the need to find happy places

You know what I could do all day? Sit inside the greenhouses at Kopke's and watch people buy plants. At Kopke's the staff is always joyful and helpful and the shoppers are at their moment of pleasure -- enriching their gardens, porches, decks with blooming plants for the season. People have very divergent approaches to this, and of course very different tastes, and this is what makes it so interesting. And they like to talk about it to someone, anyone, so I'm sure if I sat in a corner, I'd be engaged in a conversation about the virtues of a pink versus red fuchsia flower.

Kopke's opened for the season today and that, to me is one huge reason to be joyful. Theirs is a very short season: mid April to late June. Sure, they pick it up again in the fall with a burst of chrysanthemums, but this is not interesting to me, nor to most serious gardeners. Our planting time is now.

So I wake up with not a small amount of enthusiasm, even though, darn it, I do have a cold. It came suddenly and of course it could be from anyone anywhere, but I know it's not Covid, just sinus stuff and yes, I do wish I had a Swiss pharmacist who could advise me on what herbal concoctions to take for it, but I don't, so I'm just barreling through with it.

But here's a Swiss remedy of sorts -- my wonderful teas have arrived (I purchased them in Zurich). Very herbal and very delightful! So if there is a psychological boost that comes from drinking fantastic infusions, I will surely benefit from it! Too, my daughter found a recipe for granola that she liked and shared and I decided to make it this morning. In reading the recipe (it's called Eleven Madison Park Granola and you can find it in the NYTimes if you have a cooking subscription, and if you dont, send me a note and I'll copy the recipe for you) -- I learned that it was created by Daniel Humm (a Swiss plant based chef working in New York), and it hails back to his childhood in Zurich. Well now, if that isn't a good omen then I don't know what is!

I make it for breakfast. Oats, pistachios, coconut flakes, pumpkins seeds, sour cherries and some brown sugar, maple syrup and olive oil. There! I've given you the whole thing, it's that simple.

Breakfast, together at last.

(meanwhile, the destroyers are out there, digging up my bulbs...sigh...)

 

 

(and still, things are looking so good now! color has returned to farmette lands...)

 

 

And then I am off to Kopke's. A piece of springtime heaven.

 

 

I stay a while, I pick out a few plants. 

Transformative!

Of course, you can't go hog wild just yet. I don't see any frosty dips in night temperatures for the next ten days, but we are not yet in the safe zone. Pansies will survive a light frost. Most of the other stuff wont and would have to be carted inside. Still, even the appearance of a few annuals, coupled with the emerging bluebells, daffodils etc. -- are enough to make anyone smile!

And my first box of plants -- these from Bluestone Perennials -- arrived today, so I will have my hands full in the coming days!

(one flower basket planted, a dozen more to go!)

I pick up the kids. I'd been stalling the weekly ice cream treat because we've had so much work to do after school, but today is the day for it!

(back at the farmette, he's finally tall enough to manage the tree...)

 

 

We're to get rain this evening, but it's slow to arrive. Ed and I are so overwhelmed by the constant news pouring out at us from all corners of this country that I suggest we postpone dinner and take a walk in our local park. If the greenhouse was a morning happy place, our county park surely is our evening dreamland. The prairie fields have just recently gone through a controlled burn and so the look here is eerie. And yet... We know there are seeds and roots just waiting to shoot up after a spring rain. Somehow this is reassuring. 

Soup again tonight. Good for a sniffly cold, good for the soul.

with love...