Timber!

See the tree labeled "this tree"? Yup, that one was slated to come down. Bob was insisting that he was going to fell it; I was equally adamant that I wanted him to remain alive (for some obscure reason...) Anyway, I recalled that my riding instructor Maiya had mentioned that her boyfriend Kyle did tree work so I thought to inquire as to whether this tree was within his abilities. He came and looked and we wound up hiring him to take down four trees altogether.

Damn! I missed the felling of the first one as I had gone to the house to retrieve my camera. Oh well. It came down clean and no one was laying on the ground crushed and dying (except the tree...) so that was good. One down and three to go!

This next tree looked nasty as it was a two-trunked monster and as you can see, Bob and Maiya were roped in to helping. The line they're pulling is hooked by a come-along to another tree further out in the swamp. The rope helps guide the tree to fall where you want it to. So while tension is placed on the right hand tree trunk, Kyle can cut it and leave the left half intact without fear of the tree twisting back and snapping. It's all a bit nerve wracking but hey! they knew what they were doing! (Me? I just take pictures and pray...)

Here Bob is demonstrating his ability to tight rope walk along the tree after it came down. Fun! I was just relieved that three trees had fallen and everyone as okay. 

And here's Maiya modeling "appropriate" footwear for logging activities. Yes, she also wears these shoes when we ride Neko. Crazy kids!

And then on to this beauty! The first one we considered having removed and the last to fall. 

Timber! Down he went! And Kyle did a superb job of landing that tree so accurately! This one had a much greater placement problem: it was inside the horse fence and between several ornamental trees (that we did not want to see damaged...) but it landed perfectly. Good job Kyle!

Now Bob has the fun of cutting up the trees for firewood (he likes this kind of activity) and we have loads of firewood to burn, not that we've had much of a winter. But wood for next year! And probably the year after that! Bob and I cleaned up the entire tree in the next two days (all gone! Already burning in our woodstoves!) I have to admit that the removal of this conspicuously dead tree really improved the view of this whole area. It was a tremendous success all around.

Smashy Smashy Bang Bang!

That's me photobombing my own creation.. Round 2 of mosaicing the tree! I had so much fun smashing all those plates! Thank goodness that I work at a facility that not only breaks its share of plates in the moving part of the job, but receives a great deal of already cracked, chipped and busted crockery. The pile I have at home is being sorted...
There are so many small details that accompany this project: assemble all tools, turn on the hose, smash plates (yes, wearing eye protection and gloves and covering plate to be deconstructed with a piece of cloth), sort plates into color coded piles, etc etc. I'm learning so much as I go, too, like smaller bits work much better. On the flat surface of the walk way, larger pieces were possible as they didn't have to defy gravity. going up the side of the tree- and around the curved surface!- presents a whole slew of logistical issues. I'm having fun!

Here's a closer read of the color. As noted previously, this particular tree will be in the reds/oranges/pinks range. The yellow above is actually gold from the rims of some really nice dishes- extra glittery! Trying to keep the integrity of the plate design has proven challenging. I'm happy with the abstracted quality as I'm not looking to be pictorial but some of the plates seem to expand on application and the image gets a bit diffuse. Luckily, my early efforts are at the base of the tree and will be semi-obscured buy the asters that grow in this particular garden area. But it all looks pretty great!
For those additionally interested in my inspirations, you only have to look up Antoni Gaudi, Park Guell, Watts Towers, Maison Picassiette, or Le Palais Ideal. Amazing!!

The Biggest Tree We'll Ever Plant

Just be glad that I didn't write the blog I was starting yesterday! A hint: the title was "A Bad Mood". Enough of that! Today was great and my mood matched it because Bob and I bought a tree! That's it, wrapped up looking like some giant dildo and eliciting stares as we drove home.

 I have been researching and shopping for a clump of birches, partly because I have always admired them and partly because we have all this empty space cheerfully provided by that tornado that visited. We needed shade and a feature to partially block our neighbor's house and a focal point. I wanted something jazzy that had several seasons of interest. I really like the very white birches but have been warned that they succumb to all kinds of borers and leaf miners and they're brittle and they break. So I turned up several cultivars of Betula nigra (River birch, more familiarly) with the varieties "Duraheat" (lousy name!) and "Cully's Heritage" being recommended as particularly attractive with extra exfoliating bark- bronzey golden brown that peels to reveal salmon pink and creamy under bark, with foliage that turns vivid yellow in the fall. After many trips and phone calls to nurseries, I found what I was looking for...

It was a lovely day, we took a pleasant drive to one of our favorite nurseries and... they didn't have the size we were looking for, despite it being mentioned on a "specimens list" that had been emailed only the week before. All that was available were gigantic and twice what we were looking at spending. Alas! But another employee at the nursery checked and located one that was about to be "upgraded" and graduated to more expensive status as it had grown so lustily this year. She sold it to us for the lower price (literally like 1/2 the price!) Hooray!!!

They wrapped this cluster up and helped to load it and suddenly it appeared like twice as big as it had. I was shopping for a (hahahaha) five or six foot individual and we got us a ten foot tree at a bargain price and I started thinking, "And now we have to get this sucker home and plant it". I'm certain Bob was having similar thoughts. It just looked bigger and bigger and bigger.
As you can see in the above pictures, it rode home quite happily and we got it off the truck intact- or I should say, BOB got it off the truck with ropes and gently inching it towards the planks he posted at the rear of the truck and slid it down. I dutifully held ropes and pulled on my side but nothing budged; I tried.
But I sent Bob into the house after he wrestled the tree onto the ground. He needed a rest and I could handle the next phase: digging the biggest hole I've ever dug. I have graduated from annuals to perennials to shrubs and bushes and small saplings to trees! (But I assured Bob: this IS the biggest tree we will ever plant.)

And here's my lovely assistant Robin, ideally suited to helping me dig. She did a marvelous job of loosening the soil so that I could shovel it onto the pile.

The pile got even bigger than that! Bob is going to finish the hole tomorrow and then we're going to plant. I'll post additional pictures of that Herculean task. But in the meantime, take a look at the detail of this bark. This particular clump is nice, too, as it has four trunks and will create a really remarkable presence in the vast empty wilderness left by the tornadoes destruction. Why, it will probably look like it was always here. Let's see if our friends notice it the next time they visit!

Enough! Enough!

On my way out the door to work this morning, there was a gigantic swooooosh! noise which startled Bob and me and Robin. We glanced out the back door but saw nothing and figured it was probably the town crew as they're delivering dump trucks full of gravel to the excavation at the end of our road. I didn't think any more about it.
But about an hour later, Bob called me at work to explain that he had figured out the noise. As if we hadn't had enough tree damage, the second half of a giant oak that had been damaged in the tornado (remember that episode) let loose. That was the giant swoooshing sound.

The final punchline to this new and updated disaster is that the tree catapulted earthward crushing another section of our fence and landing smack in the middle of my Shade Garden. This is the very Shade Garden that I strolled by yesterday- while swatting gnats and mosquitoes away- admiring just how nice it was and thinking how lucky that at least one part of our property had been spared in the tornado! Hahahaha! The joke is on me!
So Bob sprang into action and sawed up most of the large pieces before I got home so that we could correctly assess the extent of the devastation.  Here's Robin looking for bodies: (You will notice the bent and mutilated fence behind Robin. Bob straightened it so Robin can't escape but it's nicely twisted!)

Fortunately, while there is crushed foliage and general chaos, none of the rhododendrons or oak leaf hydrangea were totaled: just wrecked enough that they'll look awful for the rest of the season. And there are plenty more twigs/sticks/branches/leaves to pick up! Oh joy! Just what I wanted to do! More clean up! (And don't even ask about the leafy juicy things like hostas...)

I'm not kidding: I didn't need more restoration work! This part of the garden had been my solace after the other parts spent the early summer being cleaned and returned to "normal". I guess I have to be grateful that Bob or Robin or I weren't standing underneath when that half a tree let go. But can we please have an end to tree destruction?!?!!?

Upcoming Oklahoman Birthday

Doesn't that look like somewhere else... as in, "not Connecticut"? As previously reported, we had the dead and dying trees cut off at around 10 feet as we have a PLAN. (Oh just you wait...) Anyway, I have taken to calling our backyard "Oklahoma" (as in: "OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOk-lahoma where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain...") because the ground is flat and parched and there are no trees on the left hand side. I expect to see oil derricks sprouting. It's pretty bleak, especially as  it's been so god-awful hot and dry.
Here's a really hard to decipher close up of the (above) blue walkway:

Those are all ants, swarming on the mosaic. It was kind of gross, but really interesting. I don't know exactly what they were up to, but there is still a good deal of saw dust on the walkway from the tree removal episode so maybe they were eating sawdust. It's hard to describe how many there were.
But returning to the subject of flat, parched, barren landscapes, I am interested to see what happens with all the available space I now have in the backyard. While I was at work on Friday, industrious Bob picked up/rolled off and carted away the remaining giant logs that littered our lawn. There is a clear path through to the horse fence (and large heaps of attendant brush). As mentioned, the upside is more room for planting things! I am contemplating a sort of mini-conifer border. Sort of like this, but on a more modest scale:

A screen shot from the Iseli Nursery website. They're in Oregon and grow some pretty spectacular things. It's the stuff of my dreams...

I should probably make a field trip there some day, like visiting Mecca if you're a believer. Well, I'm a believer in Nature and plants!
So I have been starting my coniferous adventures recently. Here's a "De Groots' Spire" that Bob and I purchased at (of all places) Home Depot. You know how I like those tall pointy things!

This puppy grows only a foot wide but eight feet tall. Ooooooooooooooooh! I like that! We also bought a half-price juniper plumosa aurea in Vermont when we were there last weekend. (I hijacked Bob and made him go to the Home Depot in Bennington. They had a great selection- all 1/2 price! I wish we'd had a trailer!) And a word to all family members who may be getting me "living things" for my rapidly approaching birthday: I did NOT purchase anything on the lists of plants I provided. Rest assured, any and all birthday offerings are welcome!!

The Tree Guys Cometh

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayy!! The tree guys finally came to liberate the house from the precarious leaners and to cut down several other potential threats. They wedged a large truck in between the house and the vegetable garden- a tight fit!- and went to work. We found this most exciting!

This is from a slightly different angle, safely out of the way, showing the trees still on the roof and the other ones standing. (I'm inserting more pictures than typical in this post as how often do you have men in buckets swarming your house and trees??!!)

Here's a reminder of how dangerous these things were.

Going up! There were two tree guys: one went up in the bucket and hauled all the aerial stuff down. The other guy admitted to being glad he no longer went up in the bucket as he was afraid of heights; he has company there!

You couldn't pay me! Especially wielding a crazy chain saw!

They had to work together to rope and brace the tree that was leaning on the roof to the other tilted tree and cut off and lower chunks down (carefully!). They were really good at this. Only a modest chip happened to the end of our walkway and no shrubs or trees were harmed (A couple of perennials got driven over but there was no way to avoid that. And a whole lot more damage would have occurred if those trees had fallen on us or the garden!) I mean, this is a heavily gardened area and I'm relieved that I can get in there and weed and plant.

Half gone! You have to appreciate that that bucket is a good twenty feet up! Yikes!

Here they are from the other side, attacking the dead/dying row of pines and spruces. Yes, they were cool trees- looking all skeletal and "Californian" but they did prove dangerous.

Last one standing!! Our house does need a repair. (That's the next project...) It only took a couple of hours total and everything looked...

Oh no! It looked just like after the tornado!!

And... everywhere you look... more branches! More limbs! More cleanup!!!

And with all that work to look forward to, I don't know what Bob was so happy about! (Probably the very excellent fact that we no longer live in danger and we can get the house repaired and WE didn't have to remove the trees and risk life and limb!!)

We felt like such "homeowners", an unusual feeling for us. We traditionally do all our own work; quite interesting to be on the other end and hire people. I could get used to it! (Hahhaahha!!)

Almost Ready

(Yeah, that's Tilda Swinton (again). She keeps popping up, this time on our ceiling. Don't ask.)
I'm almost ready to begin working in my studio again. Almost. I have loads of ideas, which I have been jotting down on envelopes and bits of scrap paper at work but I haven't been (seriously) in my studio for three weeks. I entered last Thursday and cracked my skylights and opened a window but just wasn't feeling it. And then my muses growled at me so I went out to do some gardening instead.
I guess it makes total sense. I worked so hard, doing three shows this late Winter and Spring, I know my artistic muscles just need a break. And it's been a good and well deserved vacation!
I know I've suggested that we artists are not factories and there is truth in that. But we do get asked (constantly) to "show only your newest and bestest work". Whatever!
So I'm obviously brimming over with new ideas (Womp Womp) and entertaining possible type-faces and fonts in my mind, but I'm not committing anything to fabric yet. I'm also toying with the next artist's book which will be an intense contemplation on income disparity. Lots to ponder there!
The other thing that's been keeping me going and making me happy (besides Bob and Robin and even cranky lame ol' Maggie) is gardening. Yes, we suffered mighty set backs from that blasted tornado paying an unwelcome visit, but every few days brings another load of logs removed from yet another garden bed and more liberated lawn. My shoulders ache tonight, but it was refreshing to be able to walk directly across the yard and not have to take an enormous detour around the felled giant of a pine tree. Hooray for Bob and the new chain saw!
I know it's obvious, but boy do I love plants and gardening. I have been constructing a birthday wish list and it's all plant material. I think I suddenly discovered all the cool colors and shapes that conifers come in: lumps! bumps! comes! shafts! pyramids! blobs! pancakes! It's exhilarating. I am especially drawn to round mounds this early summer. Maybe I've explored tall narrow forms enough for a while and realize I have no mounded evergreens at all. And space! I do have more space to play with now that those trees have fallen... endless possibilities.
Wish us luck.. The tree removal men are due on Wednesday. I don't even remember what the house looks like with trees resting on it. And we have a spectacular idea in store for the stumps... stay tuned!

Nice Pictures

I don't know; maybe it's because it's too awful to contemplate the level of destruction and mayhem that has been visited upon our garden but it seems really hard to get "good" pictures. In this shot, you can see the magnolia was spared (thanks for something!) but that's my garden under all those reclining monster tree carcasses! And while I'm eternally grateful that bob and I and Robin and Maggie are okay, our yard and property are definitely not okay!
And as anyone who knows me knows, my garden is very important to me!!

Large sections of our yard look like this. Like Bob said, it's hard to know even where to begin cleaning up. Our friend Joe came over today and helped chain saw away a tree that crashed through the fence next to our neighbor's house and remove another large oak that fell near Bob's studio so that we can drive debris down and make a giant pile (or ten) in the woods behind Bob's studio.

So we have some damage to the house in the back. The storm didn't entirely crush our house- like some unfortunate neighbors!- but we can't get the tree down even with the skilled assistance of talented friends. The insurance people have been notified. We'll see what happens there. I know (and have been warned) that insurance "adjusters" will try and save the company money and try and get out of paying for damages as much as possible. But we're tenacious and I am making a list of all my plants and shrubs that were smashed. I have quite a lot of valuable plant material that is not salvageable!
How about one more?

This is a perfectly healthy spruce that was uprooted and toppled in Maggie's pasture. Poor Maggie was totally freaked out and has spent the last three days sort of hanging out in her barn. We removed a couple of smaller trees that fell in her auxiliary grazing area so that she could get out and graze as she's blocked by the above monster from the lower field. What a mess!

A Little Tornado, Anyone?

Yes, just your average glance out the studio window to see how Mother Nature has arranged your yard and trees in a charming- and unexpected- manner! This is just the first picture and posting of many to come, that document how messed up life at the BobnRita Ranch are.
Fortunately, Bob and I and the Dog and Pony Show are all fine. Robin thinks the backyard disaster is sorta fun (lots of trees to jump over/climb on/root around under) but Maggie seems exhausted and still freaked out (she was outside during the storm and was lucky to not get crushed by falling trees! Her barn was spared but she didn't want to be inside.)
More later, but that'll get you started. Hint: this is no where near the worst of the damage. I can't even look at the rest of the pictures now. Our garden is somewhere under a pile of giant trees.

Spring Break!

Bob and I took a short but well deserved trip to the New York Botanical Garden today. We went to deliver more of Bob's fabulous metal work to the garden shop there, but they give us passes so we spend the day wandering around in a state of horticultural bliss. The weather cooperated handsomely and we got thoroughly oxygenated and made new friends. That's me with a new friend in the picture above. I have always had a soft spot for those tall narrow conifers...

Another fine fellow with a curious question mark of a top.

Look at that one! Bob spotted this charmer off in the distance. You have to laugh at some of these specimens. Here's another one:

Sort of a scrappy fellow! But it's surrounded- and honestly upstaged- by the lovely daffodils blooming behind it. There are daffodils everywhere. And entire hillside blanketed by what must really be a million blooming all at once. It smells intoxicating, too.

Here's a variety I particularly liked. It's apparently a very old type called "Seagull" (I guess you could have just read the tag...) that I'll be looking to add to my lilac/daffodil collection this fall. I did develop a real hankering for those white narcissus...
And look at this:

There are these amazing, magnificent blooming cherry trees all over the Botanical Garden. Huge old specimens with gnarly trunks and weeping over rocks; it's quite breath taking.
We had a fun and relaxing day and managed to get only minorly lost on our way home.

Will This Winter Never End?!

We were eating breakfast, happy to have survived the Stormageddeon or Snow-pocalypse or Bombacyclone Megawetsnowiliciousness, when the phone rang. Bob was informed that the steel delivery truck was at the end of the driveway but his steel couldn't be delivered because there was a tree down. Bob went out to investigate and returned to tell me that two trees were down, all carefully coated in heavy wet snow.

This is the other side. Equally blocked! The steel (unfortunately) took a return ride back to Bridgeport, to be delivered on another day and Bob went to work with the chain saw.

This is the other, smaller cherry tree that cracked. It's sort of too bad as this one had a decorative sweep over the driveway and Bob liked it. This one cleaned up quickly as it wasn't all choked with vines and snow like the above cedar tree.
We were busily sawing and lopping (I chopped up the entangled vines and hauled limbs away) when our neighbor Meghan made a guest appearance and went to work helping drag debris off the driveway. She's been a really good friend in times of need- like when we first moved in and had major ice dams on our roof, causing leaking and general havoc. She pitched right in and held the ladder and called her father, who worked for the utility company to find out what we should do. Meghan called her father again today (and he's in Arizona where it's 85 degrees...) to ask about a branch that is (still) hung up in a tree at the side of the driveway. He said be careful. We're not going to mess with that and will call the utility company.
In the meantime we- maybe surprisingly- still have power and I was able to drive out to the store after lunch. It was slushy but passable and the road were clear. Several people have mentioned that we may get another storm on Monday next week. Where is spring?!?!?