#Gardening--Winter to Summer #Therapy by Karen Rose Smith

Our winters in Pennsylvania seem to last forever. I have arthritis, fibromyalgia, and osteoporosis, all conditions which are not winter friendly. I don't venture out in ice and snow. Fluctuating temperatures can affect pain levels. The weather can lead to inactivity (except for work which is ongoing and sedentary.) I care for stray and feral cats for their welfare and to keep me moving on a basic level. Our four rescued cats inside have their own demands but they aren't taxing. Every year I look forward to an activity that helps me focus on better health and spring. That activity is
gardening.

After the bustle and busyness of the holidays, the activity slowdown led me to look for motivation and something positive to keep my activity level up. My husband gave up his work table and we set up another. On those I put a plant heat pad and above each a grow light. I order seeds and I get started with my winter-to-spring therapy--starting flowers in January and February, heirloom tomatoes in March, and sunflowers and zucchini in May. Around Memorial Day, I use my cane to dig a trench and I drop zinnia seeds and cover them lightly with the loose dirt, again with my cane.  Zinnias are one of the easiest flowers to grow.

This year in January I started geraniums, petunias and impatiens. Each year I don't know which will grow heartily. This year the impatiens have really taken off and they are already a size that could be planted. They have two months before I'm ready to do that. So I've taken them off the heat pad and just put them under a grow light. The geraniums are coming along slowly and nicely. The petunias, which take the longest, are puttering along. I started the heirloom tomatoes this week.

But whatever plants grow...they give me the activity I need with standing time to plant and water as well as movement in shifting around trays with varying weight levels. As I transplant each plant into a larger peat pot, the plants themselves help me increase the amount of weight I'm carrying and manipulating. Come spring, I'm lifting full trays of plants and gallon pots.

There is such satisfaction in seeing a seed develop into a tine seedling and then a six inch plant. There is such joy in watching these plants bloom or bear fruit. There is also more patio activity involved in trimming the plants and watering them on the patio throughout the summer. When tomatoes are at their height, I freeze them for winter. We still have tomatoes in the freezer from last summer that are so wonderful as a basis for soup. I'm hoping for a banner crop this year. My husband plants about 25 tomato plants and we give the rest to neighbors and family.

Most of the flowers I plant attract butterflies and hummingbirds which is a side benefit to the color and scent. I enjoy photographing both the gardens and the creatures--more activity. Some years I collect rose petals and dry them to make sachet bags for Christmas presents. Gardens just keep on giving.

We each have to find whatever benefits us to keep us strong. Gardening does that for me...and relaxes me too. Therapy at its finest.

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USA TODAY Bestselling Author Karen Rose Smith is an only child who delved into books at an early age. She learned about kindred spirits from Anne of Green Gables, solved mysteries with Nancy Drew and wished she could have been the rider on The Black Stallion. Yet even though she escaped often into story worlds, she had many aunts, uncles and cousins around her on weekends. Her sense of family and relationships began there. Maybe that's why families are a strong theme in her novels, whether mysteries or romances. Her 95th novel will be released in 2016.

Readers often ask her about her pastimes. She has herb, flowers and vegetable gardens that help her relax. In the winter, she cooks rather than gardens.  And year round she spends most of her time with her husband, as well as her four rescued cats who are her constant companions. They chase rainbows from sun catchers, reminding her life isn't all about work, awards and bestseller lists. Everyone needs that rainbow to chase.

Karen looks forward to interacting with readers. They can find her at the links below. 

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Mother's Day Memorial Garden -- How I Remember

Mother's Day is here again.  Spring is rich with memories as well as flowers.  When a mom is gone, the Mother's Day commercials, cards and sentiments are hard to watch.  So for many years, we've tended a Memorial Garden in our yard where lots of my mom's favorite flowers and bushes grow.  We started small at first.  Originally a circular ring surrounded three Canadian Hemlock trees.  We expanded to include spirea bushes which formed a privacy border around the backyard of my childhood home.  In following seasons, I found a statue of a little girl on a bench with a basket for flowers.  We surrounded her with forget-me-nots.  A border of hyacinths bloom with color and fragrance in early spring. 
 

Each year, some aspect of the garden changes.  Bleeding hearts, another of Mom's favorites, have grown tall.  We lost a hemlock and replaced it with an Alaskan cedar.  A yellow rose bush--my mom especially liked yellow roses--produces rose hips and we don't trim it back as much as our other garden roses.  For the past few years, I've been growing flowers from seeds.  In early summer, we plant geraniums I grow and sow zinnia seeds to replace the spring flowers. This year I'm adding Shasta daisies for two reasons. My mom liked them and...  I've named a dog in my second mystery "Shasta" to commemorate that.

Just as life continuously changes, the garden does, too.  Each bush that greens, each flower that sprouts, each blossom that blooms and gives off a glorious scent, brings back memories.  So on Mother's Day, as well as through the summer, I remember and relive a little of my childhood all over again.
 


©2013 Karen Rose Smith



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Mother's Day Memorial Garden

Mother's Day is here again.  Spring is rich with memories as well as flowers.  When a mom is gone, the Mother's Day commercials, cards and sentiments are hard to watch.  So for many years, we've tended a Memorial Garden in our yard where lots of my mom's favorite flowers and bushes grow.  We started small at first.  Originally a circular ring surrounded three Canadian Hemlock trees.  We expanded to include spirea bushes which formed a privacy border around the backyard of my childhood home.  In following seasons, I found a statue of a little girl on a bench with a basket for flowers.  We surrounded her with forget-me-nots.  A border of hyacinths bloom with color and fragrance in early spring. 
 

Each year, some aspect of the garden changes.  Bleeding hearts, another of Mom's favorites, have grown tall.  We lost a hemlock and replaced it with an Alaskan cedar.  A yellow rose bush--my mom especially liked yellow roses--produces rose hips and we don't trim it back as much as our other garden roses.  For the past few years, I've been growing flowers from seeds.  In early summer, we plant geraniums I grow and sow zinnia seeds to replace the spring flowers. This year I'm adding Shasta daisies for two reasons. My mom liked them and...  I've named a dog in my second mystery "Shasta" to commemorate that.

Just as life continuously changes, the garden does, too.  Each bush that greens, each flower that sprouts, each blossom that blooms and gives off a glorious scent, brings back memories.  So on Mother's Day, as well as through the summer, I remember and relive a little of my childhood all over again.
 

©2013 Karen Rose Smith



IN TOUCH with KAREN ROSE SMITH ezine
Karen Rose Smith's romance website
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Gardening--More Than A Hobby

I like to garden for relaxation.  Urging plants to grow from seed and taking care of them throughout the process fills a basic need for me to get away from everything technological for just a little while each day.  Nurturing plants is a lot like nurturing kids and pets!

I'm planting more heirloom tomato seeds this week.  My geraniums and impatiens are growing stronger.  The petunias are popping out of the soil.  It's time for our major growing vegetable.  We usually plant around twenty-five tomato plants in our garden to produce fresh tomatoes as well as to freeze for winter.  But I grow about 100 plants so we can give plants to friends, family, neighbors.  I never know how many will thrive and once they start growing, I nurture them.

This year's geraniums and impatiens

2013 tomato seedlings

The first year I grew tomatoes, I started with a basic beefsteak variety and paste tomatoes.  I watch cooking shows and was intrigued by the chefs using "heirloom" tomatoes which were supposed to have a richer, more vibrant flavor.  In our area there wasn't a market where I could find heirloom tomatoes.

What are heirloom tomatoes?  To me the term means tomatoes with a history and possibly a story behind them.  They are open pollinated and are true tomatoes without genetic engineering.  When I decided to grow them, I understood that they might be more prone to disease and cracking.  But that hasn't been my experience.  To my surprise, almost all of them grew and the result was close to a hundred healthy plants last year.  Maybe this was the result of the varieties I chose.  Or maybe my crop was the result of where I bought my seeds.  I found an organic farm online (Tomato Fest) that is California-based. (http://www.tomatofest.com/)  This year I purchased seeds from another venue, too--Totally Tomato  ( http://www.totallytomato.com/ )

I'll give you an example of the history of an heirloom tomato.  My favorite variety is Marianna's Peace.  This tomato is an indeterminate that produces a 1 to 2 pound beautiful fruit.  (It's officially a pink tomato!)  It has a bountiful, not too acid taste, wonderful for eating and also good for sauce.  The seeds date back to the early 1900's when they were smuggled out of Czechoslovakia by a seventeen-year-old named Marianna.

Another favorite of mine is Anna Russian which has a heart-shaped red fruit.  The seeds came from a Russian immigrant.  Here's a photo of last year's fruit.

This year I'm trying some new varieties along with Marianna and Anna Russian.  A few are Ponderosa Pink, Ponderosa Gold, Big Italian Beefsteak, Bull's Heart and Watermelon Beefsteak.  As the garden progresses, I'll blog and post photos, comparing this year's crop to last year's.

Do you grow tomatoes?  What are your best varieties?  What does the process of gardening give you?


©2013 Karen Rose Smith

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Gardening, tomatoes and planters

This has been a week when color exploded in the garden.  Snapdragons are a beautiful pink splash as are poppies waving in the breeze in orange and salmon. Roses are budding. Diascia are planted. I've filled patio planters with our favorite varieties of flowers from home-grown petunias and geraniums, to daisies, to verbena and begonias, as well as caladium. And the tomatoes are two feet high! On Memorial Day at our yearly picnic, we'll give out many of them to friends.  The varieties that have been the heartiest heirlooms so far this year are Marianna's Peace, Anna Russian and Big Orange Tomato. More about all of them as they grow.
Have a beautiful spring week!

©2012 Karen Rose Smith

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RENEWAL AND NEW BEGINNINGS, Gardening Week 9

I suppose it's fitting with Easter this weekend that I see this week as a time of renewal and beginning.  Outside, buds from bulbs planted last fall are blossoming.  Bleeding Hearts are coming back to life.  Tulips are in full bloom and lilacs are budding.  Our Dwarf Redbud is blossoming with green leaves starting to open.  Inside, I have to recommit to the process I've begun.  The sprouts need the most care at this transition time from baby to youth.  Sometimes I need to water them twice a day, move them to the best location for success and think about the next stage--if I remove them from the heat mats and grow lights, will the sun porch still be too cold at night?  I'll watch and decide day by day.

The petunias are off the heat mats but are still positioned around the edges under the spreading rays of the light.  They are doing beautifully and a few were even big enough to pot for a neighbor for Easter.  (The two blue survivors are alive, though one has yellow leaves under the same conditions as it's sister.)  The geraniums are growing slowly.  The "Rose Ice" variety are fewer and behind the others.

The first heirloom tomatoes I planted (Marianna's Peace and Carmello) are growing steadily in larger containers.  The "Big Orange" variety are popping up vigorously and "Anna Russian" isn't far behind.  New beginnings are everywhere.

Transplanting is an activity I do every day with sprouts that are very tall with two leaves or have grown three or four leaves.  I have to care for them and decide daily which to transplant so their roots, already spreading and attaching to the peat pot, won't be damaged.  Handling the earth and the plants is relaxing and makes me feel as if I'm part of nature and the growing process.

Renewal and commitment.  Isn't that what life is all about?

 

©2012 Karen Rose Smith

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