look great all summer using perennials, however, can be a challenge for the new gardener. You need to choose perennials that bloom in succession. This is called, curiously enough, succession gardening. Of course, most of us are not going to spend hours researching which plant blooms when.

So how do you ensure a successively blooming garden with beautiful color from May to November using primarily perennials?

Step 2: Visit the nursery every three weeks.

The stock will change as the growing season changes because the plants that sell are the ones in bloom. If you buy a few plants every three weeks and plant them, you will have a lovely garden in bloom throughout the season, not only in 2014, but year after year.

Step 3: Buy perennials.

Check the tag or ask nursery staff to confirm that your selections are, indeed, perennial. You may want to add an annual or two to your cart, but the bulk of your purchases to plant in the ground should be perennials.

The gardener’s saying, “Annuals in pots, perennials in the ground,” is a good rule to follow for the greatest balance of the time and money you spend on a long-lived, colorful garden.

About the Evening Garden Club of West Roxbury

Founded in 1996, The Evening Garden Club of West Roxbury is a member of the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts. A 501(c)(3) charity organization, the club maintains four community beautification sites. Club meetings – which are open to the public – are held the second Wednesday of each month and feature presentations by experienced horticulturists. For more information, go to gcfm.org/eveninggcwestroxbury/Home.aspx or www.facebook.com/EveGardenClubOfWestRox.

Judy Bucklen, a global account manager at Evolven Software, is an avid gardener, and a seven-year member of The Evening Garden Club of West Roxbury. She also provides landscape design services.

Inside the homes of ground-breaking designers

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Most professionals have to demonstrate a certain level of competence in their own lives if they hope to attract and keep paying clientele. (Would you open your mouth for a dentist with bad teeth?) That just makes sense. We expect professional expertise to be reflected somehow in the personal lives of the practitioners, and this is especially true of design work.

We look to artists, fashion designers, architects and other professionals in “aesthetic” trades not only for what they provide to clients or the public, but also to see the work they do for themselves. Unfettered by the constraints that come with most paid commissions, this personal work is often more daring, more expressive, or perhaps the purest version of a designer’s work, pared down to the essential elements.

Dominic Bradbury, a British design writer, recognizes that designers’ homes can be great and unique examples of the craft, and for some he takes it a step further. The really exceptional ones, in his view, are iconic. That is, they are definitive works that capture the essence of a particular style or movement, or even of a specific historical period.

Bradbury has singled out 100 of these homes for inclusion in his book The Iconic Interior: Private Spaces of Leading Artists, Architects, and Designers. The large-format hardcover is a thinking person’s coffee-table book, mixing plenty of eye candy (more than 500 color photographs) with an informed and in-depth discussion of what makes these homes what the author calls “essential reference points in the history of interior design.”

The book opens with Bradbury’s take on how we got where we are today — how social and technological changes have shaped residential architecture, and why interior design has evolved from a domain for the elites into a passion for many “ordinary” homeowners. The 20th century ushered in many profound changes, he says, one of them being the transformation of the home from basic shelter into a vehicle for creative self-expression.

Previous centuries had produced stunning artistry in buildings, certainly, but much of it in the form of ornamentation. Impressive exterior facades concealed structural forms that remained fairly basic, acting as shells and subshells to be filled with fine interior furnishings produced by guild artisans. To paraphrase the late comedian George Carlin, they were big boxes to hold artsy stuff.

When architects broadened their role and took a more organic approach to building design, interior spaces became part of the design package, not just the empty stage for someone else’s performance. Late 19th-century Victorian styles had featured elaborate decoration that masked line and structure; now those core elements were featured prominently, even celebrated, in cleaner and simpler work of the Arts and Crafts and modernist aesthetics.

Toss in consequences from two major European wars — many artists and professionals fleeing to the United States, air travel coming to the civilian market and military technology spinning off new materials such as plywood and aluminum — and by mid-century the cross-pollination of cultures and ideas was underway and unstoppable. Traditionalists and modernists alike found room to grow, either through reinventing classical styles or by claiming new artistic turf of their own.

The resulting diversity is part of what makes Bradbury’s book possible, and he has dutifully assembled here a remarkable array of spaces and places. Readers get glimpses and in-depth looks at, among others, writer Edith Wharton’s neoclassical New England residence, The Mount; Frank Lloyd Wright’s Hollyhock House; fashion designer Coco Chanel’s Paris apartment; the respectful and dramatic home that architect Ray Kappe built into a California hillside; and the jaw-dropping 17th-century Chateau du Champ de Bataille restored and owned by French interior designer Jacques Garcia.

American and European homes make up the bulk of the entries, but other featured locations beckon from as far away as South America, Australia, South Africa, Japan, Morocco, Turkey, China and Thailand. Photography by Richard Powers and others aims for a timeless quality to match the featured interiors.

With the book’s focus on 20th-century work, contemporary design themes outnumber traditional examples, but it’s hard to believe that anyone who appreciates architecture and design won’t find a lot to love in this volume. If I have a gripe, it’s only that having this international tour of beautiful homes at my fingertips makes me wistful, knowing I can’t see them all in person.

Four seek three seats on Orchard Dale Water Board

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Octavio “Toby” Chavez

Age: 74

Occupation: Retired postal manager

Public offices held: South Whittier School Board, 1985-89, 1997-2001

Whittier Union High School District, 1989-93,

Family: Married with three children

Education: Associated of science degree from L.A. Trade Tech

H.C. “Hal” Estabrook

Age: 85

Occupation: Retired purchasing director

Public offices held: Member of the Orchard Dale Water Board since 2002

Family: Married with two children

Education: Attended Ithaca College

Bob Noonan

Age: 82

Occupation: Retired insurance brokoer

Public offices held: Member of Orchard Dale Water Board, 1993-present

Family: Married with five children

Education: Attended University of San Francisco

Joseph Velasco III

Age: 43

Occupation: Employment representative with the state of California

Public offices held: Member of the Orchard Dale Water Board since February 2008

Family: Married with two children

Education: Attended University of Southern California

SOUTH WHITTIER This year’s Nov. 5 election for three seats on the Orchard Dale Water District Board of Directors has the feel of deja vu from four years ago.

Incumbents H.C. “Hal” Estabrook, 85, Bob Noonan, 82, and Joseph Velasco III, 43, were challenged then by two challengers — one of whom was Octavio “Toby” Chavez. 74.

And this year, those are the four candidates in 2013 for this district that has 4,200 customers and serves water to about 20,000 people.

The issues also aren’t much different.

The three incumbents say the district is doing a good job and Chavez, a former school board member, said he has the experience to contribute.

“It’s the incumbents who understand the issues,” said Velasco.

“We spend countless hours discussing how we can save the district and ultimately our customers’ money,” Velasco said. “As president, under my management team, we’ve saved the district $100,000 in spending and in staffing.”

Noonan cites his 19 years on the board.

“I was instrumental in the construction of a new office and the building of a new reservoir,” he said. “In the next four years, I want to be part of the redoing the master plan to remodel a 50-year-old water system.”

Estabrook said the district is in good shape financially.

“We’ve set aside in excess of $1 million for infrastructure,” he said.

The board also works well together, Estabrook said.

“We’ve got a combination of seniors and juniors on the board,” he said referring to the age. Two are under 50 and three are over 65.

Chavez said he brings his experience of involvement in the community, including eight years on school boards and his time with the Whittier Coordinating Council, where he’s now vice president.

“I have a little free time and I’m willing to contribute, serve and hopefully improve and help the district,” he said.

Chavez also said he has some new ideas.

“I think they should consider figuring a way to use recycled water,” he said. “It’s a little cheaper for landscaping.”

Estabrook said the district has looked into bringing reclaimed wastewater to Orchard Dale.

Bitterroot Public Library creating five-year strategic plan

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Bitterroot Public Library director Trista Smith knows just how hard it is to hit a moving target.

In the last week of October, Smith and members of the library board are hoping the public will step forward to help them with their aim in creating a new five-year strategic plan.

“When you start thinking about how things are changing so rapidly, it’s hard to know just where we’ll be five years from now,” Smith said. “This will be a best stab at where we need to go.”

The library has set aside two times on Oct. 24 for the community to step forward and offer input on the draft strategic plan that is now ready to read at http://bitterrootpubliclibrary.org.

“We want the public to tell us if they think we’re hitting the mark,” Smith said. “We’ve already received some great feedback from them. We’re hoping for a lot more.”

The sessions will be held from 3-4 p.m. and 5:30-6:30 p.m. at the library.

The draft plan breaks down five goals for the upcoming five-year span.

Smith said the library has already done some work on the first goal that seeks to create a space that fosters an environment of lifelong learning.

Initially that seemed like an overwhelming challenge, considering the fact the library is housed in an old Carnegie building that’s already bursting at the seams and isn’t particularly conducive to technology.

There was no money for an expansion or a new building, so Smith said the focus turned to making the best of what was already available.

They found that space just outdoors. Some new landscaping and places for people to sit added a whole new place for people to enjoy their library.

“That space that we already had wasn’t being used,” Smith said. “The transition has been amazing.”

The next goal focuses on the changing world of technology.

The library’s initial offering of Kindles for reading and another device for tapping into the world of streaming information and programming has been met with a great deal of demand.

“They are so popular that there’s a waiting list,” she said.

Smith said the library wants to continue to explore the potential of using technology to expand its offerings to the public.

Another goal centers on unleashing the creative potential of the library staff by using a program piloted by Google that allows its employees one free hour a week to explore and learn more about their field.

“A lot of great program ideas came from that time at Google,” she said.

The library’s plan also creates goals for the continuance of the library’s role as a community center and gathering place.

“Our Wild Wednesday offerings have really captured that idea,” she said. “We want to try to build on that.”

The last goal focuses on developing a new marketing strategy.

The two public meetings are open to everyone.

Smith hopes to have a final plan in place by the end of the year.

“I think we have a really solid draft plan,” she said. “We hope people will give us some solid input that we can add into it before we take it before the board and have it finalized.”

Reach reporter Perry Backus at 363-3300 or pbackus@ravallirepublic.com.

Elizabeth Gilbert returns to fiction with ‘The Signature of All Things’

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Gilbert sets her novel 200 years in the past and writes in lavish prose reminiscent of the Victorians. The book spans continents and decades, and as it follows Alma on her lifes journey, its filled with exquisite details regarding all kinds of plant life.

The narrative begins with Almas father, Henry Whittaker, a ruthless man who uses his knowledge of botany to become the richest man in Philadelphia. Alma is his miniature in female form, ginger of hair, florid of skin, small of mouth, wide of brow, abundant of nose. But most important, Alma is as clever as her father: She seeks knowledge at every turn and becomes a brilliant scientist.

The plants Gilbert dwells on represent characters, and in particular, mosses represent Alma. After realizing that no one has studied mosses extensively, since they are not big or beautiful or showy like orchids, Alma dedicates her life to these parasitic, rootless entities. Mosses are a stupefying kingdom. Here was rich, abundant valleys filled with tiny trees of braided mermaid hair and minuscule, tangled vines.

Mosses become a symbol for Alma, representing overlooked and ugly things, yet hiding a brilliant mind underneath their plain shell.

Rather Dickensian in style and structure, Gilberts novel is also populated with oddities in human form. Among them are Almas adopted sister, Prudence, who lives in poverty in opposition to slavery, and Almas mother, Beatrix, a staid and practical Dutchwoman who practices Euclidean landscaping.

The novel hits its stride when Gilbert introduces Ambrose Pike, a talented lithographer who dreams of becoming an angel of God. Hes a beautiful but deeply sensitive and fragile man. Alma, at this point, is 48 years old; never married and never departed from her fathers Philadelphia estate.

When Ambrose and Alma come together, their relationship is not only a sharing of ideas and knowledge but a spiritual one. Gilbert drifts into the supernatural when Alma and Ambrose decide to marry after sharing their thoughts telepathically in a book-binding closet.

The marriage turns sour after only a month, and Alma sends Ambrose to Tahiti to manage a vanilla plantation. Ambrose leaves without protest, obedient man that he is. Some years later, Alma learns that he has died from an infection in the hot climate.

The novel shifts into more recognizable Gilbert territory after Ambroses untimely death personal enlightenment while traversing an exotic locale.

Like Gilbert in her memoir, Alma journeys to Tahiti to unravel the mystery of her husband. Gilbert chronicles this journey with a close eye, from the leaking, ramshackle cottage in which Alma lives to the crabs scuttling on the sandy beaches to the native Tahitians who steal and return Almas belongings at random. Alma searches in the Tahitian jungle for months until finding the man who supplies the answers about her husband she so desperately seeks.

The Signature of All Things, though sprawling, follows a direct course most of the way. It falls off the tracks when Alma discovers what her husband had been up to in Tahiti and tries to heighten her own experience in what turns out to be an odd and jarring attempt at spiritual and sexual awakening.

The novel returns to its course thereafter, leisurely following Alma into her 60s, 70s and 80s, as she writes a thesis based on yes, you guessed it the signature of all things. Connections abound in every living thing, Alma discovers; she forms a scientific theory of adaptation and evolution rivaling Darwins. But Alma never publishes her findings an avoidance by Gilbert to dilute actual history within the context of fiction.

By the end of this 500-page, good though not brilliant epic, the novel seems to be searching for its own signature, its own take-away lesson about life. Gilbert refuses to let the novel and Almas journey speak for themselves so she tidily oversimplifies the connection between those fascinating mosses and Almas own life.

Garden of the week: Rooftop terrace at Birmingham’s stunning new library

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There is also a herb garden on the third floor Discovery Terrace, where fruit and vegetables will be grown next year, but it is the colourful explosion of rich red flowering sedums on the seventh floor terrace that is a really magnificent sight at the moment.

Red hot pokers, shimmering grasses and the contrasting foliage of blue-green curry plants (Helichrysum) and bright green cranesbill leaves add to the interest as you meander along the gravel paths admiring the fabulous views over Britain’s second city.

There are still a few everlasting wallflowers providing a little colour, but even when winter sets in the garden will still look good thanks to the hard landscaping, which includes artfully arranged wooden seating that has a slightly sculpted look.

And come the spring the borders will be brought to life with flowering bulbs.

The fact that the two roof terraces were created by volunteers, led by television gardener Alys Fowler, is even more impressive.

Volunteers will continue to maintain the gardens, and many of these have been sponsored by Birmingham Library for a training scheme at the University of Birmingham’s Winterbourne House and Garden.

Once you have had a look round the roof terraces, make sure you take a tour around the space age interior.

Orchard Dale Water Board candidates