Stealing the View

View, below, from the Garden Room earlier this year. Same view, below, last week.

My tiny property lives large because I own the sky. How? Canopy & understory trees, walls of evergreens, floors of groundcovers/stone on axis from window views inside my home. Vanishing Threshold.

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And, Dahlings, this is big, I stole the view, above. Those aren't my trees. La-Ti-Da.

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Azalea 'George Tabor' is the pink flower you see. Soon blue mophead hydrangeas will be blooming. Later, rosy pink Sasanqua's will bloom.

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By December I'll have the 4 Seasons view from this window.

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(Tara's Trinity of the Southern Garden: Azalea, Hydrangea, Camellia. Plant my trinity and you won't go a day in the year without blooms. Included are oakleaf-Anna Belle-mophead-PG-Tardiva hydangeas & C. Japonica.)

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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23 years in my home & these are the first pics from this view. Why? Since January interiors have been painted, kitchen & master bath remodeled, furnishings redecorated. Odd, new interiors creating new views of the garden. Susanne Hudson was hired to choose colors. Ha, that flowed into other changes. Love everything she's done. Salient fact, I gave her free reign. Total control. A blessing to get out of my own way and let Susanne create magic.

SERENDIPITOUS BEAUTY

Serendipitous Beauty is one of my mission statements. Chinese Snowball blossoms snowing petals, below, 2 days ago in the rain on my Bay Terrace.

Going inside, below, a perfection of Serendipitous Beauty.

Tossing off my hat & setting the umbrella down, inside the door, below, more Serendipitous Beauty.

Jack, below, was attracted immediately to my Serendipitous Beauty for different reasons.

No, I'm not making this up as I go along.

Creating a life of Serendipitous Beauty is a choice.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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She invited me to tour her garden. No, I invited myself. I'm quite rude if I think it's important to see a garden. It was hot. Humid. Bringing us (I was rude enough to invite myself & entourage) inside she offered lemonade. Yes. Walking toward the kitchen she set down her straw hat & straw purse on a table without pausing. Beautiful still life. Without effort. The effluvia of her life was beauty. In that moment I knew. Serendipitous Beauty must effulge in my life too.

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Oh dear, now you know I go into a morning rain wearing my gown, and ugly shoes, taking pics of my garden.

Potent Tool: Repetition

View, below, from a window in the master bath. View, below, from the Garden Room into the lower Woodland Walk.

View, below, from the Music Room into the upper Woodland Walk.

View, below, from the Garden Room onto the Natchez Terrace.

Another view, below, of the Natchez Terrace.

Repetition is a potent landscape design tool. Get you some!

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Azalea 'George Tabor' ensorcells my home, and heart, this spring.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics taken in my garden last Monday.

AKEBIA VINE & SLOW FOOD MOVEMENT

Akebia vine is blooming. Pretty but not showy. It's FRAGRANT. With akebia blooming, I feel like a dear friend has returned. A once a year fragrance, akebia flowers aren't sold during the rest of the year, that I know of.
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Is this what the SLOW FOOD MOVEMENT is about? Creating a sense of drama, desire, appreciation. Skip the eco, carbon, sustainability, la-ti-da.
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Savoring smells, tastes, textures.
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Giving up the world of choice and gaining the world within the fragrance of akebia.
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Akebia quinata - 5 leaf akebia, zone (4)5-8. Plant only 1. They like to have SEX.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

FRAGRANCE OUTSIDE MY WINDOW

Outside my office window, top left, viburnum x burkwoodii are arraigned in white glory. Faithful friend each year. Hearkening spring, honoring winter. Their fragrance seductive, evocative, redolent. My birthday is very soon, ha. When the viburnum blooms I know I've made it another year. Throughout the year, many birthdays as various plants come into peak. My 'real' birthday pales in comparison.
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Blue blossoms near the viburnum? Hydrangea 'Anna Belle' with leftover spray paint. Sometimes being silly in the garden works.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

SNOWS OF SPRING

My garden last spring. I garden for these moments. Designed? Yes. But really, who did the beauty? The unexpected moment? The surprise chair blossoms?

We see chairs glued with leaves, moss etc......for flower shows. This is Mother Nature laughing.

This looks 'natural' but it's completely designed. A backdrop evergreen hedge (camellias), deciduous flowering shrubs (hydrangeas) behind the chair, understory tree (Chinese snowball), a path to the right.

The white petals are from the Chinese snowball (Viburnum macrocephalum).

A PEAK AT MY GARDEN

Wisteria 'Amethyst Falls' near my front door. Round gutter, birdhouse not wall planter. Low maintenance. Many birds have hatched in this house. Sir Walter Scott's garden taught me about the well placed chair. I have lots. In summer I pull this chair to my tub to hold drink/book/umbrella/phone. In winter I pull it into a sunbeam and eat lunch if I'm lucky enough to be home. English daisy was planted by a passing bird.

My woodland walk is what most people in a subdivision call the airconditioning side of the house. See my airconditioner? Fallen branches are used for edging to make the pathway pop. Canopy, understory and groundcovers. Design rules have been followed. 3 rooms overlook this woodland walk.