A noun. A verb. A blog.
Snowed in – psychologically, if not physically? Let me take you away from all this! Click any image for a slideshow getaway. After seeing the wonderful pool our neighbours S & B created in the back yard of a (relatively) small, east-end semi-detached home, I know that even snowbound Torontonians like us can benefit from ideas […]
A post-Christmas celebration of some of Nature’s busiest creatures, bees and bumblebees (and wasps) in the great big Apidae family. Let’s recognize how essential pollinators like bees are to our planet. Please join me in a wish that human bee-ings do everything in our power to serve and protect them in 2018 and beyond. Click any image for the full-size slideshow.
I could give you a play-by-play, but on an almost-Wordless Wednesday I’ll just say this about why I love them: Inventive plant combos, cool containers and display ideas, great scale (from very-very big to very-very small), a mix of enthusiasm (by some) and restraint (in others), and steal-worthy ideas. All seen in the mild climes of Virginia, Maryland […]
An almost-wordless Wednesday post from my photo archives – in the days when I could shoot these things freehand, simply by breathing out and holding my breath. My hands aren’t quite as steady without a tripod today. Blame the heavy lens. No idea what the bee species is, but it was really getting into the […]
I love the asymmetrical. Something in the balance of off-balance appeals to me deeply. Yet, the perfect order of a four-square courtyard can also be satisfying, don’t you think? This garden, with its European-style courtyard, has been calling to me for more than two years. We saw it back in September 2014 on a story tour with the […]
Before the rain began this morning, our walking group headed west for a change. The Distillery District would be our turnaround point, but I never made it that far. Corktown Common and a golden patch of flowering witch-hazel fixed me and my phone camera to the spot. Click the arrows above for the slideshow. What an excellent […]
Have you seen the Chihuly glass exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum? I have been meaning to go since it opened, and I’m glad to hear they’ve extended it till January 8, 2017. (Looking up ticket prices this week, I learned you can get a good price by combining it with the Wildlife Photographer of the […]
On Remembrance Day, we remember all who served and sacrificed – and who survived – with the symbol of the red corn poppies that bloomed on the fields of Flanders after the First World War. None of these are corn poppies. Some are Oriental poppies, some are Iceland or opium poppies. Some are perennial, some, […]
Think of this as a late-blooming “Wordless Wednesday” – a visual, almost-silent* paeon to the glories of the late-July garden. These are all from the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum, viewed on banquet day at the Minneapolis Fling. I’m not even going to name the flowers, but you can ask in the comments if you’re interested. Just […]
Herding 60 cats bloggers into our Minneapolis Fling group shot in the sunken garden of the Marjorie McNeeley Conservatory in Saint Paul’s Como Park meant we ran out of time to do Como Park’s Japanese Garden justice. At least, I felt so. But all was not lost. Perhaps it’s the dry shade in me, but I heard the sunlit waterlilies […]
I’m really going to let the pictures do most of the talking here. This garden was a revelation from the recent Minneapolis Garden Bloggers Fling (we hosted this event in Toronto in 2015). “Revelation” in many senses – it was surprising, moving, inspiring, and we all revelled in it! My “If I had a Million […]
On Wednesday, Sarah and I were thrilled to enjoy a Tweetup in the Ancaster garden of Country Gardener blogger and garden author Yvonne Cunnington, joined by Hamilton Tweeter Tricia of @ycswid. It was just a few days after Yvonne hosted a garden tour, so every inch was pristine. However, my sense is that “pristine” is […]