Garance Dore Shoots Aerin Lauder's Southhampton Garden

Rare is the USA garden passed amongst generations.

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Aerin Lauder's Southampton garden began with her grandmother.

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More amazing than Aerin inheriting a lovely garden, she's kept it a lovely garden.  Without sacrificing her 'voice'.  Says much about her ego, confidence, talent.

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Photographer Garance Dore, below, recently shot Aerin's garden.

Pruned hedge, above, a Flying Buttress.  The event for the table must be delightful, but how the vignette is framed by the photographer, magic.

Combing classic & modern, above.  Metaphor, Lauder's grandmother & Aerin.



My mother-in-law was a professional photographer and this foodie shot, above, made me smile and remember how many hundreds of them she took, and, how she used food as a magnet gathering her grown children, their spouses, and grandchildren around her.  Only the best, and in decadent amounts
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Basket, above.  My basket collection is beyond decadence in quantity, must reduce, and my best antique basket is similar.  Perhaps Aerin inherited this basket from her grandmother.  Hope so, incredible having such a useful touchstone to someone she loved.
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Few garden photographers excite me.  Garance Dore, shooting Aerin's garden, feels like a gift, and a Madeleine.
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Enjoy the complete Garance Dore Lauder shoot, here.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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If you like good garden photography, enjoy, Clive Nichols.

How To & How Not: Creating a Landscape

Another example, below, designing a garden as backdrop to your life.

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What does that mean?

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Of course the ubiquitous necessities: beautiful, low maintenance, organic.

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"I can live without the necessities but I must have the luxuries," Miss Katherine Scott, close friend of my grandma, said in conversation when I was 8 years old.  Doubtless you already know Miss Katherine Scott taught Flannery O'Connor her first college writing class, English 101, General College Composition.

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Back to the garden & making it a backdrop to your life.

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Aside from being able to go into my garden, (note: any garden I design/install is forever 'my' garden) and shoot a roll of 36, each worthy of a magazine/book cover, impromptu life scenes must have incredible setting/backdrop, a daughter getting married, cats being crazy cute, a friend at lunch, a grandchild's 1st birthday party, a spouse arriving home with the great news of a big award, a teenager having a sweet 16 with her best friends, and etc...  

Designed, less than 5 years ago, path, above, on axis with the porch & opposite axis from drive, then overdosed theme with flagstones, pairs of boxwood, gate, etc.

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Photographer knew my intention, above, and it is the 1st bride's photo posted by the event planner.  

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This is how I 'check' my work, creating a life of its own.  

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Understanding the core value of Miss Katherine Scott in my gardens via these 2 photos, above/below.

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In college I was trained/taught to design gardens EXACTLY as, below.  Degreed less than 5 seconds I knew I couldn't design a garden to save my soul, or any soul.  With no money, but pure grit, I began 2+ decades studying historic gardens across Europe.

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Landscape of necessity, below.

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Garden of luxury, above.

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Cannot believe I saw this pic, above, recently, online.  Total incurves, outcurves, drifts, specimens, contrasting shapes, be sure to use odd numbers, contrasting textures.  Everything I went to Europe to unlearn.

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Understood Miss Katherine, age 8, five decades later, feeling as though I'm paid to play.

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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara

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Met with clients last Saturday morning to run through plan/bid for their garden.  Mentioned the garden as backdrop, to the husband, for all that is arriving ahead for their 2 little boys with events/pictures at home, knowing he was unaware of Miss Katherine Scott's motto, and his eyes glazed over a bit, he smiled politely.  No matter, the choice was made for him.  I can design no other way.  He will understand, his epiphany will arrive.  

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Top Pic, Brita Photography, bottom pic here.

Moved In: ca. 1900 Farmstead

Last week, below, feeding the chickens, an audience arrived.  How do animals this large appear at the fence within seconds, no sound?

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Our views of neighbor's dairy farm.  Soon, when more invasives are removed we'll have views of their lake and rolling Piedmont hills, the last, before the coastal plain.

Still moving in, over 3 days almost 50 boxes unpacked.  5 boxes refilled, heavily, and another Goodwill trip taken.

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How did I ever live without a front porch?  Boxes went to the dump each night.  Fear, not tidiness.  Did not want boxes sitting, and possibly finding a timber rattler in one.  

From the boxes, below.  Over 90% of china/ironstone unpacked.  Dining room has 2 built-in closets, this one, below, was for glass jars of fruit/vegetables.  At least that's what markings on the wood shelves report.

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The door, blessedly was not painted inside.  Made of pine, it has been faux painted, over a century ago, like an expensive wood.  Rest of the doors in the house were painted white.  Will never know if they had all been faux too.

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Shelves, below, go to 11' ceiling/wrap each side, and filled to overflow.

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This is solely colored china/ironstone.  Agreed, Houston we've got a problem.

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On the other side of the fireplace, below, blue/white china cabinet.

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White ironstone still in boxes.  Painting to be done before unpacking those.  Hardly near the top of our action list.

We've done nothing, below, to the garden, other than take what I brought from my last garden, a cottage garden, to Goodwill, or place on 8 pallets under a century old water oak.
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Driveway, below, a compacted meadow, and narrow.  Perfect for us, not our trucks.  Drama ahead.
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Soon, all foundation plantings, below, will be removed with the Caterpillar.  Excepting the camellias, at the end of the front porch, and 2 oleander at my office windows.
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Beloved & I wanted to get it done today, but finishing the pantry renovation beckons more loudly.

 A month living here, I braved my first nail.  House is ample, closet space not.  Basket on wheels is one of my longest & best employees when I lecture.  Files, shredder, printer etc in this closet too.

Mentioned above, drama, below.

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County permit department came, and we were approved to add another driveway.

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No trees will be cut.

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In a perfect world this would not be the new drive entry, it affects axis views, cross axis views, & enfilades of placing the new orchard, rose arbor, potager, smoke house.  For starters.

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What I know, for sure, after 3 decades of studying historic gardens, and designing them, issues in reality always make a garden better.

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Form & function.

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Beloved needs his driveway, and a barn at its end.

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Our new drive will curve, below, it has to, you read the list, above, for this new garden room.

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How long before our new curving drive looks like this, below ?

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More than a bit impatient.

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Life is good.

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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara

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Top pics mine, bottom pic, Pinterest. 

Choosing Chairs

Choosing chairs for your garden, a couple of things to include.  A chair back tall enough to lean the head back to rest or fall asleep.  And, arms.

Lovely chairs, below, but after-dinner-conversation will flow longer, enrich & be funnier, sitting in the chairs, above.  Wine will taste better too.

Table/chairs, top pic, large enough, perhaps conversation splits into 2 groups, and a pair of chairs are pulled away and closer to each other.
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When clients have a party I always have the same request, Please take pics of your furniture afterward.  I learn most, and adore learning daily, from gardens living/leveraging lives.
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Cote de Texas recently wrote about John Saladino, here,  and his various homes thru the years.  A rich article.  Almost a design course.  And, where both pictures were found.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

Best Garden Design Rule for 'Eyesores'

Yesterday's surprise, below.

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We didn't know the wedding tent would have 2 sides filled with equipment.  Southern summer wedding, air conditioning happily wanted.  

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3 hay bales had been sourced for power box/satellite dish.  Those 'eyesores' no longer mattered, once a/c was set up.

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Game changer.

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Early in the day my contractor said there was no reason for me to stop by the jobsite, he could site the hay.  You know I was coming to the site.  Once there, I knew he wasn't about to let me leave, or site the hay himself.  Adore this type of horticultural humor.  180, not needing me to needing me, oh so rich.

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What you must know about eyesores in a landscape and focal points.  Easy garden design rule.  Basic.  One of the first I learned in college.

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If you have an eyesore, place a focal point nearby to draw the eye.

Every wedding guest will look at this view, above/below, walking from ceremony at the lake, to the barn.

Great serendipity, the hay bales are round, greater contrast with straight lines of tent/barn.

 More than hiding eyesore of a/c, I had the good fortune of pretending the hay bales had been left in the field, as they are across several counties at present.  Timing was good.

Seen from the barn, above, another axis for the hay bales to look 'natural'.

Contractor, above, leaving field after siting last hay bale, happily thinking, If mother of the bride is unhappy with hay placement, Tara gets-the-talkin'-to.  Better, he only had to site each bale once.
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Take away? If you have an eyesore in the garden, put a focal point nearby to draw the eye.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pics taken at jobsite yesterday.  Could not get out of the field fast enough, and it wasn't because of heat/humidity.  With each step, looking down, making sure no fire ants or timber rattler !

Nancy Lancaster: Finding a Library to Copy

Garden Design has several first-rules-of-design, one of my favorites, COPY.  Don't take this rule, as I did for too many years, as a crutch or not unique.  Each site is unique, and, how YOU copy is unique.  End of theorem?  Copying is unique.
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Moving house after 3 decades I've discovered how much my library is woven through most layers of my life.  New home has no library.  With manly help, I helped tote my boxed library to a shed behind the house.  A terrible activity.  Using Garden Design principles, the hunt has been on for types of library shelves to copy in our ca. 1900 American Farmhouse architecture home.
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Nancy Lancaster,  below, is my choice.  A touch rustique, exactly how I Garden Design.



Until painting my house, about 5 years ago, my library looked like this, below.  Chaos was organized because it evolved over decades.  Once painters put things as they wished, I never again found a book easily.



When a library lover says all their books are boxed, you know what it means.  A few books, for life to continue breathing at bare necessity, are in my office, below.
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Table & lamp, below, in my new office, had been in my Conservatory.

Book shelves, below, were bought for my previous office.  They had been organized.

Chaos reigns.  Little did I know, packing the books from my prior office, they would become my sole library.  Probably for a year.
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New library will be in the central hall, totally Nancy Lancaster, with sconces added.
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Cannot wait to get the Gardening section back in order.  Until then, my feathers are not quite smooth.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Top pic, here, 2nd pic, here.  Bottom pics, my office this morning.

Front Porch Furniture Placement

Temps & humidity are at their extremes.

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Yesterday, after lunching with a friend in town, I had the good fortune of riding shotgun while my friend had to stop, below, for a few minutes.

Without words, tone poem, this front porch is a full class, How to Design Your Front Porch.

No incorrect note is played here.  Of course the Kimberly Queen ferns were showing off, but even the Christmas cactus was thriving.

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I don't know the owners, yet, but you know I will.  Their front porch looks/feels like a fine spring day.

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Will get the white they used for home/furniture, and sparkling gray on the floor.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO T

Garden: Foot Swing

This is the swing, below, I thought was hanging from our old pecan tree.



The wood seat on our swing, below, rotted long ago.

Wise teachers arrived yesterday, below.

 Their inner narrative was one of use, above/below.

My narrative, wildly wrong.

This is a foot swing.  Never had a 'seat'.  Paying attention to the knot, and height, it never had the intention of being a sitting swing.

This morning, above, Laskett's tail truly is this magnificent.  

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We think the pecan tree, above, in the sunbeam, is as old as the house, 115 years.  Maybe older.  

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Friends came to lunch yesterday.  Rather, friends brought a feast for lunch.  Homemade, the bounty arrived in baskets, including fresh tea, my 1st watermelon of the season, breads, cheeses, chicken, pimiento cheese, more/more/more, cotton table cloth & linen napkins.  How did they know, even my linen napkins are safely hid in a box amongst stacks of boxes?

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Our kitchen not functioning until painting and renovations completed in the pantry.

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Their arrival a great deadline to get many things done.  Their first time seeing our farmhouse, its land, and walking the grounds where the orchard will be, the new conservatory, where the gravel drives will curve, property pins, views, and dreams.

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And the girls on the swing.  Many clients, thru the years, with children even younger, I've drawn their children's gardens once they graduated college, married, bought their 1st home. 

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Seeing these girls on the swing, I'm excited for the right time, and drawing their 1st gardens.  Knowing, when I do, it will feel like 15 minutes ago they were teaching me about my own foot swing.

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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara

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Top pic, Ben Pentreath.  Bottom pics mine.

Front Porch: Open Wide

Rich in sublime detail I'm curious about the front porch, at the drive way side.



Perhaps more shutters between arches?  A ceiling fan suggests moments of leisure.  Foundation hedge is a barrier between home & garden.  Forcing foot traffic to the front door.



Choices are good, this 'landscape' is good, adding choices makes it a good garden.
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Between the open arches, above, add choices.  How?  Take away foundation planting & add more brick steps across the front.  Then, you've made house & garden a vanishing threshold.  Significantly changing the use of the porch, and its 'feel'.  More, you've made a narrow'ish front porch entry luxuriant in scale, and tied the history of the home's architecture to the garden.
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I think of these gardens, above, as pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey gardens, one size fits all.  And this home is worthy of a garden matching its patina.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pics here.
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Humorous how curious this home/garden make me.  And, perhaps reasons for the 'landscaping' would put me in agreement.  Without knowing more, it's all Cole Porter, don't-fence-me-in.

What Makes a Good Guest Room ?

Quirkiest delight of my career has been lecturing out-of-state for Garden venues.  Mostly, they have little money to spend, and I'm given the choice of a hotel or some one's home.
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Is there a better way to know a place than staying in a private home, and help a non-profit save money?
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On this path I've learned what I want/need in a guest room, host, and activities offered.
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The room?  Plenty of cleared surfaces, a chair, lamp by the bed, books/magazines, something to set my glass of water on at nite, easy access to electrical outlet.
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Because it's work, I need quality time alone to run thru my powerpoint & handout, one last time, ahead of a presentation that may be some one's one-and-only Garden presentation, or even more difficult, some one's 42nd and I must delight/educate their inner spirit to see their own garden new again.
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Inherent to the visit there is a walk with my host, thru their garden.  Adore seeing plants in new soils & zones.  Garden groups help the host, and there is a tour of several other local gardens, usually 1/2 day with lunch at a delightful cafe. Pride in their location, I feel as if my garden ladies are chamber of commerce emissaries.
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Then, dinner.  Now we get the husbands, and open bar.  Dinner is most often at someone's home.  Cocktails before dinner never disappoint, ever.  If it's Make Way For Lucia, hightum-tightum-scrub, E.F. Benson, we are all tightum, by today's standards.
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And the husbands, why-did-I-let-her-drag-me-here-'tude, does a 180 after the first round.
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Beyond this point, I will leave laughter, conversations, stories, to your imagination, but I know it's not close to these evenings.  Something about strangers, kindred spirits, I'll be gone by morning, souls splayed, safety in sharing, they can't tell on you, because you could tell on them.  Basic kindergarten rules.

Still unpacking boxes for my new office, a dozen had engulfed the guest room, above, now the guest room is functional, though far from complete.  Office should be completed this afternoon.
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Hope I've hit every layer for my guest room.  Cannot wait to get the walls painted a creamy white, keeping the existing white trim.  Windows on 2 walls, am anticipating some power naps here too.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO T
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Why would I stop lecturing for Garden venues?  They are my original base, truly have little money, and I learn so much seeing the private gardens.  Fun does have a price, it is Joseph Campbell's, 'Follow your bliss.'  
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It has been a privilege fiercely learning about Gardens traveling the globe for 2+ decades.  Gaining a heart's desire carries obligation.  Lecturing outside Garden venues, bringing Gardens to the People.  Corporate venues, women's wellness, trade shows, etc.  Places not normally associated with a garden, yet there is a hunger, a need to be filled, only a Garden answers.
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Secondary venues, not garden venues, pay well, I added a clause in my speaker's bureau contract 'allowing' me to continue with the Garden venue lectures.  They are content with the arrangement.  Happy this is true, but sad it is a truth about garden venues.
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Why are they so lacking in funds?  Partially, attitudes about Nature Wendell Berry writes much of.  Attitudes killing towns, supporting atrocious behavior toward livestock, annihilating soil, ourselves.  Further, our government is passing laws making elements of Nature commodities we no longer own upon our own property.  Each of these nuggets gleaned because I like to Garden !  Liking to Garden is political?        

Cottage Garden vs. American Farmhouse Garden

Moving from cottage garden to historic American Farmhouse architecture garden has, in less than 2 weeks, taught much.

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One lesson, after moving team finished near midnight, was apparent at first light.

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Cottage garden accouterments, though loved & used for decades, are not at home in their new garden.  In fact, they are cringe inducing.  Go me not knowing this, indeed.

Yesterday I had unexpected resources in Beloved's team of men & trucks.

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Pallets were loaded with 'keepers' and Beloved moved them with his Caterpillar under an old oak, no weeds/grass, near a fence line, trucks were loaded & driven to Goodwill.

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Wish I had not moved the cottage garden accouterments here.  Yet, if anyone had said at the front end, 'Don't take your entire cottage garden', I would have scoffed, and moved everything anyway.

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What a difference daylight makes.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

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Pic via Gil Schafer.

John Adams Celebrated July 2, the True Anniversary of Breaking from England

John & Abigail Adams, at each turn, humble.  

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David McCullough wrote a Pulitzer prize winning biography of John.  

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McCullough's book trumpets for the same treatment of Abigail.  With her, I want to know every layer of her successful farm management.  In minute detail.  The same treatment given to Washington & Jefferson and their farms.

"On this day in 1776, the Second Continental Congress unanimously adopted the Declaration of Independence, and the United States officially broke from the rule of England. The document was approved and signed on July 2, and was formally adopted on July 4. John Adams always felt that the Second of July was America's true birthday, and he refused to appear at Fourth of July celebrations for the rest of his life in protest.", from The Writer's Almanac, listen to Garrison Keillor read this passage, here.

These flags, above, have moved from their tiny cottage garden I adored for 3 decades.  Good change can hurt deeply, this grieving is from a new angle yet grief has not been unknown before, it will be managed.

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Joy in our new home/garden, profound.  It was imperative I leave my garden on my own terms, and I did.  More, I have a new garden needing me, as badly as I need it.

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Better, is having Beloved.  Last night, late getting home after dinner, we had our inaugural ride in the golf cart by moonlight with wine.  Destination, known, unspoken.  Our pond, about 1/2 acre.  A rough ride, Beloved still clearing invasives, we spilled as much wine as we drank.

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Eyes acclimated, moonlight crested its angle across the tops of the trees, and what felt too fast, finally a spotlight on all of the trees and water coated in duckweed & frogs, our chorus.  Then, our chorus stopped, and the lake next door at the dairy farm blared its music.  Made me laugh, learning a new language.  Who knew there was a tempo to a pond & lake across acreage?

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Then the epiphany hit deep, and rich.  We own this.  

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My little cottage garden, and Beloved's garden, he sold his too, have been turned into a ca. 1900 American Farmhouse, 4.5 acres, open/wooded, pond.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

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I staged both homes, and each sold within 24 hours of being listed on MLS.  Another instance of good change being stressful.  Who is ready for 2 homes selling so quick?  Earlier this year I staged/shot/listed by owner on Zillow Beloved's cabin, it sold.  Chose to use a realtor for our 2 homes for several reasons, and know it was the right choice.  Realtor for our new home is equally amazing.  Oh the horror stories I was told about realtors !  These 2 realtors will stay in my phone.  They are now friends, and part of our lives.