The Yard, Garden & Patio show

So I did finally make it to the Yard, Garden, and Patio show after mistakenly arriving at the gun show. Gun show people are really different than garden show people. They don't smile, they don't share coupons in line, and they don't compliment your scarf the way the ticket guy did at the YGP. 

I have never been so happy to arrive safely at the Convention Center. And thank you, random people behind me at that seminar, for being nice when I rudely eavesdropped on your conversation and demanded that you show me your hellebores. Gardeners are really wonderful people.

Once there I rushed off to the Japanese Garden Elements for the Home Garden talk by Sadafumi Uchiyama. I took a Japanese art history class in college that left me permanently enamored of all things Japanese. They can take an artform from China, Korea, India, or wherever, and do it better.

Winter Landscape by Sesshu

Mr. Uchiyama was a lovely man who spoke about his work at the Portland Japanese Garden, his training in Japan, and about how gardening is great because it's a level playing field--you just need to push that wheelbarrow across the yard a hundred times and you'll get really good at it, regardless of whether you're an idiot or a genius. That's probably why this accidental-gun-show-attendee likes gardening so much. I take terrible notes and I have a crappy memory, so if anyone attended this session and feels I'm misquoting, please chime in.

He spoke about gardening mostly being maintenance and how the Japanese look at the life of a garden in terms of more than 50 years. One family might tend a garden for ten generations, during which time trees will die and need to be replaced but the structure will largely stay the same. He showed us pictures of the Japanese garden thirty years ago and how it's changed (or not changed) throughout the years, including some dramatic photos when a Douglas fir fell and took out the waterfall.

Photo from the Portland Japanese Garden's Facebook page

Finally, he offered some practical tips to incorporating this tradition into your yard. The first lesson: 

• Kill the corners

Ease the corners of buildings, either by planting on the corners of the back of your house or building a fence that defers the edge of the house, even if it doesn't offer privacy. 

He said that foundation plantings in a yard "kill the corners" by easing the transition from a vertical fence to the horizontal ground. He talked about how important rock is to Japanese landscaping and how it must look like it does in nature. He said you can use them to kill corners, like if you're transitioning a wide footpath to a narrow one. Stick a rock at the corner and the width change won't be so noticeable. I'd think that plants in ceramic pots could likewise be used to kill corners.

Second lesson: 

• ease the transition from one material to another. 

Instead of letting grass grow right up to a cement path, he showed us a picture of a sidewalk edged with a trim of poured cement with stone embedded, which was abutted with four inches of river rock, which was edged with clay ceiling tiles turned on their sides, which finally lead to grass. It was gorgeous.

This wasn't the photo he showed us but it's a close approximation

Or use pavers on top of your cement slab to ease that transition to a flagstone pathway.

Click to embiggen

Last lesson (and what landscapers always say): 

• group your plants. 

Don't buy one of each. I hate this advice because HOW WILL I EVER FIT ALL THE PLANTS I WANT IN MY YARD IF I HAVE TO BUY MULTIPLES OF THE SAME THING? He says he tells his students that it's okay to leave a bare spot rather than putting a single plant in. I say phooey to that, Mr. Fancypants with your multiple landscape degrees and years and years of experience!

He said that Japanese gardens don't use annuals or perennials. Their gardens rely on an relatively unchanging lanscape of trees and shrubs that don't die down to the ground at the end of the year. The winter garden has the same bones as the summer garden. Lastly he talked about what a Japanese garden is not. It is not lanterns or footbridges or water features or tchotkies. I was so happy he said that because those lanterns and bridges to nowhere drive me crazy.

I also attended a panel on hot plant picks for 2012. Sadly, there was no projector for diplaying images of the plants they were discussing. Good thing there was June Condruck from Blooming Nursery to deliver the horticultural equivalent of phone sex. She was so good at talking up plants ("An absolutely stunning blue eye surrounded by petals that fade to a dusky purple atop an unfurling mass of shiny green foliage . . .") that I didn't really need visuals. I think I put a star by everything she described.

WANT. Eryngium 'Big Blue'
Photo from High Country Gardens

And then I bought some hellebores and some hot pink bleeding hearts to drown out the mousy and diminutive pale pink native variety that I have in the shade garden. 

All in all it was a very good time. Be sure to check out Scott's photos of the feature gardens over at Rhone Street Gardens. And if you're interested in attending the Spring Home and Garden Show, THAT'S at the Expo Center next weekend. 

Tagged!

Amy tagged me!

Despite the fact that the game of tag always resulted in me slipping in my mary janes, eating asphalt, and crying in the nurse's office, I'm going to play.

Here are the rules:

1. Post these rules
2. You must post 11 random things about yourself
3. Answer the questions set for you in their post
4. Are jokes about "there is no Fight Club" still funny?

 11 random things about yourself:

1. I've kept a journal my entire life. I've shredded some of them and kept others. My sister and I have a pact that if one of us dies, the other will fly to the their house and burn their journals. I secretly think my sister will read mine first.
2. I get really handsy on planes. It's not the flying; it's the Xanax and alcohol I need to get on a plane. I love you so much. No really, I dooooooo.
3. I drink a stupid amount of water so I pee more than 30 times per day.
4. I'm high strung and I always have been. I hate it, and yet: I get a lot done. Think of what I could achieve if I wasn't peeing all the time!
5. I don't think Sarah Winchester was crazy or worried about ghosts. I think she just loved home improvement. I think she would have been an awesome home blogger. Who amongst us hasn't accidentally built a staircase to nowhere?
6. I like having secrets. Everyone should have some. Someday I want a swing-out painting that hides a wall safe. Or a bookcase that hides a secret room. And in it I will watch The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills without having to hear someone sighing loudly in the next room, GREG.
7. I have the best family. I totally won the parental lottery. The older I get the more people I know with strained parental relations and I feel even luckier for having such a supportive family that I genuinely like being around.
8. My mother was a total DIY rockstar, without the Internet. Growing up she was constantly redecorating our house on a tiny budget. There was nothing she couldn't make/fix/do. She is the reason I knew I'd be okay buying a fixer. I'm still hoping she'll teach me how to hang wallpaper.
9. Now that I have EIGHT nieces and nephews (plus Greg's two!) I've realized that all kids are really weird. You were weird too. Let's all stop pretending anything or anyone is normal.
10. I am super cheesy but can't abide it in other people. I'll be over-the-top sappy but if someone else tries it I roll my eyes and dry heave.
11. I can't paint without singalong music, which is how I know that it's much more embarrassing to be caught singing the Glee cover of Endless Love than any song on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode.

What is your #1 best memory – the one that will always make you smile?

I totally can't write about any of my favorite memories because my parents read this blog. But pretty high up there would be celebrating at the bar after my graduation from library school. All of my friends came up to watch and I felt really celebrated. It was a blast.

Literate for life, yo.

If you could do anything (career wise), and money was no object, what would that be?

An Alvin Ailey dancer or a gardener. Or a garden consultant. I just want to talk about plants all day with other people who like plants.

What is the most awesome place you’ve ever visited?

Probably Florence, Italy. It's a ridiculous city--the art, the architecture, the food, the beauty. How did one country get so lucky? Of course, they have Berlusconi. So.

What is your go-to comfort food?

Kraft mac and cheese or egg noodles with butter, parmesan, and lots of salt.

What is your guilty pleasure (that you’re willing to admit to in a public forum?)

The Bachelor. It's horrible. I have to watch it even though the current bachelor can't use adverbs (he wants to "kiss her so bad" or "take it serious") or open a bottle of champagne properly despite the fact that he OWNS A WINERY. You pull the bottle away from the cork, no bubbles get spilled, and you still get to aggressively tongue that "VIP cocktail waitress" with a made up name. JEEZ.

And he always wears a vest. How does that work?

Favorite way to relieve stress?

Working really hard in the garden or dance class, followed by a long shower and wine in my jammies.

Favorite book?

Despite my suspicion that John Steinbeck hated women, East of Eden. It's followed closely by Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner or Plainsong by Kent Haruf. I love the Western experience.

Favorite movie?

Moonstruck. I dare you to find a better scene than Nicolas Cage knocking the kitchen table over, picking Cher up, and yelling, "Son of a bitch!"

What are you good at that hardly ever gets recognized? (example, are you a masterful karaoke singer? do you play a mean harmonica? is your hidden talent hopscotch?)

Whistling. I can totally whistle.

What did your 10-year-old self want to be when you grew up? Do you still want that? (Are you that?)

I honestly can't remember. When I was very young I wanted to be a housekeeper (I would clean my friends' bedrooms growing up, if they'd let me) and then I think maybe I wanted to be a teacher? I definitely wanted to be an eater at The Sizzler's all-you-can-eat buffet. So in that sense, yes, I am that.

What's holding you back?

Debt and doubt. Double-dipt cones. Possibly dub-step. I have no idea what dub-step is and it makes me feel ancient.

Tagged:

Ami.
Jess.
Anne.
Laura.

Same questions. But no pressure to do this, if it's not your bag.