A great ride on "Zeke"

Since I ride my old Sizzle several times a week, I seldom seek out opportunities to ride "strange" horses when I'm away from home. Frankly, I'm cautious about horses I don't know, plus I get to ride as much as I want at home. But Amanda and I had great treat when we took a trail ride together at Sun Mountain Lodge. I could see I've really been missing something. It's just plain fun to do something new with a different horse.

I was just interested in a quiet ride to look at the scenery, but since I'm more experienced than the average dude, they gave me a relatively young, but very well-behaved half "draft" horse named "Zeke." All I can say is it was fun and he was BIG! There were only four of us on the ride, so I followed Kit the wrangler and we had a great time talking about horses and wildlife.
The scenery was spectacular and for almost 2 hours we rode through valleys and forests, past lakes and streams then climbed high on a ridge for fabulous views of the North Cascades. I could have kept going forever on Zeke!
We saw unusual birds like the Western tanager and osprey, and a carpet of wildflowers were blooming all along the trails. Amanda enjoyed a little "away from baby" time. Kit invited me to go out for a private ride with her the next time, so "we could really cover some ground." Oh boy, sign me up!

Fairy Woods

Fairy Woods
by

Henry Meynell Rheam

"Every time a child says 'I don't believe in fairies,'
there is a little fairy somewhere that falls down dead."

J.M. Barrie

Living in a terrarium

I can take about 10 minutes of local TV news in the early morning (the overnight house fires, scandals, car accidents, crime!) But then, there's the weather report. There are two types: those of us who find weather reporting endlessly fascinating, and those who just take each day as it comes.

For the weather freak, the national forecast map is the highlight. Yesterday, across this huge country of ours, Seattle had the lowest high temperature (about 56) in the nation. Even Montana and North Dakota were warmer at noon. Candi and Roger-- I seldom have the chance to envy your Missoula weather!

Looking at our upper left corner of the map, you would think we're living in the frozen north, but western Washington is actually a temperate zone. The big ocean to our west keeps us cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter, relatively speaking.

It's green now. Really green. When I opened the blinds this morning, it was like looking out into a misty wet terrarium. When the lawn is parched in August, what we wouldn't give for some of this rain.

A good mango

When I was a kid, a mango was an exotic fruit, and you had to travel to an exotic place (and be brave) to eat one. I'm sure there weren't any at the A&P grocery store in Quakertown, Pennsylvania! But like many other things, now they are easy to find and relatively cheap. In some parts of the world, papayas and mangoes are a diet staple, and a beloved part of the food culture.

Tropical fruit is so good, and one of the joys of waking up on vacation in Hawaii or Mexico is eating slices of big, sweet, red papayas with a squeeze of lime juice. With toast and strong coffee, it's a perfect tropical breakfast in my opinion. They never taste quite as good here.

When I was poking around the Internet, I was surprised to read how many healthful benefits (and various superstitions) are connected to eating mangoes and papayas. Most Americans wouldn't think of picking one up and eating it like an apple, but there are other tasty things to do with them.
This week, one of the nice ladies John works with gave us two deliciously sweet Champagne mangoes. I like to make a fresh mango "chutney" or "salsa" with these. The easiest way to peel the slippery things is to slice the fruit off the pit in thick chunks, then score and dice it off the skin.
The recipe is simple: small amounts of chopped jalapeño, onion, tomato and cilantro mixed with the diced mango, plus a squeeze of lemon or lime juice and salt/ pepper. Make it about an hour before dinner so the flavors mingle.
It is really good with pork chops or breaded chicken cutlets like these.

Nova's first camping trip

A few weeks ago, Amanda, Tom, Nova (and Roger) went camping at Banks Lake in eastern Washington with a group of families from the Valley. There were lots of babies, little kids and dogs-- and it sounded like everyone had a great time. Amanda told me Nova loved the tent, and being outside for three days in beautiful spring weather. Here's a few pictures:

Having fun playing in the tent...

Helping take care of the camping gear (with Roger standing guard)

Of course keeping yourself clean is more work out in the wilds...

But new toys to discover on the beach...

And a very first mud facial!

May flowers and showers

Another week of gray skies and rain showers in Seattle. Today will be a fine day to spend in the museum basement, working on archive projects.

Still...so much beauty is packed into the garden during the short weeks of May. The tall, bearded iris are starting to flop over from the rain, so I've been cutting stems for the house. The colors are spectacular and the ruffly flowers almost fake looking. They have a strong and distinctive herbal scent (I wouldn't say "fragrance") that you'll catch walking by the vase, mostly at night. It's easy to see why some gardeners go nuts over iris, and start digging up their lawns to plant more.

The plant is named for the Greek goddess Iris, who was the divine personification of the rainbow. She used the rainbow to glide to the ends of the earth carrying messages to gods and men. What an image!

Here's a pretty iris poem from an old 1931 "Green Gate Gardens" seed catalog:

The garden with its little gate of green,
Invites you to enter, and view mysteries unseen,
Its vine laden bowers and overhanging trees,
The air filled with sweetness, the hum of the bees,
The flagged walks with iris galore,
Of most beautiful coloring, unknown before,
Pink, white, purple, yellow, azure blue,
Mixed and mingled of every hue,
You come away wondering, can more beauty be seen
Than in the garden with its little gate of green.

Fools rush in

One thing led to another yesterday, as it tends to do on your "day of rest." On Saturday night a bedside lamp went on the blink, leading to bustling around, pulling out strange little tools, and laying out lamp pieces on tables. Then a trip to True Value Hardware on Sunday morning, with mutterings from a certain person about how "they won't have what I'm looking for." And of course they didn't, although somehow the lamp got repaired by this same person likes to tell me: "it's a good thing you married a genius."

My part in the domestic drama came when the genius pulled the bed away from the wall to unplug the offending appliance, revealing enough dust to stuff a pillow, and give Martha Stewart a conniption fit. Out comes the vacuum, and there goes another hour. As I say, one thing leads to another...

What does any of this have to do with an olive tree? Well, we stopped at the West Seattle Nursery on the way home, leading to the impulse purchase of a spindly little olive tree for $19.95. As John pointed out, "a bargain" as the label says we will soon be harvesting "up to 20 pounds" of olives right in our backyard.

Since Seattle feels more like Anchorage this week (damp, cold and wet) maybe it was the thought of Mediterranean sunshine and dry hills that pushed us over the brink. Olive trees are borderline winter hardy here in western Washington, but never mind, the label also said I could plant it in a large tub and "bring it inside" during cold spells. Along with all the other tubs of Zone 8 plants I try to grow in our chilly Zone 7?

Anyway, we're ready for summer to finally and truly get here. Sizzle is wearing her winter raincoat again.

"Wild China"

We just watched a BBC TV series called Wild China, and if you enjoy nature programs you'll like this one. The photography is spectacular as they travel around the vast regions of China, showing many beautiful and bizarre creatures.

For example, the adult bamboo bat is about the size of a bumble bee; it's perhaps the smallest mammal on earth. They live only in bamboo stalks, squeezing through beetle-made slits that are only 4mm wide. I did the conversion, and that is an astonishing .16 (or 5/32) of an inch. The hollow bamboo stalk shelters a nursery of minuscule babies-- each mother has just one, but they all cluster together crying for their mammies when they fly home. An amazing bit of micro-filming.

There are many human mouths too in China (1.3 billion to be exact) and it isn't an exaggeration to say the Chinese traditionally eat just about any protein that walks, flies, creeps, swims or crawls on the earth. Exotic animal parts are also considered "medicine" and "taken" for different conditions, so the conservationists face an uphill battle. In China, I've seen for myself the appetizing sight of a tank full of live snakes and turtles greeting you inside a restaurant door. I guess you could say it's not that different from a tank of lobsters. But yuk.

Anyway, it was encouraging how the program shows recent conservation efforts to save some of the wild places and animals across this enormous country. I also noticed how many Asian wild flowers are common in our gardens, thanks to the plant "gathers" of previous centuries. If you missed it on PBS, Wild China is out on DVD.

Cornflower

For years I've tried to grow a weedy plant called cornflower, or Bachelor's Button. I finally had luck last year with a package of seed. I was happy to see it re-seeded itself, so now I have some vigorous new plants without even trying. The shade of blue is pretty-- this is a picture of the first flower I took yesterday.

The botanical name is Centaurea cyanus. Like many flowers, it takes its name from mythology, where Cyanus was a strange youth who garlanded himself with flowers and wore blue clothing. He adored the goddess Flora, who one day found him dead in a cornfield, where she transformed his body into a cornflower.

The cornflower frequently appears in fields of grain, where farmers consider it a nuisance. In England it was known as "blunt-sickle" because it dulled their scythe when grain was being cut. So it's interesting that in the language of flowers, the cornflower is a symbol of delicacy, perhaps because of the devotion of Cyanus to Flora. There are also traditions in which wearing the cornflower shows one is unmarried.

Anyway, I'm happy to see it my garden at last-- after trying to grow it for so long, I wouldn't be surprised now if it became invasive!

Flora

Cat in the apple tree

Can you see Vino? Early yesterday morning I watched him slink out of the hedge and jump up there to hang out. He's "guarding" an old ornamental birdhouse that no self-respecting bird would ever build a nest in. When I opened the door with my camera, he ran off in terror as if he'd never seen me before. That cat must have a guilty conscience about something. John calls him our "Dodo kitty," and for good reason.

We've had wild weather in the last 24 hours. At noon yesterday I was working in the garden with hot sun on my back, and within 45 minutes a dark, windy storm blew in from the west. We had driving rain, which made me sorry I cleaned all the outside windows last week. Gale warnings on the Washington coast, snow in the mountains, and damp and cold in Seattle today. Crazy spring weather...hope yours is nicer.

Copper River Salmon

The spring arrival of the first Copper River salmon on a Alaska Airlines cargo plane is a big deal around here. What is so special about it? Well, I've only had Copper River salmon a few times, and there's nothing like it-- rich, buttery and delicious, with an amazing texture and color. That said, the high price and short season certainly add to the expectation and mystique of eating it.

Is wild salmon from other Alaska rivers as good? How about the Yukon River, for example? Probably just as tasty, but Copper River salmon has benefited from a brilliant marketing campaign. Twenty years ago, no one knew about the "Copper River," which is actually an extensive delta region. Now all the Alaska "rivers" would love to jump on this exclusive salmon bandwagon.
Want to really impress someone? Take them out for a special Copper River salmon dinner. Personally, I don't care for the restaurant style of serving rare salmon, and no chef would overcook such an expensive portion. So if you know how to cook and really want to show off, throw a $100 fillet on your grill.

I took this picture at Thriftway's retail fish counter yesterday. Next to the salmon, wild Key West prawns, which I've never noticed in Seattle before. But I hear the shrimpers are pulling them out of the water as fast as they can down there, with the dreadful oil slick approaching.

(In case you're wondering, John got chicken tacos for dinner last night.)

As seen on TV...

It doesn't look impressive yet, but the box says my "Topsy-Turvy Hot Pepper Planter" will soon be bursting with over 200 peppers!
It was a warm and (mostly) sunny weekend, giving people a chance to go nuts at the local nurseries, carting home thousands of little bedding plants. There were no parking places at the West Seattle Nursery when I drove by; it looked like a feeding frenzy. We have rain today and for the rest of the week, which will help water in all those new plants.

Thanks Mom and Dad for sending the "Topsy-Turvy" present-- more pictures at harvest time.

Happy Birthday, Marji

Here I am with my big sister Marji, way back when. We're having a great time on the homemade stilts our dad made us. It looks like learning to stilt walk was bit hard on the knees :-)

Have a wonderful birthday, Marji-- and don't fall off any stilts!

A spring clean for the May queen

There's a lady who's sure, all that glitters is gold
And she's buying the stairway to heaven.
When she gets there she knows, if the stores are all closed,
With a word she can get what she came for.
If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now,
It's just a spring clean for the May Queen.
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run-
There's still time to change the road you're on.

And it's whispered that soon if we all call the tune,
Then the piper will lead us to reason.
And a new day will dawn for those who stand long,
And the forests will echo with laughter.

Lyrics from
Stairway to Heaven
by
Led Zeppelin

Sunrise, sunset

Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly flow the years
One season following another,
Laden with happiness and tears.

Fiddler on the Roof

Now that the old curtains are gone, I have a much better view from my computer desk. This is a picture of a sunset the other evening, but my favorite time is early morning. The corner of the yard is quiet and shady, and I never know what creature will wander through. I see the neighborhood cats like to cruise by, acting cool and anti-social. And Vino still likes to sit on the gazebo railing like he owns it. The raccoons beat a path through here too in the morning; they look purposeful like they're heading off to work. Or maybe, bed.

Our laurel hedge is overgrown for most of the year, so the birds love that corner too. We've been lucky to have bewick's wrens in the hedge for the past few summers-- I hear them often, but seldom spot them. Like all wrens, they're secretive and shy, so it's a special joy when you see one.

A while back, I wired a little wicker bird house high up on the palm tree, just for fun. I didn't think anyone would actually move in, but I saw one of the wrens actually checking it out the other day. A wren nest in a palm tree...now wouldn't that be something?

Family pics

Good times on a sunny spring day...

Hong Kong noodle with seafood

Sometimes I'll buy a $20 bag of big Atlantic sea scallops at Costco. With this dreadful oil spill polluting the ocean for the foreseeable future, it might be a long time before we see these huge guys again, so I decided to splurge yesterday. You won't be surprised to hear that I dole them out frugally, so we have several special meals from that one bag.

On our dim sum lunch outings in the International District, I've enjoyed a simple dish called "Hong Kong noodle." The very thin noodles are fried quickly in a big, extremely hot wok. The leaping flames and well-seasoned pan (they are never washed) give the dish a distinctive taste the Chinese call "fire of the wok." This is hard to reproduce in a home kitchen, but with the right ingredients you can still throw together something tasty with these thin egg noodles.
As they say, the secret is in the sauce. I mix up dashes of soy sauce, oyster sauce, hoisin, and sweet Mirin wine to taste. This is a powerful brew, so also a bit of water or broth to dilute it down.
I chop some vegetables, fry them lightly, and set aside.
Then I brown the scallops and shrimp quickly.
Finally, I combine everything: seafood, cooked noodles, vegetables and sauce, and heat over high. I learned this method in the New York Times cooking supplement, where they have a way of making easy things harder than they should be. But the "separate frying" method makes a better stir-fry.

I've worn out many "woks" over the years, but finally banished Teflon from the kitchen. Now I have a plain, carbon steel one that heats up like lightening on my Viking range. It was pre-seasoned (whatever that means) but doesn't stick, even though I wash it.

Green, green, green

This time of year, our family members living in the Colorado Rockies always tell me, "our aspen trees still don't have leaves yet." This is hard to imagine, with the rampant growth here in the Northwest. I took this picture yesterday afternoon. I've never seen the roses or peonies so tall-- the horse manure and rain is working its magic. We had strong sun over the weekend, rain yesterday, and sun again today. Which translates into a deluge of tasks for the overworked gardener.

My favorite garden writer Henry Mitchell once said, "if an element of play is not present, there is no point in gardening at all." Well, as far as I'm concerned, there isn't much "play" in weeding, although it was nice to finally plop my rear down in the dirt with hot sun on my back, and do some hand-weeding. This is the time of year when I accidentally rip out, chop off, or trample many delicate things coming up. And every year, this is the time when I give up on the dahlias (they froze, they rotted) but finally, here they come again. That is, if I haven't decapitated them with my hand weeder. You would think I'd remember this; it happens every May.

And there are always, always surprises. This is what keeps us going from year to year. I wrote about buying Sea Holly last June, and convinced myself they would all die. But yesterday I noticed a healthy, strong plant that survived a year's worth of digging and weeding-- so John might get one of his favorite flowers this year, after all.

The tall, bearded iris is the movie star of the spring garden. We used to have many varieties, now we just have a few. I got tired of them because they take up space and have to be divided so often, but then decided having none in the June garden was too sad. So I started nursing back a few special clumps, like this one. The flowers don't last long (what great beauty does?) but they give a few days of supreme loveliness and then become ugly plants again for the rest of the year.

Weyerhauser display garden

We drove to Weyerhauser yesterday to see the rhododendron garden and bonsai display, which was open briefly for Mother's Day. The headquarters building is visible from the freeway, and was completed in 1971. With a green growing roof, it's a wonderful integration of landscape and function. As Architecture Week says, "it has withstood the test of time beautifully."

As you leave the freeway and enter company property, the road meanders through beautiful parkland and forest, reminding you what good stewards of the earth the Weyerhauser folks are!
The weather was magnificent-- almost 70!
And the bonsai display is like walking through a living museum. Each one a perfect work of art.
And many were blooming...
In the display garden, there are rare plants and botanical oddities to tempt the covetous gardener, like this fascinating rhododendron. Of course visitors must exit through a plant and gift store, making impulse purchases easy.
The blue Himalayan poppies were blooming by the pond. This is an unreal sky blue, and in the sunshine they were magical. John generously offered to buy me a couple of poppy plants, until I read the care sheet: requires moist woodland soil, shade, protection from freezing, does not bloom for two years, and usually dies after the first bloom. Well, I told him we'll just drive to Weyerhauser once a year to admire them :-)

And credit where credit is due-- John took all the pictures in this post, except for the first one.

A fancy cake

Have a sweet day!

Happy Mother's Day

Spring is back for the weekend, and we're looking forward to the gift of sunshine and normal 60 degree days. My plan is to spend some it on my hands and knees under our allium forest, going after weeds. The alliums bloom on their spectacular 4 foot stalks, and make a great display with the peonies and roses for a few weeks. One of my favorite times in the garden. I took this picture yesterday morning when the sun finally came out.

Tomorrow we're taking a trip to the rhododendron garden and bonsai collection at Weyerhauser company headquarters. The bonsai display has always been one of our favorite places, and we were surprised to hear it was closed to save this massive corporation a bit of money during the recession. Go figure...however, there's a one-time opening for Mother's Day. I'll have some pictures for you Monday.
And speaking of Mother's Day, best wishes to Wilda, Marge and Irene. And special, loving thoughts to the hard-working young moms in the family: Amanda, April and Julie. Enjoy your day!