Tag: dry stream bed

Vintage landscape: rocky road

Cindy at enclos*ure6 Comments

Dry stream bed, via Library of Congress “Road to Nicholson Hollow. Shenandoah National Park, Virginia,” October 1935, by Arthur Rothstein, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

I think this would be a good reference picture for making a dry stream bed path through a naturalistic garden (click to enlarge).

More on Nicholson Hollow this Sunday. . . .

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura
che la diritta via era smarrita

The Divine Comedy – Pt. 1 Inferno – Canto 1 – (1-3)

13. In the middle of the journey
of our life
I came to myself
In a dark forest
The straightforward way
Misplaced.
(Schwerner, 2000)

— Caroline Bergvall, from “VIA” (48 Dante Variations)

The new garden

Cindy at enclos*ure4 Comments

Note:  There is gallery of photos at the end.  I’m still having trouble successfully inserting pictures into my posts without tears.

This spring I started my seventh garden.  As a Foreign Service spouse, that’s how it’s been: move, make a garden; move, make a garden . . . . Five in Africa, one in Chevy Chase, Md.  Now, here we go again.

We bought our 1920’s rowhouse last August.  The back garden is about 16′ x 74′.  We’re really lucky to have this much space in Glover Park, where normal is a tiny plot in front and a deck overlooking a parking pad out back.

What was already in our long narrow garden was not bad.  We have a deck, which sits about 4′ above the ground,  a 6 1/2′ tall stockade fence — nicely weathered — and a flagstone sidewalk to the back gate.

There’s a huge old holly tree (a male apparently, no berries) about two thirds of the way back.  It provides morning and mid-day shade and shields us from the view of some Wisconsin Avenue shops and restaurants (and their noise).  Unfortunately, it also drops its prickly little leaves like crazy in mid spring. Continue reading “The new garden” →