Spring flowers and planting!

It's the lovely time of year when I get to bulk up my garden with flowers. There are few things that make me more cheerful. I had to deadhead the last of the tulip bulbs last weekend, but let's remember them in their glory for a moment first. This photo was taken about a month ago, when the daffodil and tulip blooms overlapped for a bit:

Here are some of the flowers that we have just planted over the past few days:

We planted some Avalanche clematis to go around one of the other posts for our fence. The Rubens clematis (in the foreground) that I planted last year has been growing nicely. Hopefully we can start to train the plants to go across the lintel trellis this year. I'm excited to have different-colored flowers growing up the trellis. It reminds me a bit of the different flowers that grow together in the story of Snow White and Rose Red.

 Here's a detail of the Avalanche clematis, before we took it off of its planter trellis. This clematis only grows about 8' tall, so I hope it can at least get high enough to start to decorate the top of the lintel.

 We planted an Asao clematis on the other side of the fence post. This one has a ways to grow before it even begins to climb up the fence, but I think it will be a fun addition. I hope this one does alright in the sun. This one will grow to be about ten feet tall. We have one remaining post that needs a climbing plant, and I'm debating between doing something like ivy (just to make sure that the top of the trellis gets covered with greenery) or another clematis that is supposed to grow at least 20-30' in length.

We planted Gerber daisies in the corners of our front garden beds, underneath the small trees near the house. I hope they do well; I know that they are not hardy flowers. I'm not supposed to let the soil dry out for these flowers.

You can't see them too well, but I planted three little Dwarf Coreopsis starters between the allium and the daffodil stalks. These are mounding perennials that were on sale for only about a dollar. They will have little yellow flowers that I need to remove after they are spent. On a side note, look how big the Japanese peony has gotten! The Bowles Mauve Wallflower which I planted last year (another plant that was on sale for a dollar or two) has gotten really huge:

The Bowles Mauve Wallflower is definitely the happiest plant in our garden, ever since I planted it last year. I love that we get to enjoy blooms year round.

In fact, since our purple wallflower has done so well, I wondered if this perennial, the "Tasmanian Tiger" (spurge) euphorbia, would do well. I love the striped leaves, and I these cream-colored flowers are really interesting. It looks like two blooms come out of another bloom, so there is this interesting tiered effect. This plant is upposed to grow between two and three feet in height.

 Next to the euphorbia I planted a Harmony Scarlet Anemone. You can't see to well in this photo, but these flowers have beautiful blue and white centers. They would be great flowers for the 4th of July, but they bloom in the spring.

Behind this flower I planted three little Origami Blue & White Columbine plants, which were also marked down to about a dollar apiece. These are perennials, so I hope that they do well and come back. They are supposed to grow to about 16-18" in height.

 On the other side of the house, just on the border of my wildflower garden bed, I planted a Lady Stratheden Grecian Rose (isn't that a marvelous name?). This is a perennial that probably won't get much larger than its current height (about two feet tall).

 Along the rest of the wildflower bed, I scattered some zinnias and stock that I got for fifty cents apiece. Since our tulips are spent and our wildflowers haven't opened yet, I wanted to add in some color.

And finally this is just a detail of the hanging basket that I put on our porch. I've never seen this type of verbena before, but I love it. Sam thinks they look like peppermint candies. There is also lobelia and calibrachoa in this pot, but I think the verbena will be my favorite.

One more update: The gladiolus have sprouted again! They are about three inches tall.

Mozart and Allegri's "Miserere, mei Deus"

Tonight, through the generosity of a friend, I got to attend a performance of the Tudor Choir at the Blessed Sacrament Church. This group specializes in Renaissance polyphony, which is some of my favorite choral music in the world. The theme for the night was "Music of the Sistine Chapel," which included music from the 16th and 17th centuries that was composed by individuals who were members of - or closely connected to - the Sistine Chapel's papal choir.

My favorite song that was performed is the famous "Miserere, mei Deus." It was lovely, especially because the choir split up and sang from different areas within the church. There was a quartet located behind the audience, up in the balcony by the choir. Another soloist stood on side of the church in the transept, and then the rest of the choir remained in the front of the building. Ethereal music floated to the congregation from all different directions; it was the best type of "surround sound" that you can imagine. If you are not familiar with this song, here is a performance of this piece (sung by The Tallis Scholars):



The program from tonight's concert included some really interesting historical information about this song, especially how Mozart played a part in popularizing this song in the 18th century. Although the story seems a little bit like a myth (and I noticed that the program pulled some of this information directly off of a Wikipedia entry that lacks citations), I thought that I would share it. This is what was included in my program:

"Miserere, mei Deus is easily the most famous vocal work of the Renaissance, largely due to an edition dating from the early-20th century, which included a soaring high C for the soprano in the odd-numbered verses sung by a quartet. The work started out as a simple succession of chords to which Pslam 51 was chanted, but over decades of exclusive performances by the Papal choir, embellishments were added by singers and the piece evolved into a legendary work. A heightened sense of mystery surrounded the piece as the Papal choir jealously guarded it from others. Occasionally a copy of the music would make its way out into the world, once via a young Mozart, who copied the work from memory after hearing a performance.

According to the popular story (backed up by family letters), the fourteen-year-old Mozart was visiting Rome, when he first heard the piece during the Wednesday service. Later that day, he wrote it down entirely from memory, returning to the Chapel that Friday to make minor corrections. Some time during his travels, he met the British historian Dr Charles Burney, who obtained the piece from him and took it to London, where it was published in 1771. Once the piece was published, the ban was lifted; Mozart was summoned to Rome by the Pope, only instead of excommunicating the boy, the Pope showered praises on him for his feat of musical genius. The work was also transcribed by Felix Mendelssohn in 1831 and Franz Liszt, and various other 18th and 19th century sources survive. Since the lifting of the ban, Allegri's Miserere has become one of the most popular a cappella choral works now performed."

If I can find a historical source to help support this story about Mozart, I will include it in this post in the future. Really, I'm a little bit surprised to see a lack of information on this particular subject online. So far, I have just found a site discussing this story in relation to copyright laws.

Sam the writer!

 "Ciuotes hawl at te moon" = "Coyotes howl at the moon"

Sam brought this paper home from his little preschool today. I think they are learning about coyotes this week. He said that he wrote this by trying to figure out the words in his head. This is his first real attempt at writing a full sentence on his own, and I think he did a pretty good job!

I have to admit, I can't take a lot of the credit for his writing skills. We practice a bit at home, but he has really been practicing most of his writing while at his little preschool. I'm really pleased with the curriculum that they use at this school; Sam is very well prepared for kindergarten this fall.

Sam's "Mogabi" Desert

Over the past few days, Sam has been fascinated with Google Earth and geography. I think this whole fascination came about because he played a little geography game on the computer at the library last week. In this game, you could visit different parts of the world and take pictures of the monuments and landmarks that were in the area. One of the areas was Egypt, and Sam "took a picture" of the Sphinx while playing the game. He has a bit of an interest in Egyptian culture, and he was excited to recognize the Sphinx while he played this game.

A few days later, J and Sam were looking at different deserts that are on Google Earth. J told Sam about the Gobi Desert in Asia and the Mojave Desert in California. Sam also is aware that there are sandy areas in Egypt, and I think all of these recent events helped to inspire the drawing he made at school today:

Sam told me that this is a picture of the "Mogabi Desert" (which must be a conflation of the Gobi and Mojave). The triangle-shaped image is one of the pyramids at Giza. The figure on the bottom is the Sphinx. (The other shapes in the upper-left corner were ones that he tried to erase.) He also brought home two other drawings with this same general composition, but they also were "erased" a bit because he didn't like how they turned out. It's kind of fun to think about how he had a specific idea in mind for his drawing; he wanted to make sure that he got it right.

My art-historical heart is happy to see Sam taking an interest in art, especially Egyptian art. And I'm tickled that he's trying to incorporate his new understanding of geography into his little world. I don't know of too many four year olds who are interested in the drawing pictures of a desert.

Jerry Lewis Photographs

J and I have a date tonight to see my favorite octogenarian. I'm very excited but also a little bit nervous to go. What if Jerry Lewis isn't funny as an old man?

To both feed my excitement and psychologically prepare for disappointment, this morning I've been looking at images of Jerry Lewis from when he was much younger. Even if he is old, I'm hoping that tonight I can see a hint of the funny facial expressions that I love:

Many photos found from HERE.

UPDATE:  Well, the performance was kind of a train wreck. He forgot the punch lines for more than half of his jokes, and he muddled several stories. His bandleader sat near Jerry at the piano with an intent look on his face; he was trying to follow the jokes and give Jerry prompts when needed. In between jokes, or sometimes during the middle of a joke, Jerry kept turning to the bandleader and either ask for a prompt or say, "Did I finish that one?"

Then Jerry held a Q & A with the audience, which ended up being thirty minutes of audience members speaking who didn't have questions to ask, but just said "I love you, Jerry," over and over. Some people wanted to stand up and voice their support of the Muscular Dystrophy Foundation. One lady wanted to say that she and her husbands were soul mates, because they both collected money for muscular dystrophy as children (?!?). Jerry kept saying that the purpose of this Q &A is to ask questions, but hardly anyone really did that. He was a little bit frustrated, along with most of the audience.

Ah well. It was a horrible show, and I felt rather confused and very tired as we walked out of the building. I think I silently exerted a lot of energy in my seat, because I kept hoping that the performance would improve. It didn't, but it was fun to at least see Jerry and applaud for him nonetheless. If anything, I was glad that he could hear my applause for all of the movies and television shows that have made me laugh over the years.

Sam's Perspective of the Lake Quinault Trip

J let Sam use his nice camera while we were in Lake Quinault, although Sam had to promise not to mess with the settings. For the most part, he was pretty good about leaving buttons alone. He loved taking photos with the camera and ended up taking over 300 pictures over the little trip. He would often take a picture and then exclaim, "Got it!"

Here are a few pictures that Sam took. It's always fun for me think about his perspective of the world and his perspective on the world.

Lake Quinault Trails

Last weekend, when we visited Lake Quinault Lodge, we went on a few short hikes in the area. Before going on any hikes/walks, we drove up the main rode (beyond the Sitka Spruce shown on the right side of this map), to see a beautiful (unnamed?) waterfall just off of the main road (right before the road turns into a gravel road):

After seeing this waterfall, we then turned around and went back down the main road. Our first little walk was to see the so-called World's Largest Sitka Spruce. This was a very short, flat walk off of the main road.

This Sitka Spruce has a circumference of 58 feet and 11 inches, a height of 191 feet, a spread of 96 feet, and total of 922 AFA (American Forest Association) points. It is estimated to be about 1,000 years old.

We then went further down the road and hiked to Cascade Falls. There were a few slightly steep moments, but this was an easy hike for Sam to do. (He only grumbled a little!) We hiked to-and-from this waterfall on a loop trail, which was less than a mile altogether.

If you look really closely, you can see me and Sam standing on a bridge over the falls.

Our last little nature walk was the Rain Forest Nature Trail Loop, which was only half a mile in length. It was fun to visit this nature trail; the nearby Ho Rainforest is the only rainforest in North America (since it receives 150 inches of rainfall per year).

 

There were signs about the rainforest wildlife and ecosystem along the trail. (Sam took this picture of J.) I learned from one of the signs that a dead (or dying) tree which has lost its branches, yet still stands up, is called a snag.

Sam also took this picture of me and J through a hollow log.

There were a lot of trees in this area which had fallen down, so we saw a lot of interesting tree trunks and roots up close. This is just an image of one root system that I thought was particularly interesting. We read on one sign that the trees have relatively shallow root systems because there is so much rainfall. As a result, many trees get knocked over by the wind.

We had a fun time hiking in this area near Lake Quinault. I would love to go back another time and explore trails in the Ho Rainforest itself.