It’s been a gardening-heavy week, and I’ve been so consumed with curiosity and thoughts of flowers that I’ve been having dreams about my garden. It’s nice. Of course, in my dreams, my flower seeds grow immediately as I plant them— I wish!
As I sowed flower seeds this week, I found myself planting them in the patterns I designed in my dreams— a little stripe of marigolds here, a little cluster of verbena there. I still have over half the yard yet to plant— it always takes longer to sow seeds than I expect. I’ve rigged some 1/4” soaker hose to our drip irrigation in the seed-sown areas, and I hope it helps keep everything moist. Thankfully today nature has given me a day of gentle, misty rain by which to rest my calves. I hope, I hope, I hope I get tons of flowers from these seeds! I have a mix of nasturtiums, marigolds, bachelors buttons, zinnias, cosmos, and sunflowers. It seems that even after years of growing plants from seed, I always have to doubt and worry first, until teeny green nubs peeking above ground turn me into a believer.
Speaking of sprouting, my dahlia tubers— left in the ground last fall— popped up some leaves, cueing me to finally dig them up (and only 6 months late)! Once dug, I found that several tubers had turned to mush, but there were still many viable flower potatoes besides. I found this very helpful write-up on splitting dahlia tubers, and I feel pretty confident that I split them correctly, though only time will tell. Waiting until the tubers had sprouted before splitting was SO helpful, since it made the “eyes” (where the sprouts come out) easy to see for division. I also planted three new varieties this year: a dinner plate (which means flowers the size of your head) Cafe au Lait, a white puff ball variety, and a purple variety. With 20 tubers planted, the yard is going to be a party of dahlias come mid-summer, and I can’t wait!
A dream of mine in a more aspirational sense is to have a gardening wardrobe that isn’t just one pair of pants and shirts with paint on them and holes in the armpits from shovel wielding. I think I’d like to find some durable jumpsuits so I can zip up like a super hero. And maybe I’ll take up a neck bandana look, like a cartoon farmer. My day-to-day is cooking and squatting outdoors, and that’s no place for a silk blouse. Is it possible to look cute while I do my favorite things? I hope so. I’ll report back with any findings.
A dream for our house is to turn the patch of asphalt in the backyard into an actual yard, where plants live. This enormous undertaking is set to begin next month, which set Chris and I off into a flurry of research on paving material. Did you know that pavers are the most annoying home material to shop? All of the photos on the websites are unlabeled, leaving us to guess which colors are in each picture. Going to see the pavers in person caused even more confusion, as they look different in person than in said pictures. Should you need to shop for pavers yourself, you’ve now been warned. So far we’ve decided to partially abandon pavers and use brick for part of the patio instead, which actually, I like a lot better. I basically want everything everywhere to look like an old English cottage, and used brick fits that bill.
Returning to the topic of dreams during sleep, I’ve gotten really into dream interpretation lately, which I used to think was really hokey. I felt like dreams couldn’t possibly be interpreted because they’re so personal— but actually, that’s the point. There are many interpretations of symbols and happenings in dreams. I take what resonates, and see how it connects to what’s going on in my life. Like tarot, it’s more intuitive than concrete. In doing this, I’ve actually been able to see my subconscious dreaming brain progress alongside my real life personal development. It’s encouraging, and sometimes enlightening. It’s source material for self-reflection.
I feel extra thankful this week for the opportunity to reflect on these dreams, and for all the time I get to spend gardening. I’m also thankful for the silicone brush (intended to be a body buffer) that efficiently and gently removes all the dirt from under my fingernails. I highly recommend it over a traditional nail brush!
This Week in Food:
Straight up, the only interesting thing that happened in for this week was on Easter, aka Garden Day, aka Luffy’s birthday.
Other than the lemon-ricotta pancakes I wrote about last week, I also made the best deviled eggs I’d ever made with kewpie mayo, yellow mustard, pepperoncini brine, salt, a little of sugar, chives, and smoked paprika.
There was also smoked salmon that I arranged on slices of everything bagel with cream cheese, pickled red onions, and cucumber, cause I love anything bite-sized. Sprinkled on top are the micro greens I’d been growing in egg shells. On the side, we had some dressed greens and radish in endive cups, balsamic strawberries with mint, and lots of Prosecco. At dinnertime, Luffy had some ham, but left all the asparagus and potatoes for us.
That’s all for this Fryday, see you next time!
Kiya