Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
A pair of poems from the spring garden. spring expectation is a blanket on my garden soil time it is to make room for new life prune, compost the dead for the earth is pregnant time it is to prepare for expectations mine is a northern soul bred and refined in the seasons of swelling… Continue reading April Garden Poetry
Spring strawberry patch In the last year we’ve seen many changes, few of which could be considered unequivocally good. But there is at least one real benefit of 2020 — many more people took up gardening in the last twelve months. Gardening is hard to track because it’s rather a broad category heading. It can… Continue reading A Garden in the Plague Era
A pair of poems by others and two garden pictures of my own creation — both photo and garden. April I open wide to the portals of the Spring To welcome the procession of the flowers, With their gay banners, and the birds that sing Their song of songs from their aerial towers. I soften… Continue reading April Poetry
the gardener i’ve got my trowel and my trencher she said i’m off to sow so saying, a-sowing she went with words hidden up her sleeves an idea or two tucked into her hatband and the rows await pull out weedy fallacy cut back dead superstition cultivate and amend and then drop the seed in… Continue reading Dandelion Break
The winds are howling out there tonight. Which reminds me of one of my favorite tales from my personal gardening mythos. It will be the twenty-year anniversary of a most remarkable shed raising this spring. Spring, that is, in other parts of the northern hemisphere. For New Mexico, where this story takes place, the season… Continue reading A Shed Raising
It’s time to make Hot Cross Buns! Though there are many conflicting and confounding stories about hot cross buns in the spring, I’ve never found a satisfactory explanation for why these are associated with the middle of spring and specifically with Good Friday. Yes, I know there’s the whole “holy rood” thing. Except the tradition… Continue reading Hot Cross Buns
The birds are busy in the backyard. They’re awake at dawn, debating the latest household design fashions and hipster watering holes. Possibly a few duels among the cardinals. The doves are sighing in frustration because they prefer to sleep in. The wren is just permanently enraged. But he sounds lovely — as long as you… Continue reading Eggs!
(Or Eat the Damn Deer) Deer droppings This week the garden finally thawed out. I can see the grass and soil and the lower trunks of trees again for the first time in months. And right along with that, I see enough deer droppings to cover an acre in an inch-thick layer. I know this… Continue reading New England Ecology
I had to refresh the sourdough culture today. The bulk ferment tub looked like it could be growing more than sourdough critters. The culture was fine, though, so I used up all but a cup yesterday, making a multi-grain nut bread with dried fruit. This meant I also used up all the nut flour that… Continue reading A Bit of Bread
The maple sap is running. The skies are blue. There is a warm breeze. The snow is… mostly evaporating, actually. Or sublimating is probably the more correct term. There are rodents chasing each other through the pines, and the birds are loud even at midday. Crows seem to have much to say today; the wren… Continue reading Permaculture (Lazy) Pruning Tips
By My Solitary Hearth 