Am I Blue?

Oh yes, I am.

This is part of my mother's day present. It's Hydrangea "Endless Summer." I love the purply-blue flowers. It's probably not as utterly beautiful as "Nikko Blue," but Nikko doesn't bloom reliably in my climate zone.

I love blue flowers almost as much as I love pink. In fact, in my former garden I had so many blue flowers that bloomed in the spring that the whole effect was a little somber from a distance. I had meant it to all bloom with some lemon yellow daylilies, but the flowers had their own ideas about when they'd show up.

This is a Siberian iris. It's much more purple than this picture shows and I'm pretty sure it's one called "Caesar's Brother." It's quite tall -- about 40 inches -- and very elegant with long, slender stems and these softly architechtural blooms that seem to float above the foliage. In my old garden, these bloomed with the first flush of roses and I grew them in full sun. In my new home, these were a pleasant surprise, found growing in dappled shade.

Another blue, though more in the category of excellent background notes is Hosta Sieboldiana "Elegans." This was one I planned to take from my old garden but my husband accidentally killed mine with Spectracide. I was debating whether or not to just buy another one when two huge ones popped out of the ground next to our new deck. What an unexpected pleasure that was.

It's been raining here for days and days and Sunday I went out and shot some water droplet pictures of these hostas. Man, there is nothing like a really beautiful plant, beautifully grown. These massive babies (they're 3 feet across and nearly 3 feet high) make my heart happy.

I've been missing my old garden a lot this spring and I seem to be unable to get a grip on what I'd like to do with this space, especially since my husband tosses out these caveats from time to time, like "No trellises!" and "Nothing with thorns!", which make it hard for me to know what direction to take things. Then, too, having a dirt-eating toddler around is kind of a deterrent to digging and planting and generally making any kind of progress at all. At least I have a few things that soften my loss.

And it all Unravels

Today is a classic scenario that reinforces my extremely anal approach to children and sleep:

Kids go to baseball game. Kids end up being out until 10:15. Kids finally wind down and fall asleep between 10:45 and 11:oo p.m. Parents end up staying awake until 11:30. Baby wakes parents at 6 a.m. Other children must be awakened by 7:15. Crabbiness commences.

Oldest daughter has minor meltdown in car because mother won't allow her to make thank you cards for her teachers this morning. She asks to make said cards as she is getting in the van to go to school.

Middle child conducts reign of terror in grocery store, annoying baby until she screams like a tortured rabbit. Then son shoves shopping cart into mother's abdomen and seriously endangers his chances of remaining in family. Mother has a little repent-and-be-saved talk with boy which involves a number of dire threats.

Baby engages in "piling on" whereby she screams at the mother repeatedly "CAN I WALK? CAN I WALK? CAN I WALK?" after which she attempts a suicidal leap from the shopping cart, which mother is fortunately able to thwart before any head injuries result.

Mother's head begins to pound like it's riddled with jackhammers. Mother calls Father and tells him that if he ever takes the children out late again he will be taking the follwing day off to deal with them as the mother hereby abdicates.

And that's just the morning. No doubt the fun will only increase when oldest child gets home from school.


These kids are so going to bed at 7 tonight. All of them.

Just a Reminder...

Hubby took the two older children to a baseball game tonight and I was quivering with anticipation -- what would I do with 2 child-free hours once I got the baby to bed? Then I wandered downstairs and remembered:

Clean the kitchen.

And as that thought was sinking in, I heard a beeping upstairs.

Oh yeah, and fold laundry.

Just 'cause they're gone doesn't mean I get to loaf around. And round about 9 when I'm thinking about a little spin on the treadmill while I watch 48 Hours, I'll probably be reading to one of my little sleep-resisters instead. Ah well.

Like one little baseball game was going to rescue me from my eternal crusade against dirty clothes and dishes. Ha!

A Moment of Serious Reflection

Not even sure how to write about what's been on my mind all weekend. When I read that Steven Curtis Chapman's youngest daughter had been killed in a tragic accident, my first thought was "nonononononono," or something equally indicative of total denial.

Because it is unthinkable, to lose a child. And to lose a child like that, at the hands of a family member, magnifies the tragedy to epic proportions. What they must feel, the anguish of loss, the self-recrimination, the guilt that so often goes hand-in-hand with this parenting gig, the desperate, desperate desire to just rewind that day and have their little one restored to life, and the terrible certainty that had they just done something different, it wouldn't have happened at all -- however untrue that feeling might be.

This same thing happened to a woman I was attending a Bible study with about 5 years ago: her husband was moving some brush on their property with a mini-front loader and backed over their 3 year old son, killing him instantly. They were interviewed for a newspaper article about a year ago, an article that profiled several families in our state who have been victims of this kind of accident -- something that happens with frightening frequency -- and they said that they will never be the same, though they believe their little one is with God. There is a hole in their family that is always there, and as their other children get older and larger, that child, who will be forever 3, is as much present in their thoughts as the ones who are playing soccer and performing in dance recitals.

And I imagine the Chapman's teenaged son, who was driving the SUV that struck her, feels like his life is over. His burden will be a heavy one, and there will be no easy way to lighten it save time itself. This is what makes me really wish Life gave Mulligans -- just the odd do-over from time to time. How much sadness would be saved if we could just take back a minute or two here and there.

Life is, as they say, alarmingly fragile. And we are all too apt to take it for granted, completely forgetting how an instant can change things forever.

Hug your babies today. Read to them. Enjoy the 6,000th bath you're giving them. Treasure their goofy faces and silly sayings. Oddly, it was Steven Curtis Chapman who wrote about the "miracle of the moment" -- each one is a gift and it's by no means certain we'll have as many of them as we think.

Learning Something New Every Day

Middle child completed his last year of preschool this week, and I went to his end-of-year celebration fully expecting to come out of it a sobbing, blithering wreck. This did not happen.

It threatened to happen -- the kids have been learning bell-ringing all year and their big finale at the celebration was "Friends Forever" by Michael W. Smith, which always chokes me up, no matter how it's played. If you hummed it loud enough I'd probably have tears in my eyes by the second chorus. Anyway, I was getting a little dewy around the eyes already when they put on the DVD of the preschool year -- a big retrospective of pictures set to music which has, in the past, been responsible for my rather embarrassing display of emotion. But this year, the pictures were set to such cool, peppy music, I found it impossible to cry.

The artist was a fusion of Paul Simon, James Taylor and REM and the music was funny, quirky, totally kid appropriate and kid accessible (my baby loves the whale song) yet so adult in its listenability (not a word, I know, but I can't think of a better one). I have a clear tolerance for Raffi (about 1 hour) and the Wiggles make me uncomfortable (they're just so....odd) so here are two very good videos by Justin Roberts. This guy rocks.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Realizing, of course, that I have just irrevocably dated myself with that reference, I still think it's appropriate for my Friday of Freedom.

Okay, I didn't steal my dad's classic car and drive all over Chicago with it, but I did get to shop for a good portion of the day, which is really the mommy equivalent. Also I got to go to the mall ALONE. WITHOUT KIDS. BY MYSELF.

And I am here to tell you that when you are ALONE, you can actually have thoughts. Long, connected thoughts about what you're doing and how you're going to do it. You can wonder how much something costs and then remember to check the price tag. It's true: children are a serious inhibitor of rational thought. I've always suspected this, but only in a a sort of dim, nebulous way because my trains of thought never go anywhere when the kids are with me. You know, you have a hunch that you're not making a bucket load of sense, but it's hard to confirm over the chorus of "MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY!" By the time you get everyone to shut up, you forget what it was you were worried about.

So I went, I shopped, I thought, I did what I wanted to do and it was blissful and invigorating and entirely too short.

And my husband says he doesn't see why I can't have a day off every month. Every month.

I knew there was a reason I married him.

Chapter 40, In Which My Husband Gets a Clue

It only took 11 years of marriage, 3 kids and 8 or 9 complete mental breakdowns, but my husband is taking Friday off so that I can have A MOMMY VACATION.

The prospect of an entire day -- not just an hour or two stolen from the regular schedule -- is dizzying. I am trying to make a list so I can do all the stuff I've been wishing I could do but never seem to be able to get childcare for. I think I am going to flee the house about 8:30ish and then I am free as a bird until dinnertime.

My hubby, on the other hand, has to make breakfast, take oldest child to school, drop the other two at grandma's, go back to school for Read With Me time, pick the other two up, take them home, feed them lunch, get middle child ready for preschool and usher him out the door when the carpool arrives, put baby down for nap, unstack dishwasher, prepare for baby's awakening (snack and video), meet middle child when carpool delivers him, get snack ready for oldest child, load everyone in van, pick up oldest child at school, take everyone to allergist and then get everyone home for dinner.

Throw in an unexpected visit to the doctor, 2 loads of laundry and 3 phone calls while you're trying to relax and that's about my day.

My head is whirling. What am I going to do?

Color Me Frustrated

Here's my garden right now.

And let's not forget this:


I am so annoyed with the weather, my new site, the trees. You name it, it's bugging me right now.


I had intended, by this point in the growing season, to be preparing my beds for new plants. Instead, thanks to the crappy weather, I still have 9 bags of rose cuttings living in my house. I also have no clear idea where I'm going to put them once it actually warms up to the point where they can be planted out.


I have spent some weeks observing our lot and determining where the light falls and for how long so I will know where to plant things. As a result of all this cogitation, I have come to the conclusion that I don't have enough room for all the plants I want to put in.

This, you understand, is a serious problem for the gardener.


Today I gingerly approached my husband about expanding the bed in the front of the house, the only one that really gets full sun. This expansion would add about a foot of depth all along the bed, making it about 5 feet deep and 15 feet long in full sun with an additional 10 feet in partial sun. The 10 foot strip along the walk would be 3 feet deep. This is pretty skimpy, in my mind, since my last flowerbed was 35 feet long and 5-6 feet deep. It's hard not to feel cheated, or at the very least, peevish.


The real issue here is that the current bed is bounded on one side by a short retaining wall. It's not more than 3 stones high, but moving it (and constructing a new wall) is not something I can do alone. I'm not even sure it's something I can do without some fairly precise help. And naturally, it's not something that my husband thinks is really possible right now. He said, and I quote, "maybe next summer."


Next summer? Is he kidding?


I want to get that bed going NOW. It's the only place I can really grow roses and clematis and daylilies and knautia and siberian iris and all the good stuff that I am missing so badly.
He just doesn't get it. I am enduring the first spring without daffodils since 1994. I will lose my mind if I have to go without roses and peonies and sedums and..and...


I think I may cry.


In my head I'm trying to sort out what, if anything, I am going to be able to do strictly by myself this year. In my old garden I did all the work -- all the digging, edging, planting, watering, etc. Of course, I was 10 years younger and had no kids, so my time was entirely my own and my body was a lot more cooperative. I am going to have to think carefully and figure out what can be done in 60-minute increments (nap time) that won't actually put me in traction.


Also I'm going to have to figure out whether I really can wait on that front bed or whether I can finagle it somehow. Hire the work out? Maybe I should get a bid from someone.


Here's what I'm missing:

Papaver "Princess Victoria Louise"

Allium "Globemaster." Behind them is Austin rose "The Prince" and some "Husker Red " penstemmon.

Allium "Moly"

Peony I inherited from my grandmother. It's probably 60 years old; maybe older.

Austin Rose "Mary Rose" always first to bloom and last to quit in my garden.

Austin Rose "Kathryn Morley" not much scent, but blooms like masses of petticoats.

Austin Rose "Abraham Darby:" Probably my favorite, with huge, luscious blooms and a sweet, fruity scent that make you want to swoon. The color, which you can't really see here, is a gorgeous pink-coral-yellow blend that I adore.

Clematis Jackmanii --and oldie but soooo good.

How can I wait until next summer for this?