Today I went into the Bean Scene in St. George to get a Pomegranate Green Tea, and I picked up some compost gold for my garden. Their coffee grounds are rich and fresh, they use unbleached filters; which are a great addition to the garden, and they give me a bucket full for my compost pile whenever I go.

I mix the grounds with my neighbor, Maas’, horse manure from horses fed certified weed free hay. Then I mix it all up with my kitchen scraps and anything I’m trimming in the garden. The result is Garden Gold.

Already this year I’m harvesting sweet Buttercrunch lettuce, and the roses are as bright and fragrant as ever.

This one is next to the gate on the way to the shop and it is such a treat to see and smell every day. I love the smell of fresh earth when I turn the compost pile, and can’t wait to see the results of the garden when the corn and tomatoes are ripening in the summer. So glad to be getting my hands dirty again, and feasting on real veges from the garden.

I’m so excited today to have baby chicks again! It’s been a few years. We used to buy 25 at a time, and then let the mama’s brood every year so we always had chicks in the Spring.

I got up early and went to the feed store so I wouldn’t miss the good picks. I got a couple of Silver Wyandottes, and a couple of Auracanas. And a little buff that I don’t remember her type, but she’s beautiful.

They’ll live in my studio for a couple of weeks so I can keep an eye on my sidekick!!

I just finished a new stained glass cross in some bold and beautiful complimentary colors, and really like the way the light bounces through it. Just enough bold mixed with subtle and soft to catch the eye.

We will be selling this weekend at the Farmer’s Market in St. George; Ancestor Square, and I hope someone sees it as a great Easter meditation. The pattern describes it’s design as Art Deco meets Southwest, and I thought that was appropriate.

I have also created some small 3″ x 4″ suncatchers in transparent clears, bronze, red, and some pale greens. They have elements of nature embossed in them including, trees, flowers and leaves.

Now I am inspired to create more embossed pieces and dishes with the “sorbet hues” I just read about on Rena Tom’s blog “Strategy for Creative Businesses” . The article is “A Scoop of Sorbet” by Chloe Douglas.

My niece, Lena, has such a passion for life. I love her descriptive writing and want to share her story about success.

Follow Lena’s blog and enjoy.

My friend and neighbor Colleen Kohler, shared her expertise in agriculture with me for many years as we raised chickens, gardens, and kids together. My yard never looked so good, as it did in the days when Colleen lived close by. She shared seeds, starts, bulbs and advice with me on a weekly basis. Colleen’s parents came for several weeks in the winter from the cold country of Idaho, and together they farmed several acres of beautiful flowers here in our desert. It was all a wonder to witness. Colleen moved, with her family, back to Idaho several years ago, but we keep in touch, and I wanted to feature her inspiring “Business of Home” on my site.

Colleen has been in business with Canyon Farms for 16 years. When I asked her what drove her to step out into this venture, she replied, “I grew up on a farm and I just couldn’t get the dirt out from under my fingernails, nor the callouses off my hands. Every time I think I might be ready to stop, the seed catalogs begin to arrive, the weather hints of spring and my mind begins to imagine the seeds sprouting into their potential lives of beauty. No one in the world is more optimistic than a farmer in the spring.”

Colleen currently works full time as a paralegal in Boise, Idaho but still maintains her flower business part-time. Since the passing of her father, Kenneth Romriell, aka. cowboy poet and farmer extrodinaire, she prefers to keep the farming seasonal. She spends about 25 hours a week in growing and selling in the spring and summer on top of her paralegal responsibilities.

Colleen’s advice to beginners in the growing business is, “Investigate your market in advance. Many people can grow many things, but it doesn’t pay if there is no market for it. Put some thought into the marketing.”

Canyon Farms can be found on summer weekends in Colleen’s booth at the McCall Farmer’s Market. You can also find the Market on Facebook.

We pruned the flowering plum a couple of weeks ago, and I put the branches in a vase of water, set them on an old bench by my garden seedlings, . . . . . . . . and waited.

And waited. . .

And finally!!!!. . .

They bloomed! The deepest most beautiful crimson buds burst open with delicate pink blooms. They are so subtle and beautiful. They remind me of my stained glass because they change in the different light shining through the windows. They are tissue paper delicate, yet vibrant and bold with the contrast of the branches deep purple.

Spring is right around the corner. The lilacs will bloom and the roses will bud. It’s exciting to capture this little preview in my own kitchen garden. It is patience rewarded.

I love winter in our desert. It is the best time of year with the blue skies, red rocks, and especially the mild temperatures. But for every gardener, the lack of dirt under the fingernails can cause withdrawals. My solution is to start some vegetable seeds indoors.

I would love to have a greenhouse someday, and truly garden year round, but for now I am content with a couple of seed starting trays and some old benches set up in my kitchen. I purchased a shop light from the hardware store, and replaced the fluorescent bulbs with grow lights, then Mike built me a stand the length of the light, which stands about 20″ high and stretches the length of two standard seed starting trays. The stand has hooks which allow me to hang the shop light at different heights as my seeds grow.

This set up allows me to get a head start on tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, and even pumpkins for our garden plot. Our summer temps really get unbearable, so our growing season is best in the late winter, early spring, and fall, and having my own little plot of green in the kitchen is a great blues chaser besides.

My good friend and neighbor is called Maas. Her oldest grandson named her that in the cute way kids do with their matter of fact reasoning. He was always being told “Let’s go to grandma’s,” and he simply shortened it to “Maas”. For as long as I can remember she has been making baby blankets, crocheting the most beautiful finishes around the edges. I used to watch her and her mother create them by the stacks when we were raising our babies together.
Maas is living my dream. All 3 of her children live close by, and she sees them several times a week. I have had the privilege of celebrating each of her grand babies births with her family; I waited in the hospital lobby with her family while their first grand baby was born. We went to breakfast at Denny’s with the tired new daddy. I have a picture of her oldest two grand kids as a screen saver on my phone. Maas took it when I helped her tend them while we waited for their mama and new baby brother to come home last summer. I laughed when Mike told me that the picture was copyrighted, and I would have to wait for my own grand kids to photograph. Not long afterwards, our son and his wife told us we were going to have our first grand baby.
As I anticipate my trip to Oregon to be with our kids, and celebrate our own joy, I am gathering precious things to pass on to their little family. I recently knocked on Maas door for a lesson in these beautiful crocheted blankets.

She has these incredibly beautiful hands that are always decked out; sometimes with gold and diamonds, and sometimes with creative nail work. They show a life of hard work, and a balance of care. They move so gracefully through the thread and handle the hook with such skill; I am hard pressed to keep up with the consistency she demonstrates.

I have worked alongside those hands on many occasions and I have great respect for them. We cleaned construction messes off of windows and floors together for years, (those nails were often scrapers where I used razors!) Our hands have pitched hay together, gardened flowers and vegetables, peeled pears and peaches, washed mountains of dishes together, wiped little faces and bottoms; sometimes not even belonging to us, and most importantly, wiped each other’s tears. I am so glad to have Maas to teach me this art, and so thankful to be able to use it to welcome our precious little grandson into the world.

Long ago and far away, I discovered a passion for drawing. Some wonderful High School art teachers, and my mother turned the lights on for me with drawing and painting experiences and materials. Our small rural community and the surrounding countryside filled my days with subject matter in old buildings and plant life. I loved the meditative quality of drawing barn-wood and wild grasses.

The summer I graduated from high school I was given the opportunity to travel to Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska, and stay with my best friend at her sister and brother-in-law’s home. They worked for the Park Service and my friend worked in the Lodge kitchen. I got a job bussing tables there, but soon found myself drawn to the dirt-roads and forests with my little instamatic camera and sketch book. It was one of the most wonderful experiences of my young life.

Recently, my friend gave me two pen and ink drawings I had done 30 some years ago. One was my rendition of the Gustavus Inn and another of an old wooden building there. Gustavus is a beautiful little fishing village not far from the Park, and the whole area is just mesmerizing. I’m glad to see the Inn is still there and owned by the same family.

My friend had found these drawings in her storage and had prints made for me and also for herself and her family members. What an honor. She gave me the originals as well.

I have since returned to college and have the privilege of taking drawing and painting classes again. My goal this semester is to fill another sketchbook with wonderful old buildings, nature and my homage to aging things.

It was my intention to create a pendant light from this beautiful aspen looking glass to go with some wall sconces we had made previously. I do the glass work and Mike works his magic with copper to accent the pieces.

As I opened the kiln, I sighed a bit thinking I had another “mistake” on my hands. The form was not uniform as a pendant, and the shape seemed very different from the mold I had started with. As I reached in and lifted the glass from the kiln, and turned it upside down on the table, it took my breath away. It turned out to be this most beautiful pitcher with perfect spout and handle folds, which I never could have anticipated.

Mike added a wonderfully unique chaparral and copper handle to the piece and I am still staring at it in awe. I love fusing glass and wondering like a kid, what will come out of that magical space.