Sunflowers – Dear Liza

Signs of the Times

Dear Liza,

You have started back to school there in Denmark, and your cousins (and all the other kids) have, too. Fall is here for certain. All the signs say so.

The tiny library at Sunnyside School is full of older books taken off the shelves to make room for the new ones.

The leaves are changing all over the place.

Apples and pears are being offered right off the tree (or sidewalk) by overwhelmed home owners.

Sunflowers are growing up to the second floor windows…

And homemade signs are sprouting up, proclaiming faith in the democratic process.

Ready or not, here comes Fall!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Fall on the Way

Dear Liza,

Portland is changing with the seasons, as it should. Fruit is becoming ripe all over the neighborhood, and folks are more than willing to share!

A house a few blocks away has a gigantic Asian Pear tree with more fruit than they can handle, so they offer a ladder, a nifty bucket-on-a-stick grabber, and even paper sacks to take your fresh fruit home. Thanks, neighbors!

As we walk around, we keep having to look UP… to see flowers! Sunflowers have hit their growth spurts and some are ten feet high!

And then there are Amaranths, these red feathery beasts, taller than me and absolutely magical looking.

Even Laurelhurst Park is getting into the change. While some late linden trees are still blooming, giving the scent we call “Portland Summer”, some others are already turning yellow.

Soon this part of the park, which we call the Middle Heights, will be bathed in cool autumn sunshine as all the leaves turn the ground bright yellow.

And of course, the roses are still with us.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Flowers of Astonishment

Dear Liza,

You know I love flowers and gardens. I got this love from my Momma Billie who was a gardener just about every minute she was alive. Today I will share some stories about remarkable blooms.

If you look closely, you can see that this is a rose in Lompoc, California. It grew, and just kept growing, in Momma’s garden. It grew up from under her orange tree, through the orange tree, and right out the top! She didn’t notice it until one of her visitors on the Garden Tour pointed it out. “Well, how about that?” she said.

We saw this giant bunch of lilies get on the funicular train going up the bluff of Montmartre in Paris. The lady carrying them walked with assurance that she and her flowers were making the world more beautiful.

We found this astonishing field of sunflowers on Sauvie Island, just north of Portland. Every summer the farms let the public in to explore, shop, eat barbecue, and celebrate the beauty of the countryside. Auntie Bridgett never wanted to leave!

And this year, we have Laverne. She and Shirley, her sister dahlia, are growing in my community garden plot. Laverne opened up first and we were very impressed!

Our friend Lynn called this a dinner-plate dahlia, which I didn’t know existed. But there she is, all right!

And that is your flower show for today.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Cult of the Sunflower

Dear Liza,

It is hard to remember during these hot summer days, but for MOST of the year, Portland has very cool, cloudy weather. Besides being chilly, it can cause vitamin deficiencies which effect people’s moods and sleep patterns. Doctors here make sure everyone (even the pets!) get vitamin D supplements, because we miss a lot of sunshine.

So I guess it makes sense that we worship the sun a little. Or, barring that, the sunflower. Yep, these tall yellow beauties are very big here, in all senses of the word.

There is a house down by Seawellcrest Park that perfectly shows this obsession with sunflowers. Not only does it host a forest of the giants every summer, but their shape is echoed in the stones and metalwork decorations. These let you remember, walking by in the winter, to “watch this space” for the next summer’s crop.

We paid a happy visit to the “Sunflower House” on the Fourth, watching the bees do their thing and feeling the sun on our backs.

But sunflowers are not all that easy to grow. I have sown a dozen seeds or more, and they have all died in the ground or just after sprouting. I will chat with my local garden colleagues and find the right varieties for this area, and, as all gardeners say, “We’ll do better next year.”

Love,

Grandma Judy

Fall Color

Dear Liza,

In Fall, Portland puts on some really fabulous colors. And today was so bright and chilly that we went out for a walk to enjoy them.

I love walking in the late afternoon because the light pours beautifully through the leaves.

The cosmos flowers one of our neighbors planted have gotten taller than me! They looked so pretty against the bright blue sky.

The last of the sunflowers are still blooming nicely just beside the cosmos.

We were getting very chilly on our walk, and passed by the Nandinas on our way home.

The weather forecast for to night is 29 degrees, just a little below freezing. I have moved the geraniums from Great Grandma Billie’s garden closer to the house and will cover them with a sheet to protect them from the frost.

Our movie for the evening is Cary Grant in “Arsenic and Old Lace”.

Love,

Grandma Judy

More Fall Beauty

Dear Liza,

The sunshine has returned! I thought it was gone until Spring, but this week has been as bright and dry as August in Salinas.

I have pictures but no words, so I will borrow some from the English poet John Keats, who wrote it in the fall of 1819.

To Autumn

Season of mists and mellow fruitfullness

Close-bosomed friend of the maturing sun

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;

To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,

And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;

To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel-shells

With sweet kernal; to set budding more,

And still more, later flowers for the bees,

Until they think warm days will never cease,

For summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells…

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?

Think not of them, thou hast thy music too.