Tuesday, July 27, 2010

More news!!! Gonna be on TV!

Well, I was just thrilled to have an article in our own South Dakota Magazine...and now I just found out that South Dakota Public TV wants to do a segment on my gardens and art for their 'Dakota Life' show!! Blew me away!
This is what happened: about 5 years ago my husband, Loren (I call him my biggest 'cheerleader'!), emailed the show to tell them about my art. Well, we never heard anything and soon forgot about it. Then the other day I got an email from them saying they want to do an interview and taping. Thank goodness I just finished my spring cleaning! Now to hope that we don't get any bad storms to tear up my gardens. They will be coming out next Wednesday, Aug. 4th. Already losing sleep over this! But should be lots of fun, too!

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Gardens are a-bloomin'!





In spite of the wind (recently had 4 days and nights of 30-40 mph winds!) my gardens are full of blooms. Sorry to say that I did lose my entire first flush of bee balm. But I cut off all the ruined blooms and many crispy leaves and now a new flush has started...so should get some nice ones to press soon.
The blue butterfly delphinium is an beautiful electric blue this year...these petals are essential for pressing and using for skies. And I add some of the white delphinium petals for clouds. I was a bit disappointed that the larkspur I let reseed (instead of using the fresh seed I bought!) has all turned out to be a single type flower. I can use these, but I really prefer the double larkspur for pressing. And I am once more having problems with powdery mildew on these plants. So far the delphinium is not affected...but just a matter of time now, I'm afraid.
I have gardens at two places, as you can see from the photos. My garden at the lake house is still in progress...but don't tell Loren, my husband!

Thursday, July 8, 2010

My 'bud', Terica

One of my best 'buds' at the World Wide Pressed Flower Guild is Terica. She is an excellent gardener, presser and artistist! And in her spare time (right!) she keeps up a really good blog:
http://flowersbyter ica.blogspot. com
She has a contest going on right now that, should you decide to enter, might win you 50 of her pressed flowers! And if you have a nagging notion that you might like to get into this wonderful art, Terica has loads of information on pressing and designing with flowers. Check her out!