It's Just A Little Thing at The Coffee Shop Around the Corner

Not a raisin dried in the sun, but a reminder of last year's dream deferred. Still it's important to dream and to work slowly towards something. I haven't been thinking about growing flowers a lot lately, but it's really hard not to think about bulbs this time of year. To begin the dream for a new season.

Brooklyn Grown for 596Acres

 The kids over at 596Acres had their first benefit event and we had a little fun making some small bouquets to add a little color to their tables. I hope they made some dough.

From a Walk in My Dad's Garden (not entirely and for Jane)

The Hosta leaves, their glorious buds, and daylily after the flowers from a walk in my dad's garden, armed with clippers and the permission to cut away. The ammi from the farmer's market in a mad dash by Susan as flowers harvested in a heat wave began to give way. The bouquet from two sides.



This post is part of chain begun by Jane over at Small But Charming. The theme is flowers in houses and from gardens. As Jane so aptly put it, it all starts with a walk in the garden. I could forever be going for walks in gardens. The last bouquet pictured here came from at least four different ones, some steps taken by me and some by Susan.

One From Today

Thankfully my father was willing to donate some hosta buds, so beautiful in that about to open stage, and Susan's friend could part with a few roses. It takes a village it seems to grow one small bouquet. And there were many today.

Yeah I know You're Supposed to Eat Them

but sometimes that feels beside the point. Pictured here, Jen's fire escape chives. I still think everyone ought to have a sweet little box or pot of them.

It's downright ridiculous how many pictures I have of chive flowers. But you know, I've got a thing for the allium flowers. Right now, there are some sweet ones blooming behind a locked fence that I can't get to and drumsticks still to come.

I did manage to nab this lone sweet moly though before the addition of bigger badder lock on the lot.

The Latest Development at the Lot, A Door

There's a door on the fence. Interesting. I've been following development and then stalled development, even the city filling in the construction exvacation and putting up the fence all at this lot for a long time, but this might be the most curious development in a long while. Unless of course you find developing buds and flower a curious thing as well. It looks like the foreclosure has gone through and there's a new owner in town. The question for us is whether or not this one will be likely to consider an interim use for it or whether they have the finances and team in place to build or are just looking to sell to someone who can. I don't know a whole lot about real estate and what the chances are for a new project these days. I know there's a large stalled site a few blocks over at the corner of Eastern and Franklin. Most of the new construction in the area happened during the great housing/development boom, but that doesn't mean that there's no chance for new development on this site. A much smaller development? Some opening buds on glads planted last fall with Susan and Anne.

OMG (as my nieces say)

Should they be saying this? I don't know. But now they've got me saying it because I'm at a loss for other words. Something unexpected just happened. I don't think I'll ever again be quite so happy and surprised to see a bulb about to bloom.

Things Left Behind (at the lot)

Someday in the future, when the foreclosure on this lot is finalized and it is auctioned most likely to make way for new condos with lots of glass, the new developers may find some remnants of a little dream before they bulldoze. Some blooms or my watering can. A shovel. A few bags of cut grass stalks salvaged from a work site meant to be lain as mulch. Right now though, the surrounding neighborhood lives with what's left behind from a shady investment and a stalled development site. Weeds and garbage that not only accumulate in the lot but spill out onto the surrounding pavement. (Even the owners or whoever was in charge of fixing the fence followed suit and left their own garbage behind in the form of the chain they temporarily put up to keep the "non-owners" out before repairing the broken fence.)

I think it would have been nicer temporarily filled with flowers. I'm still holding out hope that some of the perennials we moved in can beat out the mugwort with the help of a thin layer of straw mulch. The thought of those unused bags of grass flower stalks are killing me. If I'd known last Monday what I know now, I might just have been late for work and taken the time to protect those plants a little better. But I thought there was more time.

If It's The End of A Dream

then at least the dream is ending in a bright splash of primary colors up against a red wall. (Something tells me the coffee spot, ( Coffee Bites) up the street isn't afraid of a little color in the vase. It could be their paint job.) Our somewhat mad and exciting experiment with growing flowers locally in Brooklyn in a dusty lot may be at its end. Though we found out only recently that the owner of this stalled construction site is in jail for mortgage fraud, (to the tune of $18 million), it seems someone has locked us out of the lot. Wouldn't you know it, it happened just as we were delivered flats and flats of native plugs (mostly prairie plants) and other drought tolerant species that would relish the space. With so many blooms still being waited on from what's already been planted, it's going to be hard not to find a way back in, if only just to harvest and not to plant and sow as we were getting excited and ready for. I'm having a little trouble adjusting to the cirumstances, though all along I knew it was a very real risk. It will kill me to watch the mugwort and garbage swallow up the plants we have in there, but that just may be the reality we are headed for. I'm pretty sure that though the owner is in prison and the property has been in foreclosure for some time that the lot will sit vacant for a while longer still. I'm going to give myself a week to think about what my next move will be and I think I'm going to need all of it.

Brooklyn Grown flower bouquet

Some Things Wild and Some Things We Grew

Because they're here now.

Trendy Bouquet!

At Duane Reade today, this sign behind some tulip bouquets for sale amused me. "Trendy Bouquet". I'm not sure I've seen bouquets for sale at the pharmacy before, but then again, maybe I'm just not hanging around pharmacies enough to really be in the know. I'm not altogether sure that the sign really means that the pharmacy thinks that bouquets are trending now or if they perhaps mean to say that tulip bouquets are trending because it's spring or if they're perhaps just looking to unload the last of their tulips at some Superbuy! prices. I do however take my cues on the spirit of the times and what I should probably do directly from marketers in pharmacies, so I stopped at the lot we've been planting in on my way home to catch up on what's surviving there and harvest a bit for the coffee shop up the block. I only took enough to fashion some small bouquets, which I'll get around to after I let them chill out a bit in the fridge. I can't gaurantee the bouquets will be trendy though, (my degree isn't in marketing) but I can tell you these blooms were sweetly anticipated.

What Matters

it's what you see and what you dream. The reality is that much of this lot is ridiculously dry and dusty (for now). Susan and I planted last night (some chives, some sea thrift, we think they will handle it) and digging into the ground was something like being in a great dust storm of earlier times, mixed with hitting chunks of brick and cement. Not ideal, in other words. But if you crouch down in certain areas, there are all these amazing bulbs that managed to survive in this most inhospitable place and they are spectacular. I am crazy for this tulip. It is the sweetest yet tough-as-nails thing.

Flowers in the House (of One Wild and Crazy March)

Unfortunately, I am not only late to Jane's Flowers in the House party, I'm also short on flowers in the house because Susan and I have been busy trying to get them in other places. So here is a flowers in the house (of muffins)...

One in the commode (at home, a sweet picking by Joe)

And some in the house (of coffee) up the block. Kind of wishing that they could all be mine to wake up and see tomorrow morning when of all things winter will actually be making an appearance for the year. Not sure I'm so ready yet to be growing these things for other people to enjoy. We didn't think these daffs were going to come up and be the typical yellow (you never know with some bags of bulbs), but now I'm thinking that maybe we don't need to be so quick to dismiss the ordinary as not being worthwhile.

 For Jane's sweet pickings and what's blooming now in Virginia (lilacs already, holy moly), visit Jane at SmallButCharming and follow the links to her fine flower-loving friends too. (Sorry Jane. Next time I'll be sure to remember to save some for home and for me.)

But They Could Be Wild (and that counts for something too)

Tulipa turkestanica, a bouquet all on its own, Brooklyn

There's something about the wild ones, even if they aren't in fact growing in the wild that captures the attention. The tulips above aren't from around here, but as far as I know, they aren't a named cultivar or a hybrid either. They are a straight species, a wildflower, not unlike the bloodroot I saw blooming yesterday at the community garden, just from a different part of the world. They can be found growing in their native mountain ranges (Turkestan, Iran) or in cultivated gardens, and in this photographed case, a stalled construction site in New York City. As a vegetable gardener, it would be hypocritical of me to pretend any kind of strong preference for a "pure" species or for wildflowers. Most things I grow in the vegetable garden have been changed and altered by human selection and breeding over time, and indeed without that human intervention and agriculture's development over the centuries, the world as I know it and the city and civilization I live in just wouldn't exist. Still how can I resist the thrill of seeing these things, those species that have managed to make it to this day on their own terms and in their own lovely way, so to speak, despite all the years that we humans have cultivated and changed plants for our own pleasure and gain?

Of course the tulips above didn't have any say in where they were going to be living out their lives. They were ordered, shipped and planted purposefully. But almost the same thing is true of that bloodroot (Sanguinara canadensis) below too. While this species is a native wildflower, it didn't come up where it is on its own. It was also planted purposefully.)  So these are both wildflowers from different parts of the world that aren't in this particular case wild in any meaningful sense of the word wild, but that didn't make them any less lovely to see in their moment of bloom yesterday.

Three New Small Bouquets (Brooklyn Grown)

Before there were airplanes and refrigerated cars on trains, the modern industry of flowers covered in Amy Stewart's Flower Condifential, there were florists who were flower growers. The beginnings of the industry were not so different from the practice of gardeners bringing in clippings from what they have growing. If you think about it, a really well established garden with a variety of flowering plants and shrubs and evergreens can really provide ample material to bring a little something in from the garden to enjoy inside in every season. I tend to see something beautiful in just about every piece or stage of a plant as I imagine most gardeners do. When I envision this little dream further along, the flower farm, whether it's pieced together through small plots like it is now or in one location, would have a lot in common with a garden. Perennials, evergreens,grasses and shrubs that would come back every year are necessary as well as seeded annuals and herbs for raising yearly. Just like in the vegetable garden, the idea of diversity is important. If it's not going to be organic and it's not going to support pollinators and healthy beneficials and be the kind of place to hunt for native bees or cool insects, in my mind it's not worth doing.

But that's the future. Right now there are three new small Brooklyn Grown bouquets at BlueSky Bakery on 5th Ave in Park Slope, and some fresh-harvested daffodils (they were supposed to be white, but turned out to be yellow) being conditioned in the fridge. We were envisioning the idea of being able to service nearby restaurants and shops with something fresh, local and seasonal, and these little bouquets fit the small tables that are common here in Brooklyn where every inch of space is at a premium. It's just an idea in its beginning stages and there's much work to be done if it is going to be successful in even a small way, but it is crazy fun. Any excuse to grow something, to have a hand on the ground works for me. Now are we gonna get a good rain soon or what?

In Every Moment.

Something.

This is why people garden.

At Blue Sky Bakery

                              Photo by Susan of some Brooklyn Grown bouquets in Blue Sky Bakery

Susan got so excited about making those small bouquets in old bottles and about the idea of making this dream work that she ran out to get some fresh  (and salvaged) lovelies going for her friend Erik over at Blue Sky Bakery  in Park Slope. One sold too, straight off the counter with the baked goods. Can you believe it?

Blue skies and sunny days by the way totally coincide with the growing of flowers (though we need some gray ones for the rain too) and the stuff that comprises the ingredients of bakeries. It's really encouraging to us that a business that cares about the ingredients in their food is excited about our flowers.  It makes us feel that we really are on the right track slowly pursuing our dream. (It's one thing to convince yourself that an idea is good, and seriously you have not read a gazillion emails from me madly trying to convince you on the topic. I need no convincing. It's another thing entirely to have that echoed back to you and really necessary to give you the push you need to move forward. So we owe Erik a great big thanks for that.)

I completely believe that there's a market out there for some small locally grown bouquets.  I guess we're gonna see now if that market is really there or rather if we can find our way to it, and then if we can continue to patch together the space in the sun to get it done properly. We know that people are going to eventually come around to the idea of this old practice of florists being the growers of flowers, just as they are embracing the idea of organic farms or supporting their local foodshed through farmers markets or CSA's. We're just starting out, but the idea is to build something small, something we can care for and grow organically. I had a feeling that those little old bottles would excite Susan, but I had no idea how much.

This post is in celebration. We don't know what the future will bring, but it's important to recognize a milestone. (A book on cycling gave me that fantastic bit of advice.)  In a way, every bouquet is just a celebration of a moment in time; a bloom, a bud, a branch in the life of a plant, so it's fitting.

Some Bits in Old Bottles

Some bits dried from last year but still vibrant. Some branches freshly pruned for practical purposes but saved for the vase. Some heath fresh because it's blooming now. And bottles found on the shore. A real salvager's delight. (Susan is a salvager of things, so I know she had a good time playing around this afternoon and I have a thing for the old and the new.)

I can't count the number of blooming things in Brooklyn right now (mid March! holy cow!), but we are still a little shy of some very eagerly awaited blooms from a dusty lot. We're hoping for some rain, but taking advantage of the insane weather and planting anyway. Today some divided yarrow, sedum and stachys. We know they like it dry, but are they ready for how tough that lot really is? We'll see. Some seeds are germinating inside in cellpacks, and the garbage that's been accumulating awaits tackling. The grand plan is to just keep on going until we cannot anymore. We'll plant some things for harvest, some things to leave be, some for the pollinators and see what comes. It's just a little dream we're following.

ID'ing at the Lot

What to make of this tight rosette? Could it be Common Evening Primrose?

Over at the High Line where plants are left to do their four season thing, it's the beginning of a busy time, spring cutback. (link to the high line's blog post on the cutback beginning) An army of volunteers will be assisting the hort staff over the next six weeks with cutting back grasses and perennials that have been left as is over the winter months in order to make way for this year's emerging shoots. So if you're the kind of person who enjoys getting to know plants in all their stages, the next few weeks are the last opportunity to see what's still standing on the High Line after winter, while the new season is beginning. The practice of waiting for late winter for cutback is cool for a lot of reasons. There's the beauty of course to pay attention to in winter and the invitation to wildlife who might nest or feed during the winter months, but for a beginning gardener there's also the potential for a lesson to be learned about what not to pull out of the early spring garden. Identifying plants by their remaining stalks or earliest stages as a seedling is a useful skill and at least for me, it's a lot of fun to learn.

Over at the lot where we planted bulbs last fall, we are still exploring what has managed to grow in this very disturbed space and we are doing that by observing both dried stalks and young rosettes as well as emerging seedlings. I think the tight rosette pictured above is a young Common Evening Primrose, Oenethera biennis. I don't think it makes a great cut flower, but it's a native plant that will remain as is. If I'm wrong? Well, I'll at least learn what it is for the future. The mugwort below? Well, that's going to have to go. It's a useful plant, but it is a thug.

Back at the Old Lot

When planting in an urban lot, you gotta work with what you've got and it ain't much. But from what's left of last year's growth, the ground, disturbed or disturbing depending on your viewpoint) supports mugwort, goldenrod, some evening primrose, some sweet clover, queen anne's lace, honeylocust saplings and mullein, among other things. No big surprises yet but we haven't explored it fully. For our first planting in the fall, we chose bulbs, thinking that since many come from rocky areas and won't be requiring a whole lot of water or care, they just might make it. Drying stalks of the nearby weeds sufficed as a makeshift mulch and our fingers were crossed for luck. We're still waiting to see what happens. So far, unlike a lot of things this year, no early blooms. Just some sweet green poking out of the ground to let us know these plants are making an effort to survive.