Wanna find out how to play along at home?  Come on out to the Center for Urban Horticulture on April 10th when I’ll be speaking to the Northwest Horticultural Society. We’ll talk about what you can plant (today – tomorrow – and next month-and the month after that – and the one after that… you get the idea!) for delicious, homegrown abundance throughout the entire year. It’s all spelled out in my new book The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Pacific Northwest which I’ll be selling and signing that evening.

What’s growing in your garden this beautiful normal spring?

I love this photo!  It first appeared in 2005/2006(?) in a profile Val Easton wrote about me in the Seattle Times. Sheesh, I loved that old convertible, my wheelbarrow collection, sunny days, and working in my tiny nursery.

PNW gardeners—learn to embrace the cool season and the many crops we can grow almost all year ’round!

This just in—my class, Plotting the Edible Garden Year at Ravenna Gardens on Sunday March 17th is FREE!  Previously, I posted that there was a fee associated with attending… that’s soooo not so!  Keep up Lorene!! Space is limited , call 206-729-7388 to sign up.  See you there!

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]]> http://plantedathome.com/2013/03/07/update-free-class/feed/ 0 http://plantedathome.com/2013/03/06/plotting-the-edible-garden-year/ http://plantedathome.com/2013/03/06/plotting-the-edible-garden-year/#comments Wed, 06 Mar 2013 23:41:54 +0000 Lorene http://plantedathome.com/?p=5627

PNW gardeners—learn to embrace the cool season and discover some very good food.

Growing fruits and vegetables is a crazy good thing! From that first chilly day in spring when I venture outside to poke peas into the wet soil to hot summer afternoons spent staking tomatoes, their sticky foliage enveloping me in a slightly bitter herbal aroma and staining my fingers olive—I find the entire process endlessly appealing. But all that pales next to the sheer pleasure of going into the backyard and harvesting crops in their prime.  It’s ALL about the food people!!!

My new book, The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Pacific Northwest takes you through every month and the many eccentricities of the PNW gardening year. You see, we grow things a little bit differently up here in the far NW corner of the country.

I’ll be talking about Plotting the Edible Garden Year on Sunday, March 17th at Ravenna Gardens, in Seattle. I’ll have lots of tips, and ways you can make your garden—be it a plot in the backyard, a community patch, or a pot on your porch, produce delicious, healthy food throughout the year. 

In the meantime heres a way to save money on this year’s seed purchases.  Seed catalogs crowd the mailbox and nurseries are stocked with enticing new varieties as well as garden-tested favorites.  I want them all!  But before you shell out for new seeds take inventory of last year’s leftovers and test for viability. Various seeds have differing life spans. Refer to the chart below to determine approximate life expectancy for seed stored under optimal conditions, meaning cool, dark and dry. A clip top jar or a sealed plastic container in cool basement or frost free garage should do nicely. Seed packets are date stamped which makes it easy to root out expired stock.

from Vegetable Growing in the PNW by Lorene Edwards Forkner

So you’ve made a list and found you’ve got 12 packets of lettuce seed,   a tattered envelope so muddied its hard to tell if it contains squash, melon, or pumpkin and 3 lonely unnamed peas rolling around the bottom of your seed storage container. Now what?

Testing Seed Life
Hate to throw seed away or not sure your storage conditions were up to snuff?  I’m famous for distractedly leaving seed packets out in the rain—hardly the low-humidity environment conducive to good storage. You can evaluate seed viability with this easy test:

1. Fold 10 seeds in a moistened paper towel and place inside a plastic bag labeled with type and date. Set the bag in a warm place where you can keep an eye on it, like the kitchen counter.
   
2. Wait to see how many seeds germinate within the expected guidelines listed on most seed packets. For instance, lettuce should germinate in 7-14 days.
3. Now multiply the number of germinated sees by 10 to calculate the percentage of remaining viable seed. A germination rate of 70% or higher is great; between 40 and 60% is workable (go ahead and sow but do so more thickly than package directions to make up for loss); if the germination rate is below 40%, purchase fresh seed to avoid disappointment.

Sample projects from Handmade Garden Projects

As a rule, I try and avoid association with the words “Trash” or “Junk.” It sort of falls under the category of keeping crazy under wraps; a  notion I’m sure we all aspire to.

But all the same I’ve got to say THANKS to Tom Watson, project manager for King County Recycling and Environmental Services, for his article in Sunday’s Seattle Times ” Junk meets Yard, Trashy garden trend” and his shout out for my book Handmade Garden Projects.

Construct your dream project from the detritus of everyday life: bricks, boards, pots, bottles, bottle caps and lids, cans, scrap metal, old windows, doors, broken furniture, light fixtures, mirrors, glass blocks, broken glass, pallets, bicycle parts, old sports equipment, tires, plumbing fixtures, boat remnants, plastic scraps, packaging materials, broken tools, chains, rocks, sticks, stumps and shells. The list never ends.

Yes, it’s recycling. And goodness knows, projects can all too easily slip down the slope of trash-junk-debris-chaos. But I prefer the term resourceful, creative, inventive, and most of all, PLAY. It’s about making a personal mark on the landscape using what’s either already at hand or can be fashioned from simple, everyday objects and basic hardware store goods.

This cedar planter had seen better days before it got a patinated makeover.

Would you believe this is termite barrier? Yep, sourced at my local hardware store.

Handmade Garden Projects starts out with an exhortation to clean the garage. “While that may not sound very playful,with a little indoor digging you may discover that you already own a great deal of everyday goods, scraps, and raw materials just waiting to be recycled, repurposed, re-envisioned, and imaginatively put to use in the garden.”

Tom has a great list of useful tips for wanna-be backyard creators (he calls it his Garden junker’s guide – there’s that word again!) Go here to read the whole story!

Just add an easy DIY finish with household ingredients

Book signing table at Ravenna Gardens.

Launching a new book is super exciting!

First you get an “advance copy” in the mail – mine showed up on Christmas eve – THANKS Santa!  This is soon followed by a case of books; orders for more books; sending out review copies, and a flurry of events to introduce the title to the great big world.

It’s lots of work and involves the effort of many. Big thanks go out to my publisher, Timber Press, for their insight, marketing savvy, and constant sense of good humor and support.

Friends and family have supported me every step of the way along this publishing path; trust me the footing isn’t always as sure as the finished books might appear!

My dear friend and partner in many adventures, Debra Prinzing and her beautiful bouquet she put together (in about 5 minutes) for our mutual book launch party.

One of my earliest champions and writing mentors, Debra Prinzing also happens to be a dear friend from back in our college days when we were pursuing textiles and art. So it was especially sweet to celebrate the launch of both of our new books together at Ravenna Gardens last Friday night. Ravenna Gardens owner Gillian Mathews and staff hosted a wonderful event and generously allowed our “Village” to gather, toast, and revel!  Big FUN.

Debra putting the final touches on a bouquet of locally grown branches and blooms. I love the burnished alder catkins against the tea rose color of the potting shed.

Slow Flowers by Debra Prinzing, St Lynn’s Press

Debra’s book, Slow Flowers (St Lynn’s Press) is an exploration of a year’s worth of locally grown and sourced flowers, foliage, branches and bulbs as expressed in 52 bouquets – one for every week – that Deb created and photographed.

I loved the bouquet Debra created for our festive event.  So I gathered my own homage to seasonal vegetables with a display of my own.

An also sumptuous and seasonal gathering of a vegetable sort!

It was a wonderful evening of local food and flowers, friends and good times. Heartfelt thanks to all who came and helped us celebrate.

Introducing my latest book: The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Pacific Northwest.

Last May – about the time of my last post(?!!?) – I had a lovely visit with good friends in Eastern Washington. Suzanne and Scotty are the purveyors of Living In The Garden, an idyllic nursery nestled among rolling wheat fields in the Palouse.  Passionate artists and plants people alike, we connect; I can’t believe I’ve only known them for a little over a year.  Especially given that I’ve invited myself to stay with them three (3!!!) times in that year.  In my defense, Suzanne did bunk with us briefly last February for a visit to the big city and Northwest Flower & Garden show.

My most recent trip was ostensibly in support of my book, Handmade Garden Projects. Living in the Garden hosted an afternoon book signing where I chatted  with folks about garden projects – those in the book, those I demo’ed, those they’d invented, and of course, the many, many creative solutions Suzanne and Scotty have implemented at LITG.

It was a beautiful spring day, still slightly chilly and brisk, but perfect for planting and filled with dreams of the growing season ahead. I was down-right giddy because Suzanne had promised me I could “play nursery” during my weekend stay.  So back and forth I went, up and down the hill to the greenhouse, grabbing flats of beautiful plants, stocking and restocking nursery tables, answering questions, suggesting plant combinations, fluffing, tending, and merchandising plants to their best effect.  Basically, scratching my nursery-girl itch and indulging a pastime missing in my life since closing Fremont Gardens nearly 5 years ago now.

People often ask me if I miss retail nursery life.  The answer is complicated (isn’t that true of most thoughtful Q&A???) Yes, I miss the connection and conversations with customers, growers, other retailers and folks in “the biz”. Somehow, yet another cool, non-summer is easier to take when collectively commiserated. Likewise, the solution to my rampant snail problem might be out there, waiting to be discovered by kibitzing with someone equally plagued by the nasty mollusks. Left to my own devices, I’ve decided to simply remove plants that remind me of their voracious appetites. Thus hosta ‘June’ is a keeper forever more. My former favorite, the luscious lime-y green ‘Sum & Substance’? Off. With. Its. Head!  Same holds true for Solomon’s seal.  I simply can’t convince myself that those lacy leaves are anything shy of tattered and taunting.  Ridding the garden of the actual snails themselves seems way beyond my control~

It seems everything comes down to control doesn’t it.

How much, or how little, we believe we are in charge of our lives, our garden—hell, the next hour and a half!  Sure, we can make plans, plot the future, and map out our days.  It’s a lovely exercise whose results are a barometer of our optimism and peace of mind; what others might call our mental health.  In the meantime, while we’re pretending to wrest control of circumstances, Life intervenes and has its way with us.

Never in my wildest dream last summer in the midst of finishing my next manuscript, wrangling household economics, and praying for heat over yet another bumper crop of green tomatoes, did I picture myself fully employed. You know, by an actual employer.  But here I am fully engaged and yes, at times completely overwhelmed, by my new position as the editor of Pacific Horticulture magazine.

Pacific Horticulture is a community of passionate gardeners and broadly curious readers interested in exploring where gardening and horticulture on the West Coast intersect with real life, design, and the environment.  Pac Hort, as the magazine is affectionately known, has been around for 37 years; no small feat for a publication published by a small, non-profit. I am only the third editor of PH and the first to reside outside of the San Francisco bay area where our office is located.

Go to our shiny new website to read all about us; explore 7 years of archived content; sign up for an upcoming tour (Tucson in late winter is looking pretty wonderful!); and join the ranks of other like-minded folks. Just for the record, conceptualizing, designing, creating and populating a cool dynamic and responsive website containing huge amounts of content is NOT for the feint of heart or mind!  Fortunately, we were in the brilliant and capable hands – not to mention always-positive and supportive mindset – of Switchyard Creative, a marketing, strategy, design and development firm based in Portland, Or.  Mine is a “virtual” office where I have the privilege of collaborating with other dedicated and creative staff and board members spread across 1,000 miles.

Good, creative, purposeful work; I’m a lucky gal to have this opportunity. But I won’t kid you, my time is not my own and the garden has slipped far beyond anything approaching control.  What seems like a million years ago, I pinned a saying to the bulletin board above my desk in the crowded shared cubicle of my first job out of college. (Note: I can count on one hand, maybe even a few fingers, the number of “real” employers I’ve actually  worked for over the past 30-some years; the list of freelance and self-employed endeavors is quite long by comparison~) The small card read: “Go often to the house of friends, lest weeds grow up and choke the path.”

Well my friends – the weeds are high. Literally and metaphorically. There’s been precious little time for anything other than work. My family and loved ones have been very understanding but I miss them.  I miss my sweet pea bouquets and fresh salads, evenings by the fire pit and long meals on the front deck. Spring – and summer – have passed without my once giving the back garden any attention and boy-howdy does it ever show.

An ambitious building project next door is scheduled to begin shortly. Our response to its dramatic impact on our landscape is basically scorched earth. This fall we’ll start on our biggest backyard do-over yet. It’s sad, daunting, and exhausting to even contemplate but at the same time I’m starting to get excited by the creative, problem solving aspects of the project. The last 6 months have taught me to tap into collaborative energy and and seek outside resources. My days of thinking I can do it all myself are OVER.

But first. We’re off on vacation – granted a working vacation – headed to the beautiful bay area. Copy for the next issue of the magazine is due to the designer, uh… yesterday, I’m still wrangling loose ends and photographs, and combing content for correct grammar, syntax, and horticultural taxonomy. Life is full, sometimes crazy, but good.

The bottles at the top of this post are significant.  Last May Scotty took me on a fabulous picking trip to the Washington State University surplus store–be still my salvaging heart!!!– where I picked up these cool laboratory beakers and flasks for pennies.  Very Breaking Bad, no? During a phone conversation with a dear friend (like my office, many of my friendships these days are virtual as well), Wendy told me about a tactic she used long ago to cope with a challenging life in the NY theater scene. She would “bottle” good days in canning jars and store them on her bookshelf to keep for those inevitable less-than-good days.

My laboratory flasks are lined up on a metal shelf in my office. Filled with casually clipped blossoms from my garden they make perfect bud vases; providing a snapshot of the growing season and a way to enjoy the resilient plants making their way in my absence a midst thigh-high weeds.  But more often than not they just sit there, capped with their darling glass stoppers, and filled with what I like to think of as my good fortune.  An antidote to stressful days, impending deadlines, crazy html code, and a new life I’m still finding my way in.

Prinzing’s thoughtful and passionate interviews with farmers, floral designers, and flower-lovers, richly illustrated with Perry’s luscious photography, creates a satisfying multi-sensory feast of provocative observations and beautiful images.

Why do we settle for anonymous, season-free, chemical laden posies from the other side of the world when there’s bounty all around us and good people working hard to bring their crops to market? Well one, because until recently, how were we to know that those cello-wrapped bouquets, that are oh-so-available at florists, markets, and even warehouse stores hid a dark environmental and human toll behind their alluring good looks.

Note to self: always question the perfect! Like a bug-free vegetable garden, it doesn’t exist in the real world.

Fran Sorin, of Gardening Gone Wild, a smart and informed blog that looks at every aspect of the world of horticulture, recently ran a lovely Q&A with Debra.  Here’s a snippet of my favorite part:

You compare ‘green floral design’ to the authenticity of the slow food movement. Can you explain what you mean?

The notion of Farm-to-Table dining has been around for 40 years, ever since Alice Waters opened Chez Panisse in Berkeley. And since that time, the Slow Food movement has gathered its momentum, its supporters, and its believers. In culinary circles and among foodies, the farmer is the new rock star. We gobble up their food and gobble up heart-warming stories of the artisanal cheese maker, the organic vintner, the heirloom tomato farmer – it’s everywhere and it’s widely accepted that eating food that has made the shortest possible journey from the field to the table is “better” than the alternative. Now, we are witnessing the early efforts of the flower world to catch up with the culinary world.

You can read the entire interview here.

I have an even greater level of respect and gratitude for farmers of all stripes this spring when I’ve been too busy to get out and plant.

I miss fresh radishes.  Last season’s kale has finally gone completely to flower providing a fabulous meal for early pollinators; dinner, not so much.  Fresh tender herbs are producing, the rhubarb is sizing up nicely, and the blueberries and raspberries are fully budded meaning their lovely crop of berries is on its way with little input from me.  I love perennial edibles!!!  But you can bet your last trusty trowel, I made time to get my fava beans planted – I can’t imagine a gardening year without my favorite vegetable.

Another sort of delicious crop from the fertile fields of the Skagit Valley

On the floral front – heartfelt  thanks go to my sweetheart who made my May day with a big bouquet of brilliant, jewel-toned tulips – fresh from the Skagit Valley – just outside Seattle. Local Love!!!

…part eco-friendly, non-traditionalist; part crafty creative with more ideas than money, and an abiding aversion to off-the-shelf shopping. My garden is my canvas, my vision, and my voice. A place where I am free of all rules, except those of Nature herself. It’s where I make my unique mark on the world.

Follow the link below to read the rest of my guest blog on the Mother Earth News Fair Blog:

Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/blogs/blog.aspx?blogid=2147484125&tag=Lorene Edwards Forkner#ixzz1tAmmLSb0

Or you can catch me “LIVE ” at the Mother Earth News Fair in Puyallup, CA   WASHINGTON.  As in Puyallup WA (Ack… methinks someone has been traveling up and down the left coast too much!!!! Thank you to those nice people who politely pointed out my mistake~)  June 2-3, 2012.  I’m speaking about my new book and exhorting people to relax and have some fun in the garden on Saturday afternoon at 4pm.

This leaves me plenty of time to mine the rest of this crafty, creative, resourceful weekend for all the latest ideas in organic gardening, FOOD and green living. From global sustainability to homemade cheese – I’ve mapped out my time to catch as many exciting speakers and seminars as I can – to say nothing of the scores of cool vendors!

Wanna join in the fun? Go here for the entire scoop.

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]]> http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/26/im-a-handmade-gardening-gal/feed/ 5 http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/21/hands-free-gardening/ http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/21/hands-free-gardening/#comments Sat, 21 Apr 2012 16:38:58 +0000 Lorene http://plantedathome.com/?p=4973 Time is flying! Weeks pass in a blur and the Charles Bukowski line “the days run away like wild horses…” is CONSTANTLY running on a loop in my head. My days are filled in collaborative and creative effort – something I’ve longed for – but alas, the work is indoors and mostly via computer and phone (with occasional airline travel for good measure)

I’m not trying to be coy.  I realize I’ve said little here about my new professional hat. Providing more details about that adventure is on my to-do list… right next to grocery shopping, planting the vegetable garden and just about everything having to do with housekeeping!  Yep, things are pretty hectic these days.  Exciting, satisfying, and productive but yes, very, very hectic.

I have little problem kicking groceries and housekeeping to the curb, but I miss my garden.  The ‘Alchymist’ rose outside our kitchen window is wearing a fuzzy fur coat of bright green aphids. (ewwww!) The sight taunts me every time I stand at the sink waiting for the coffee to brew – the only domestic appliance getting a workout these days.  Weeds are colonizing the gravel pathways and last year’s kale is a giant bouquet of yellow flowers so brilliant you can probably see it from space.  All the more reason to appreciate and focus on those plants that are quietly and steadily doing their good work completely independent of my input.

Erysimum 'Constant Cheer'

Erysimum ‘Constant Cheer’ is more than living up to its name.  This little subshrub has been blooming it’s heart out for more than a month already; ha, and they call it a wallflower!!! Picking fistfuls of flowering stems for a desktop bouquet is about the sum of my (outdoor) horticultural endeavors these days. I confess, generally I have issues with plants that bloom, and bloom, (and bloom) without ceasing — I get bored.  And nobody likes a showoff, botanical or otherwise.  But ‘Constant’s’ charm lies in its every-changing palette of water-colored blooms.  Even after picking, the flowers continue to morph from citrusy yellow to peach to berry — a veritable bowl of horticultural rainbow sherbet.  [I must be hungry... even the busiest day can't distract me from my next meal~]

I got a very sweet email from Poppy, my father-in-law, this morning with the following quote:

“A garden must combine the poetic and the mysterious with a feeling of serenity and joy,”
– Luis Barragan.

Admittedly there’s very little serenity in my life just now, but joy, poetry and most definitely the mysterious are all playing starring roles.  So I guess I’m gardening after all.  But in a new way that’s less digging and plotting, more receiving and observation.

Yet another line from a gifted poet is pinned to the bulletin board by my desk:

“…my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished” — Mary Oliver

I had NO IDEA aphids could build up in such astonishing numbers if left unchecked!

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]]> http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/21/hands-free-gardening/feed/ 3 http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/18/dusting-off-the-musty-side-of-horticulture/ http://plantedathome.com/2012/04/18/dusting-off-the-musty-side-of-horticulture/#comments Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:25:54 +0000 Lorene http://plantedathome.com/?p=4951 Long considered “one of the  slowest of the performing arts,” HORTICULTURE is a living, breathing, ever-adapting, reflection of the world and our human role within it.  Whether you’re (ahem) a venerable gardener, or a rank beginner, passionate about African violets, or garden-infused cocktails, the garden has many gifts to offer.

Funny story:

Lorene & Annie

Part 1 – a coupla years ago, while on a trip to the Bay Area, my friend Joyce took me to Annie’s Annuals, a plant-lovers’ playground deep in the industrial heart of Richmond, CA.  If you’re not familiar with this destination nursery and mail order delight, go here for a dose of pure hort-heaven and rambunctious joy.  That June day I was thrilled to meet Annie herself. The previous holiday season, Annie’s Annuals had spread a considerable amount of love around when they included my first book Hortus Miscellaneous in their holiday catalog along with some very kind words.  I introduced myself to Annie and gave her a hug of gratitude.  Being Annie, she hugged me back with a big grin… and then confessed she pictured the author of Hortus to be more of a “granny-librarian-type”!!!

Part 2 – last week I got to visit Flora Grubb, another destination-worthy hort-hot spot, this one in the industrial heart of San Francisco, CA.  (See a trend here?  The good stuff is always buried away in an off-the-beaten-path rust-belt…)

It's a truck AND a patio in the nursery yard at Flora Grubb

Flora Grubb herself –yes, that’s her real name– and her co-hort Jason (pardon the pun, but this is very much a botanical-retail collective effort) are passionate, smart, thoughtful and oh-so-hip.  A group of us gathered around a tiny table in the courtyard discussing what garden retailers and publishers often discuss – “The Future of Gardening.”  As if this process that’s been around since nearly the dawn of time is going away anytime soon… but retail and publishing? Let’s just say we had a lot to talk about.

No garden? No problem - Flora plants the walls!

Graphic display of potting containers

Flora and company have created a delicious and style-driven entry point to the often intimidating world of Horticulture. Botanical Latin and a detailed discussion of carbon ratios in compost –  talking points at most “serious” nurseries  - have a way of dampening a garden newbie’s  enthusiasm; go figure!  Whereas Flora’s colorful design-driven displays, fun loving, re-purposed industrial scrap, and lots of ways to play along, invite everyone to get outside and play. “Aeriums” and edibles might just be today’s gateway drug to ornamental horticulture. Don’t get me wrong; this isn’t about seducing the customer into purchasing yet another pricey perennial or tender tropical – well, maybe a little – but if Flora and company have their way, a means of getting people to connect with Nature, grow things,  and think about their impact on the environment.

The funny part of this story? At the end of our hour of crazy-good conversation and dreaming, I put on my author-promotion hat and made a plug for my latest book, Handmade Garden Projects and referenced my previous book which I knew Flora Grubb had stocked in the past.  Flora and Jason graciously acknowledged my “pitch” and had nice things to say about Hortus —pause—but they were picturing an older, more-bookish, author.  S*gh

 

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