Three Years Ago

Three years ago, while Cindy was undergoing chemotherapy treatment for cancer, some of our friends from the San Diego County Garden Guild invaded our front yard and weeded, pruned and planted new plants to cheer her up.  I thought I had written about that visit on this blog, but found that the post was on the Caring Bridge website instead.  She's feeling great now and able to garden again, but seeing how good the front garden still looks three years later reminded me of that difficult and very stressful period in our lives, and how a random act of caring and kindness by our friends meant so much to us at that time.  So here's that original post, and, thank you again, Garden Elves.  

A Visit From The Garden Elves 

Journal entry by Kay Teeters — Jan 26, 2017

Cindy had her third infusion of the Red Devil chemo on Tuesday, and while we were gone some of her gardening friends (with a little collusion from me) descended on our house to spruce up the bee and butterfly garden in our front yard, which was very much in need of some attention.  With all the rain we have been having the weeds had begun to spring up through the mulch; the roses always need pruning at this time of year and the Bougainvillea was so overgrown that it was threatening to take over the entire side of the house.  We knew all this needed to be done, but it seemed like such an overwhelming job that we just couldn't face it.

So the Garden Elves arrived, weeded, pruned, planted, raked and disappeared before we got home. I was debating whether to tell Cindy about it, but while we were on our way home a neighbor sent her a text telling her how nice the garden looked, so I had to explain what was going on--I had been biting my tongue for weeks to avoid spilling the beans and spoiling the surprise.  As it was, she had to wait until the next morning to see it in the daylight--she was like a kid on Christmas eve waiting to see the surprise.  It was a huge job, but it looks great, Cindy loves it and so do the birds, bees and butterflies.  See the photos by Jodi Bay in the Gallery section.  Thank you, Garden Elves! 

And here are some photos of how the bee and butterfly garden looks three years later.

Bee & Butterfly Garden

I Love Lavender, And So Do The Bees

Succulents Spilling Out

Grevillea?  Or Maybe Cousin It?  

Aaron's Beard

Lantana Looking Good

In The Time of Plague...

Giovanni Boccaccio's book The Decameron, according to Wikipedia, "is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales told by seven young women and three young men sheltering in a villa just outside Florence to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city."

It won't be anything close to the classic Decameron, but I though I could amuse at least myself during this period of "social distancing" by reviving my neglected garden blog and telling a few tales of gardening during the current virus plaguing the world.

Fortunately, gardening is an activity that can be done alone, and if you're a vegetable gardener, it's pretty much a full time occupation, so Cindy is outside right now planting carrots and lettuces.  She won't harvest them for many months, but it does get us looking ahead, toward the future, and whatever the future brings, we'll have something to eat.



Edited to add--It's not my intention to minimize the terrible struggle Italy is having with this deadly and highly contagious disease, but to show that there are positive things we can do while we are responsibly slowing or halting the spread of the disease.