ME AND MY BLUE PARADISE!

It seems that winter has finally caught up with us.  We had blizzard-like conditions yesterday all day, which left  us with snow packed over glare ice roads, and some pretty frigid temperatures.  It's kind of a kick in the shins after the nice mild winter we have been having, but on the other hand - this is our normal - we should be happy to finally see it, this winter.

I made good use of the nasty weather - I spent time finalizing my seed order, which started with mainly vegetable seeds, but somehow grew to herbs, perennials and even a couple of perishable plants as well.

I believe I should be good to go, come spring.  With the established perennials I plan to dig up and transport from my old yard in the city, along with what I already have here on this property, and now what I have ordered, I should be able to create at least a honest start in my vegetable and flower gardens this year.

I want it all.... now! But establishing gardens and beds takes years of planning, hard work and just plain good luck.  After gardening in my other yard for 17 years, I was just getting to know the yard, the soil... and now I will have to learn all over again.

Every yard and every garden has a different environment happening in it -a different ecosystem.  Gardeners have to pay attention to things like soil type, water, drainage, sun, shade, pH, even snowfall - all the controls that can make or break a garden and the gardener.

I started a journal of my new yard last fall, and I will continue to journal this spring and every season following.  I learned long ago not to rely on my memory - it's just not that reliable when it comes to plants!

I am excited about a few new varieties that I have ordered from T&T.

One of them is Little Bluestem (Blue Paradise).  It is a grass that has silvery-blue foliage all season and then in fall turns a deep-wine colour.

Isn't this glorious?

The other varieties I am excited to try are the Bold Cheyenne Spirit Echinacea.  I have the traditional purple and white varieties in my garden in the city which I will bring here, but I have been dreaming of having a big enough space to try these lovelies.

And Lavender...

I have never had any luck with growing this Lavender - but I love it so much - love the colour of it's blossoms, and I love the scent.  So I am trying Lavender Lady again... maybe she will like this yard better than she like my other.

I am so fortunate that all the plants I have nurtured over the years are still available to me.  Our son bought our home in the city, and he is not wanting quite as many flowers as his mother - so I will be able bring a lot of my favourites out to my new gardens come spring.

There is nothing like staring at colorful blossoms to make one forget about the white stuff outside.

Hope you have enjoyed this taste of summer too...

BACK HOME FOR DINNER!

I don't usually post on a Sunday, but we have blizzard-like conditions going on outside and I seem to be stuck on the computer, so I thought - why not!

I have a real treat to share with you... but first  - of course I have to tell a tale!

Two years ago almost to the day, I walked into my workplace of over 17 yrs on a cold February Monday morning.  I was met by my manager and a total stranger who were waiting for me.  In less than an hour I was unemployed, standing at the hospital entrance 4 floors below my office, waiting for my husband to pick me up  - while I waited I was saying tearful goodbyes to other hospital staff who were just arriving to work.  The company I had worked for had out-sourced my and my co-workers work, and our office was closed forever.

It was a really difficult day to get through.  In actual fact both my son and my husband showed up to get me, and we didn't go home - we went out for breakfast to Salisbury House and by the time I got home later that morning - I was already feeling so much better.

My neighbour Elaine, had lost her husband to cancer the year before.  She was totally alone with no family living in Winnipeg.  When her husband was sick and then dying, I made them both a priority, giving them my time, my help and my love.  After Gordon was gone - I doubled it, for Elaine.

When we arrived home that morning after I lost my job, my first inclination was to head next door and tell Elaine.  I knew she would see our car parked outside, and wonder if everything was okay.
I arrived at her door unannounced, spilled the beans before I even had my boots off - and instantly, our roles were reversed!

From that moment until early summer when I went back to work in a different position - Elaine made me her priority - sharing her time, help and love.

After we talked a bit that morning, she put the coffee on, and asked if I had a hour to spare.  How funny that struck me - I had just lost my job - I had many many hours to spare... I smiled and answered that yes, I could stay for an hour.

She got up from her chair, turned on her TV, opened a case of Cd's that her son had sent her for Christmas ands popped one into the blue ray player.

That was the first hour of many that spring, that I sat in her living room drinking coffee and eating her awesome cheese scones and watching the most fascinating TV series that I have ever seen.  I was introduced to BBC  television series (the real BBC - not the Canadian version of) or the Brit's take on reality television - which in my opinion we would never be able to duplicate, if we tried for hundreds of years.

These series all have the same small group of historians and archaeologists in them.  They recreate life in whatever time frame they are working in, using actual abandoned buildings or in many cases farms from the correct era.    They live and work as people would have in structures that were used in those specific time frames.  You might think this would be boring and stuffy to watch - but it is anything but.  It is fascinating, funny, entertaining, educational and totally mind-boggling as these very intelligent and professional people take on new lives and recreate periods of time that we can only read about in books.  They live their lives for one full year in the correct period, without any involvement of their real present day lives.


Tudor Monastery Farm Series

Tales from the Green Valley ( my personal favourite) this one is a must-see.

Victorian Farm

Victorian Pharmacy

Edwardian Farm

Wartime Farm

all still available to watch on YouTube as well as a bunch I have yet to see...


Yesterday I got an email from Elaine telling me she has found a new series for us to watch.  Even though we can no longer watch together, I jumped at the chance to share this new series with her anyway.

I have started this one and you have to watch it.  It is a good one too.

This series is called  BACK HOME FOR DINNER.  I am not going to spoil it by telling you about it - just watch it...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfPof73YF94&list=PL7fg9NEjNqazfuuads51Y8fpC9WCb4sFh


Happy Watching!

PLEASE DON'T MAKE MY MUSIC STOP!

After I wrote yesterday's post I became curious to see if I could find a chord organ similar to the one I had as a child.

I found a picture of one very much like the one I had, only mine had legs on it - perhaps my Dad added the legs to it, himself.

Back to my piano...

There are a few things very different about my piano that you just don't see on other pianos...

The first thing that is obviously different is the music stand.  Not very many piano's in Canada have a music stand such as mine - because piano's that have this type of stand are from Europe.  My piano is an Irish piano. Built in Belfast by Hart and Churchill in 1929.

The second thing about my piano, is that it is not a spinet, and it is not a full upright - it is a half-upright... these are not all that common either.

The piano teacher I studied with all those years - had a piano that looked just like my piano... it had a music stand just like my piano, and it was a half-upright... I know because she always made me set the metronome myself, and while it wasn't an easy reach for me to take it off the piano to set it - it was still easy enough to reach where it sat on the lid - without me having to stand up - which would have been the case if her piano had been a full upright.

All this went through my mind as I stood looking at my "new" piano... can you imagine the excitement that shot through my heart when I was also told that Gary had found out that the piano had originally been owned by a piano teacher who had brought it with her from somewhere in Europe?

My teacher was from Europe - France to be exact - her piano looked just like this new piano... could it be possible?

Well there is no way to prove that indeed this was my teacher's piano - but I know it is.

I can't explain the feeling I have always had when I play it - like I was speaking to a cherished old friend, who knew me as well as I knew them.  I still feel that way every time I play it.

So what has all of this got to do with having my piano tuned this past Tuesday?  Well now you know how much I cherish my instrument, and why.

Back to Tuesday!

Just minutes into the tuning of my piano, I sensed that the tuner was not happy.  He hadn't really gotten right down to business as other tuners had in the past, but he sat staring at the strings at the back of the piano.  Then he fumbled in his bag of tools and then he stared some more.

I sat waiting for something to happen, and then he turned to me and asked me the strangest thing.  He asked what I use my piano for.  "Do you just play for pleasure, or?"  were his exact words.  I wondered why he asked such a question really - who cares why I play it - I play it! ( Now I am getting irritated).

Then he turned around and told me that my piano was built all wrong!

Well this is news to me!   How does a piano live to be three years short of 90 yrs old if it is built wrong, and why am I being told this now?
So he shows me - his tuning tool is too large for the first 4 pins beside middle C.  Strange - I had two different tuners work on this piano before, and neither ever alluded to this problem.

So he starts to tune the piano beginning with the 5th pin! Ah - hello - what about the first 4 pins?  He completes tuning the whole piano and then tells me that he has silenced half the strings on the first 4 pins with felt, and that it will have to stay that way until he can return to remove those 4 pins and replace them with longer pins so his tool will work.

He told me the piano will have to be taken apart, the strings removed the new pins replaced and then restrung... "It's not cheap" was his other comment.

News flash - neither was his tuning job!   He charged me 165.00 to "tune" my piano, and he altered my instrument, and the next day 40% of the keys below middle C were flat!

I am sick - I plan to use my piano to teach piano lessons in fall.  I am performing at the nursing home for the residents there several times a month, and I am the accompanist for the church services at the nursing home as well  - I need my piano to practice!

To say nothing of the fact that I wish to be able to sit and play my piano whenever I please, and after a 165.00 tuning bill - I should be able to play for months without noticing a note out of tune.

Am I being taken advantage of?

It sure feels that way - all I know is that no one is taking my piano apart.  The other thing I know is that it is not my or my piano's fault that the tuner does not have the right equipment to perform the job.  That piano has been successfully tuned for 86 years.

Taking my gloves off on this one - hope it doesn't get ugly!

NEVER LET THE MUSIC STOP!

I had something happen to me on Tuesday that has really upset me.

I had my piano tuned - which usually is a celebration, but somehow things did not turn out as well this time around.

After months of asking around for reputable tuners, we finally decided on a name of a man given to us by several people here in town.

We called the man well over a month ago, only to get a return call form his father ( also a piano tuner) stating that his son was away, but if we were willing to wait he would come and tune my piano.

So we waited, and then he called and said Tuesday would be the day.

Like a kid at Christmas, I was so excited.  My piano was finally going to be tuned - a very big deal for me!

My piano IS a very big deal to me - and it always has been.

This is my music journey!

When I was four years old, one of my brother's brought home a tiny little chord organ for his little sister.  I actually remember it - it was green and the cord buttons were black and white ( the black buttons being for the sharp and flat chords, I imagine).
To hear my family tell it - my chord organ and I were inseparable.   That little instrument started my life-long passion to music.

As I gained a few years all I wanted was a real piano.  My parents weren't rich, in fact with  five children at home, as well as foster children to raise, I am sure they were quite strapped.  So my parents arranged for me to start piano lessons with the man across the street who was a choir director at a local church - and I practiced my lessons at another neighbour's home on their piano every day after school.

That arrangement lasted for a year or so... I don't know if I was constantly nagging for my own piano ( I am sure I was) or if my parents saw something in me that made them believe that investing in music lessons would be a good move  - but a year later there was a beautiful piano sitting in our living room, and I had started studying with a French instructor who was a Professor of Music at the University of Manitoba who taught from the Royal Conservatory of Music.

I never looked back.  I studied with her for nine years, and I credit her for giving me so much more than the ability to play the piano.

She was the kind of teacher that inspired one to love music - all music.   She often took me to the University to listen to concerts performed by students, on many instruments other than the piano... concerts of performances of Classical music from all the great composers... I was a sponge, and I think she realized that the piano was just going to be the beginning for me.

I was the kid on the block that went home after school and sat at the piano and practiced for an hour every day - without being asked to.  I was the kid on the street, who declined the opportunity to go to the YWCA to swim, because I'd rather learn a new piece of music from a newly acquired book.

As I grew older I became more involved in music all the time.  I studied the Cello ( my second love) and played in orchestras for six years during my junior and senior high school years.  I took voice lessons, and sang in choirs in church, high school, and joined a troupe of singers and entertainers who performed in plays and "showboats" all over my city.  I  also performed as a soloist for many years.

From the first time, I sat as a very young girl in the concert hall at the University, watching and listening to students perform, all I ever dreamed of becoming was a music teacher - even a professor like my own teacher.
I ended up making a different choice in careers - but throughout my life I have always wondered where life would have taken me, had I chosen music as my career.

Music, and my ability to perform it or to sing it, has been a very important part of my life - all my life, and the piano has stayed a major force of who I am since I was 4 yrs old.

I no longer have the piano my parents bought me, in fact there were a few years when I did not even own a piano but I always had some sort of keyboard to play on - even though the real deal was missing.

About 16 years ago, Gary was working at a clients home, and came back home one evening and all he could talk about was the beautiful old piano they had sitting in their basement.  I asked him who played it, and when he said no one played it - I asked him to inquire if it was for sale.  A few weeks later it was delivered to my home.

I didn't see the piano prior to Gary buying it and having it delivered to our home - which in itself is rather strange, I admit... I can't even remember why I didn't go and see it first - as I would be the only one playing it  - but there it was sitting in my living room - and I had such an overwhelming feeling that I had played this instrument many many times before...

MORE TOMORROW....

SPRING LIST #1 !

What I meant to talk about on Monday, was Spring, but I slept in, and then yesterday the rodent got in the way so finally today, I am getting to my Spring List series of posts.

Last Week we had several very warm days, in fact I think it was Friday last week, we were the hot spot of Manitoba at +7 C.  Most of our snow has melted.  When I look out, I see grass, flowerbeds and a little bit of snow here and there, but seriously - it looks like late April in my yard - not Feb 3rd!


This weather is really messing with my mind.  I want it to be spring so I can get outside and get to work.  There is much we want to do well before it is time to plant gardens.  I have lists that keep growing as well as frustrations over how those lists will be attended to, come spring.

My back yard where the vegetable garden is located is 50'x54'.  It is this space that I am going to be concentrating most of my gardening efforts on this year.  Except for the big vegetable garden, this space is an almost clean slate.  Bordering this space are 3 ginormous dying spruce trees that are taking up 6' x 54' of my yard.  They are going as soon as someone will remove them.

Over the winter these three trees along with the three in front of the house have deposited about 2" of dead pine needles over almost every square inch of my property, which is I am sure creating a yard of acidic soil where not much is going to want to grow.  My first nightmare!

The second nightmare, is the 54' of Karagana hedge that runs in front of those big trees in my yard.  Once the spruce trees are gone, these old hedges will have to be moved back to the property line about 5.5 ft, or I will have to remove them completely and replace them with a new hedge at the property line.  Most likely it will be the second scenario.

My third nightmare comes in the form of a fairly large garden shed shaped like a barn.  It is nice, and useful - but it's in the wrong place!   At the moment it stands beside the garage, well into the yard.  Every time the garden tractor (which lives in said barn) is used it has to be driven across well established grass and lawn.

I am not sure why the shed was placed where it is, but I am VERY sure that it is somehow going to be moved adjacent to the driveway where the tractor can have access to pavement instead of my pretty grass.  Just because it is a "lawn tractor" does not mean it is going to be used on that piece of lawn - no sirree - that lawn gets cut with a lawn mower from here on in!  The shed will have to be moved - but at the moment, we are at a loss to know just how that is going to be accomplished!

Once the trees are down, and the shed and hedge are moved, then I can get going on the plan I have made for that back yard.  I am building a patio area adjacent to the side of the garage, for our BBQ and patio set, surrounded by beds of flowers and maybe a couple of shrubs for privacy.

I have a nice grassy area behind the garden that is bordered at the back by yet another beautiful full hedge.  I want to build a small brick wall to imitate a small walled English garden.  I will put some flowering perennials there, perhaps a rose bush ( I have a few that need to be moved) and my pretty old garden bench.  It will be a lovely place to take a book and sit and read, or watch the birds, or just dream of gardening and nature itself.

I have one more thing I want to accomplish out there this spring, and that is to build or acquire an out-house-size garden shed.  I want something small enough to disappear in the landscape of the garden, but big enough to hold all my gardening tools and equipment.  Something like this...

I would even covert and old out-house - if I could find one that still was solid enough to work with!

If I can accomplish all this by the long weekend in May - that will be the first one of my lists of things to do outdoors this spring - accomplished.

Then it will be on to the next list!

To be continued!

PUT YOUR TRUST IN A RODENT!

Happy Ground Hog day, everyone!  Are you sitting at the edge of your seat waiting and wondering what the news will be from the rodents around the world?  Will Spring be early?  Will winter be another 6 weeks away?

Am I the only one in the world that thinks this is the most ridiculous tradition ever?

Punxsutawney Phi - perhaps the most famous rodent of all has popped his head out of his burrow this morning and proclaimed to all and sundry that we will have an early spring this year.

Nova Scotia's Shubenacadie Sam - fully concurs with Phil.

Ontario's Wiarton Willie - strongly disagrees and says they are both off their mound - winter will continue for yet another 6 weeks.

And poor sweet orphaned and rescued Winnipeg Willow dropped dead on Friday night - just days before her awaited prediction could be recorded for all time.

Manitoba Merv?  He croaked last year as well  - I believe.

So obviously here in Manitoba we don't have a reliable source of rodents - although I strongly believe I have the next famous predictor living in a burrow at the back of my garden, I can't seem to get anyone interested enough to come and claim it as the next predicting hero he or she could be.  How very sad for all Manitoba citizens!

The truth of the matter is that the occurrence of these rodents sticking their head out of their holes on February has nothing to do with seeing a shadow and making a grandiose prediction, but everything to do with finding a mate.  It's really all about Valentine's Day - not Spring at all!
In the past 30 years, Ground Hog predictions have only been correct 37% of the time.  That's not too good of an average.

Personally I am more apt to watch the birds.  They are a far better predictor of weather changes than some furry burrow-dwelling critter who has been asleep for months and is just now waking up from a long nap, taking a stretch, giving a scratch or two and peering out at a white world to see what's shaking!

However it is predicted, spring could be early or six weeks away.  Depending  on where you live - you might already know the answer to this question anyway.

Here in Manitoba, even though we are having a very mild winter - I think it might be safe to say we will still have winter until at least the end of March - which is for sure 6 weeks hence!

I am more than willing to let the Hogs off the Hook... but just in case I'll keep my eye out for McCreary Mitch this morning when I am outside with the dog!

NEED A BOOST?

I am having an extremely difficult time getting my motors started today.  It is mid afternoon, and it is just now that I am settling down to getting something accomplished.

I was up at 7 this morning, took the dog out for her first morning trot, and then instead of putting the coffee on, I crawled back into bed.  I don't remember anything until Gary woke me at 9:45 and asked me if I was going to get up anytime soon.  Apparently it had not been the first time he had tried to wake me...  one time before he tried, only to be told by me that " I was calling in sick today"!

Okay, there is a flashback!  Haven't had the need to say those words in over 8 months!  Wonder what that was all about?

That got me out of bed in a flash - and on some level I still think he is pulling my leg, but Gary isn't a liar, so it probably did happen, just the way he said it did.

Truth to tell, I have not thought about the days when I used to have to get out the door by 6:20 am very often in the last 6 months at least.  I regress - just last week when we were enjoying a really nice day in Neepawa, I did mention to Gary how very much I was enjoying the freedom of being out shopping and having lunch out with him, without the thought that I should be at work, or that I had to get back to work.  But that has been the only time in all these months that I have given employment any of my precious brain activity.

I hope to never have to think about that ever again..

Moving on - so I rolled out of bed almost at 10am (which I never ever do), I had breakfast, 2 cups of coffee, checked my non-existing emails on my ipad, had a bath, washed my hair.  Went upstairs turned the computer on, wrote an email to my ex-neighbour, Elaine; went back down to the sun room, fought with some #10 crochet cotton trying to work though a design I am working on for a Chatty Cathy outfit... Had lunch!

Did the lunch dishes, took the dog out again - scanned and sent a pdf document about seed starting that I had found in a magazine, to my ex-neighbour Elaine, and here I am.

Crikey!  Surely it must be nap time soon!

I really did have a much better outline for this post - but it has vanished my thought process somehow...I promise, tomorrow will be better.

Please come back...