unsolicited advice, part three: are you happy now?

A few months ago, a concerned neighbor left a note on my car kvetching about the sorry state of our parking strip. Apparently, she/he was worried about our weeds spreading to surrounding gardens. This anonymous neighbor (and I'm pretty sure I know who you are now), who evidently has a bird's eye view of our property and all the time in the world to critique my gardening skills, somehow missed the countless hours we've spent trying to battle those very same weeds over the course of the almost 20 years we've lived here.

So to make a long story even longer because I know you're just dying to find out what happened, here's the progress that has been made since my last update:

I dug out the dreaded horseradish and Canada thistles once again

and cleared the patch for phase two of what I'm now calling Operation Victory Garden.

Here's the pile of cedar 2x6's we saved from our deck remodel a couple of years ago. I've been planning on building some new raised planters with them. After scaring away about a hundred spiders, I picked through the boards and hauled them out to the sidewalk.

I measured and cut all the boards and waited for Dave to get home,

because assembling those suckers turned out to be a two person job.

While taking a break from screwing assembling the boxes, Dave inspected my weeding job and pointed out I'd missed some horseradish that was growing in the street in a crack between the curb and the asphalt.

He determined it was time to try a new method of eradication.

And discovered it takes a lot of heat to burn horseradish leaves.

In a last-ditch effort to keep the horseradish from coming up again, I decided to line all the planters with 1/4" metal screening and covered that with a layer of weed-blocking fabric. That step took a ridiculously long time, because the screening doesn't come in sizes wide enough to cover the bottom of the bed in one piece, and I figured if I didn't sew all the seams together that horseradish would certainly find its way through any crack.

My friends Iris and Laurie stopped by and helped shovel dirt for awhile.

This entire project has turned into a communal garden of sorts. Dave and I built the beds and provided the land and water, and my friend Laurie bought the dirt and helped fill all the planters in return for the use of the one farthest from the camera. We finally got all the vegetables and seeds planted at the end of June.

Here's what the garden looked like last week:

The corn is well over my head.

Laurie went on vacation, and by the time she got back,

her radishes were the size of torpedoes.

And I thought I was being smart by planting only one zucchini, but I've harvested four in the past week. (Those giant leaves hide the squash until they're the size of baseball bats!)

Anyone got any good zucchini recipes?

imagination unleashed

I love Anthropologie. Every time I walk into that place I'm inspired to look at styling in a completely different way, to play around and use the humblest of materials to elevate an idea into the realm of great design. Yesterday I stopped in to visit the Portland store and was transported to another realm, as I am almost every time I visit. Don't take my word for it, see for yourself:

scraps of fabric create a bohemian canopy bed

circles cut from old books and scrap paper, sewn together to make a fabulous curtain

a chandelier of twisted wire and cut-up plastic bottles adorns the fitting rooms

crazy cocoons fashioned from strips of recycled cardboard

I love this place!

hot or not?

wordless wednesday no. 22

wordless wednesday, newport beach edition

pdx to oc, day three

On the road again, after a stop in the Bay Area to visit my sisters and nephews...I stayed up too late and got up too early, but I was eager to get the trip down that desolate stretch of Interstate 5 over with. Not much to look at but gently rolling golden hills and cows. Lot of cows. Down around Coalinga, you can smell the feedlots from miles away. A truly awful way to raise food. I'm not a vegetarian, but why we feel as if it's our right to treat these animals as if they're just inanimate, non-feeling things is a mystery to me.

Further south the rolling hills give way to the enormous San Joaquin Valley, a formerly fertile, now incredibly arid place full of orchards and vineyards and orange groves fed by broad, manmade canals moving water from North to South. Farm is such a quaint word. This is Agribusiness.

It's easy to be critical, but not so easy to reconcile that criticism when I pull into an oasis to fill up my car with gas and have a breakfast of fast food at Burger King.

However, nature is not quite so critical...the wild things see opportunity in the very things I'm criticizing.

Hours later, I make the long, hot climb up and over the final pass

into LA smog and traffic.

It seemed fitting that I was listening to this song at the time:

Welcome to LA...

did I mention it was hot?

pdx to oc, day two

Back on the road after a one night stopover at my cousin's place. By 7:45 am I've already seen two dead deer and a small orange tabby on the side of the road. We humans sure have made this planet a dangerous place for our fellow creatures.

On the bright side, I narrowly avoid hitting a confused squirrel trying to cross the interstate, so I console myself with that for awhile.

By mid morning I've climbed up and over quite a few mountain passes:

The first three were hills, really...

but then they got a bit higher...

Still, nothing like going over the Rockies, but the highest point on I-5 nevertheless.

And then I got to see the last little bit of cool, green Northwest scenery for about a week: