I was sick in bed last week, and the gunkiness and low energy have been hanging on! Someone called it the yucks, and that’s exactly what it is. I have been looking out my studio window at the garden bed, which has been covered in black plastic since last spring, and I am eager to get out there and start landscaping. I’m just trying to be patient with myself and getting the rest I need. I’m hoping I’m back to my old self by next week.
Anyway, here are my four things for this week – Crafting a life beyond productivity, a race across the world, on limits and lack, and watching the garden wake up.
what I’m reading
I started listening to the audiobook Making Time by Maria Bowler and it’s so good so far! I’ve followed Maria on Instagram for a while and feel like we’re on the same wavelength when it comes to the value of creative work. I am very driven by productivity, so it can be hard for me to play and rest. Especially in this day and age where so many things can be monetized. This could be a blog post or social media content, or a YouTube video. This could be sold, replicated, and reproduced. It’s a positive thing, but it can also become a drawback when every hobby and curiosity is asked to make money.
Anyway, what I’ve heard so far has resonated with me.
what I’m watching
I love it when I trip across a little gem I’ve never heard of to watch, and such is the case with Race Across the World. It’s a BBC One show we found on Amazon and plowed through it in just a few days. (You can watch seasons three and four on Amazon Prime.) Sadly, we couldn’t figure out how to watch seasons one and two anywhere in the US, but we found that we could watch Celebrity Race Across the World for free on the BYU app. It was completely free, and we didn’t have to sign up for anything. We just downloaded the app to the TV and were able to watch it.
As I have found with many other British reality shows, they do an excellent job of telling stories without manufacturing drama and highlighting pettiness and backstabbing. The race is dramatic enough, and the contestants’ efforts to travel across great distances on small budgets while compromising with each other. It’s an excellent, heartwarming show with great contestants, and it’s thoroughly enjoyable to follow their adventures. You also see some amazing scenery.
As a warning, it’s rated TV MA because some of the contestants are pretty liberal with the f-bomb. I don’t think it’s as offensive in the UK as here in the US, but I just wanted to throw that warning out there. It’s not family-friendly in that sense.
what I’m loving
On limitations and lack…
“A landscape artist often uses a paper viewfinder, a small makeshift frame she places before her eyes to help her see possible compositions in nature. She cannot paint the whole world at once and does not try.” – Maria Bowler, Making Time
what I’m working on
After spending over a week without setting foot outside, I took a walk around the garden beds on Monday to see little buds appearing. I cannot tell you how much satisfaction I felt to see that the espalier apple trees made it through the dry summer and cold winter. Little bits of green are surfacing on previously brown branches, and I’m finding so much delight in watching the garden wake up,
The weather was nice and I felt like some fresh air would do my congestion and mood some good, so I took 15 minutes to trim off last year’s hydrangea blooms, pull some weeds, and rake some leftover leaves out of the beds. I filled a couple of paper yard waste bags in that short period of time and could already see a big difference.
I am dealing with bulbs coming up all over the place where I don’t really want them, but I’ll cut those back or dig them up when I start working on weed suppression again. I’ve been saving tons of cardboard and will have some more mulch delivered to continue my efforts in establishing new garden beds.
I also took some time to look through my garden notebook from last year and made some new notes about what was blooming at what time, what annuals I want to replant, and perennials that didn’t make it. I also made some new notes about fertilizing, so I can get everything fed and off to a good start.
PS – I didn’t include links to my gardening notebook, but here are links for those interested….
8 Responses
I’m sorry to hear you’re not feeling good. There’s nothing more frustrating when you know you have things to take care of, and you want to get things done, but your body is just not cooperating! Your focus on gardening is inspiring me; your gardening journal in particular is intriguing to me. Thank you, as always, for the inspiration!!
Can u say more about your gardening notebook? How do you use it? How do you press the leaves / flowers? What do you track and learn from it? It sounds fascinating- both beautiful and highly useful.
You might like the gardening vlog Garden Answer…..great ideas and information and lovely people.
Will you share the names of perennials that did not come back ? Maybe some are still sleeping and need a little more warm weather and soil to “come forth.”
So far, there have been a couple of varieties of lavender that didn’t make it. The Spanish lavender didn’t make it, and I wasn’t really expecting it to because it’s not meant for this zone. I cut the other variety back and am hoping it’s still alive and will start producing some green leaves, but it’s not looking great at the moment.
Hope you are feeling much better soon! In February, I had influenza A with pneumonia and it took 3 weeks to recover. Take care and you will soon be back to your usual productive self and I look forward to follow along when you are up and running again.
Get perfectly well soon!!! / prayers
Dear Marian, For me, I love to weed my garden when I’m not feeling tip top. It’s somehow symbolic–tearing out the weeds by the roots and just exerting my influence and determination to get back in the game and start fresh once more. But that’s me. I am grateful for your energy and dedication to sharing your life and am filled with admiration for your forthright presence.