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What seemed like a month was compressed into 11 days in Mexico. Each day was organized with field trips, demonstrations and 4 days of art making. I have way too many photographs to share but will begin at the end with the small city of Oaxaca, the final destination. The Day of the Dead festivities had already begun with thunderous booms (like canons going off) over the town to waken the dead and remind them that it's time to come home and celebrate with the family. 

For a camera I tried a little experiment and primarily used a 50 mm lens (f-stop 1.4). This fantastic little lens was a film camera lens, so I had to manually focus and adjust my aperture. Even though I was using my new Nikon Z6, the latest in full frame, mirrorless Nikon digital cameras, I was adding a lens that predated digital. It was a challenge and I see that the shallow depth of field didn't always work, but I had a lot of fun with this easy to carry light lens.

The street art was unbelievable, beyond what I had imagined. The use of flowers was the biggest highlight for me. I even bought a small bouquet of tuberoses to have on hand and enjoy the fragrance. Primary flowers for Day of the Dead are marigolds, red celosia or cockscomb, calla lilies, and tuberose. The cemeteries are filled with people, visiting their lost relatives and celebrating with them. The grave sites are decorated and candles are lit for the night. Special candles can be bought that are three feet tall. 

Ofrendas are set up in every home and business, these are shrines that hold photographs of lost friends and relatives and the food, drinks or other items they liked. Sugar skulls, pan dulce (a local bread), citrus, mescal or tequila, were common items you might find on ofrendas. The ritual dates back to Aztec culture where they believe there are three levels with the deceased existing on the top tier and their spirit on the lower tier. Items such as candles, a mirror and soap and towel are left for the spirit. Incense is burned, a resin from a the Copal tree or Protium copal to ward off evil spirits.

Parades are short but all day events with some beginning early in the morning. The architecture was incredible, the buildings are painted with bright colors and the churches are magnificent and reverent, which makes an incredible backdrop for the daily activities. 

These photographs are in random order, but all from Oaxaca. 

When the children take part in parades, the adults surround them on all sides. I was able to catch a few of these adorable children in costume.

This street performer was incredible. He waved his hand to change the music which played from speakers under the cloth (which was clever) and he handed out fortunes. The costume and theatrics were well practiced and there was a always a line to give him money. A few street performers from New Orleans could learn a lesson from the gold man.

I will continue with a post about the great Tule tree, a Taxodium that is over 2,000 years old and more adventures in Mexico City and Oaxaca. 

Traveling

Today I leave for a most excellent adventure. Traveling with my middle sister and my traveling buddy Sharon Ross, we are off to Mexico City and then Oaxaca for Day of the Dead celebrations. Our days are full as we join others and also create art. So follow me on Instagram or wait for my return for some exciting tales. Sadly there will be no pumpkin carving this year, but plenty of excitement.

Wisconsin in August

The perfect hostess talked me out of visiting Wisconsin in June, instead recommending August, a nice time to leave the heat of Northern Virginia. Little did I know that it was also the peak week to go for cherry picking, and of course the weather was delightful. My destination was Sister Bay, a small village that is filled with tourists in the summer and located on a narrow peninsula that extends into the waters of Green Bay and Lake Michigan. At its narrowest point it's not even four miles wide so one can walk to the beach either way with fresh water that extends as far as the eye can see. 

The summer gardens there are gorgeous; hollyhocks don't get rust, you can grow lettuce in the summer, and there is even an indigenous primrose (primula). My explorations included wild areas, art galleries with sculpture gardens, and cherry orchards, (which are everywhere).  I met artists, goats, honeybees and sailors, blues singers, hard cider makers, and wayside farm owners. All in just four days. 

My favorite artist was Pamela Murphy, not only is she a painter but she grows 90% of her own food with everything from goats for milk and cheese, chickens, geese, and all sorts of fruits and vegetables. 

Pamela Murphy with Karla (the perfect hostess)

Pamela's art studio is in an old dairy barn where she hangs her canvases to coat with gesso which is liberally added layer by layer to create texture. Silver and gold leaf are a large part of her process and they are also added, often in a random fashion. 

I met my first goats here, one was an escape artist and loved chewing on my clothes.

Steven Woodward was another artist that creates very large installation pieces. His studios are in rental units, where he can store pieces that were larger than the height of any standard house ceiling. Made of wood, metal, and fabric, they were incredible. This is a museum piece that utilizes braided rugs, unbraided and recreated.

Karla's maiden name is Grasse so we visited her cousin who has a vineyard and is bottling wine. They also have goats and Karla keeps her honeybees there so I was able to suit up and learn a bit about how to take care of them.

There was a sunset sail on Lake Michigan from Sister Bay, and we had to help with the riggings, or the sails, or whatever he was talking about (the jargon was lost on me).

I was also treated to a native plant walk at The Ridges Sanctuary with is a bay that has been washed over by the waters of Lake Michigan where they are dumped in ridges that can be narrow or very large. The plant diversity was incredible with wetlands and dry ridges. There are pockets of boreal forest, mostly black spruce. A mistletoe species parasitizes the younger trees which causes them to develop witches brooms, which are clusters of branches growing from a tight junction. The small red growths are the mistletoe.

a black spruce with multiple witches brooms

Jens Jensen, the famous landscape architect from Denmark created a school at the tip of the peninsula which is called The Clearing Folk School. Well known for his council rings, there is one there but I also noticed many in surrounding gardens. 

Nearby are the bluffs where the terrain rises very high and the trees grab onto the rocky soil and their roots are exposed. 

As Karla pointed out, imagine this with a light coating of snow?

The cherries were picked on my second day there, $53. worth. The picking was simple, lift your hand and fill it full of dangling cherries which detach from their stem with such ease that you wonder if it's a function of hybridization or just how cherries work? The Ballantine cherries were ripe and Karla's favorite for Cherry Bounce, so they're mine too. I have tried repeatedly to imitate her recipe only to figure out that it's all about the cherry. 

We drove to the nearest Piggly Wiggly to choose our alcohol, I prefer mine with brandy and Karla likes bourbon or whiskey, and we had them in jars by nights end. Her plan is to mail them to me, and you cannot open the jars until Thanksgiving. I know it will be extra special, and I'm already planning my trip back.

Cheers!   

 

Maple Syrup

On the cusp of spring, closer to winter, across a broad swath of northern North America, maple trees are being tapped for sap. Quebec, Canada is the highest producer of maple syrup, followed by the state of Vermont, a product that is unique to this continent.
The sugar maple or Acer saccharum is not the only maple that produces sweet sap, but the one with the highest sugar content. Occasionally I have icicles where sapsuckers have drilled into my tree, and these are mildly sweet, which is a nice treat on a cold day. The southern most regions of maple syrup production are in the mountains of West Virginia and Virginia with a Maple Syrup Festival in Monterey, Virginia. This year's dates are March 9-10 and 16-17.
The flow of sap relies on two events, nights below 32 degrees followed by a day of 40 degrees or more. The entire process ends when freezing nights stop, so February and early March are the only months for maple sap harvests. Naturally there is a longer freeze cycle in northern climates, where the harvest is extended. Either way, production will vary from year to year, region to region.

Historically the trees were tapped with metal spouts that held a bucket. Each large tree can hold numerous buckets and be repeatedly tapped. The tree will heal and seal over past drill sites over the course of a year. Modern collecting uses tubes that connect the trees and flow with gravity or incorporate a vacuum to speed up the process.

The raw sap is 98% water, which is boiled off, the steam escaping through open roofs in sugar shacks. To avoid burning, more sap is gradually added in large vats which are heated with wood fires that burn day and night. The process is labor and time intensive with a goal of 6% sugar content.

In recent years a process has been developed which separates water from sugar by forcing the sap through filters with high pressure, reducing the amount of liquid to boil down. Both time and wood for fires are reduced, with the extra water often diverted and stored in tanks for alternative uses.

Outside of Monterey, Virginia in the small town of Hightown there is a sugar camp, the Rexrode's Sugar Orchard. Home to a long line of Rexrodes, my husband's uncle ran the operation until he passed and it is now operated by a grandson. The maple trees are many and very old, 200 to 250 years old, highlighted in the book "Remarkable Trees of Virginia". If you visit, it's an uphill climb from Monterey, the hills are steep, the landscape beautiful. Coined "Virginia's Little Switzerland", it’s been said that settlers thought it looked like home and decided to stay. Conventional agriculture is challenging, most farmers raise sheep with some cattle and/or turkeys.

In the sugar shacks it's warm and steamy. Large vats filled with sap boil away; the vats on in the Rexrode Sugar Orchard produce 9 gallons of maple syrup each. Rarely enough for the surge of visitors which also come for the concentrated maple sugar candy, which is left in the bottom of the vat once the liquid is removed. They called them clinkers, which is probably a local term because I find no mention of them on the internet. In my case, clinkers don't make it home, so tasty and delicious, they are consumed with delight.

Black and White

Nineteen participants enjoyed a fun week of instruction from Michael deMeng in New Orleans this past week. One of many highlights was our second line parade with the Panorama Brass Band. To prepare for our Noir themed event we participated in a 3 hour makeup tutorial. The idea was to transforms ourselves into black and white. When it came to donning costumes and wigs, the makeup really paid off, in fact my phone with face recognition didn't know me. 

That is a monkey on KD's shoulder, a very realistic, not real monkey.

A gathering in the lobby allowed us to photograph each other before we headed out for the big parade through the French Quarter.

Gary was partially (mostly) responsible for the theme this year and suggested Noir movies to watch for the prior year so we would be ready to immerse ourselves into the part.

Kathy even brought her own street light!

 

Once on the street we danced and danced!

And that my friends is the recipe for a good time!

 

The Cullowhee Native Plant Conference - part 2

Other than the kudzu, areas of northern North Carolina can be almost pristine. The small town, more like an outpost, of Cullowhee is clothed in kudzu vine, it creeps into the road and smothers the mailboxes that line it. Imagine having to uncover your mailbox to receive mail? There is a guard rail along the road, but it looks like a green bump at certain times of the year. But higher up, adjacent to the Blue Ridge Parkway there are fields and forests that are lush with all kinds of native plants. Between the acidic soil, the size of the native surrounds, and the high altitude, very few invasive species have crept in. Along wide trails you may find some orchard grass or the occasional timothy, spread from the intermittent horse that is ridden through the area. 

A fieldtrip to the Graveyard Meadow was for botanizing. There was a dense fog, it was chilly, oh how I wished I had brought a jacket. There were lots of spruce trees, weeping seeps, and the occasional rare orchid. 

The lowest level of plants were ericaceous, blueberries grow here, as do lichens, running club moss, and Indian pipe or Monotropa uniflora. The trees are stunted from the cold winters and the low pH. This small carnivorous sundew plant had just captured a crane fly. 

There was a large angelica along the trails and roads, Angelica venenosa. The flowers were just opening, very small and green, the mason wasps were there for nectar but too cold to move. 

Lowbush blueberries were common, some with ripe fruit.

Larry Mellichamp was our botanical guide, our other voluntary leader was John Manion of the Birmingham Botanical Gardens, eyes always peeled for unusual specimens.

Following are a string of plants we found as we ventured on.

The next stop was the McKinney Meadow in the town of Cashiers, NC. A pesky triangle of land was transferred into a meadow and is maintained by volunteers. July is a fine time to visit. 

The conference was split by 2 days of lectures and 2 days of fieldtrips or workshops. On our last evening there is a cookout and talent show. Young scholarship winners are required to participate and reveal another talent, maybe something not horticulturally related. Or maybe related, it's all good. We listened to poetry, did a camp song, one young man was a summer camp counselor, and watched 2 girls have a staring contest, they claimed to have no other talent. Needless to say, it was loads of fun!

Anyone and everyone was invited to show their talents, we listened to bluegrass music, heard some original songs, and really laughed when Greg Tepper (director of the Delaware Botanic Gardens) did a skit with Erica Galetin on plant pronunciation, or the proper way to speak Latin. Wish I had videotaped it.

On my arrival home, I immediately set up a moth cloth with a black light. Knowing this is National Moth Week, I was hoping for a slew of visitors, especially with my night garden and the many, many years that I have maintained it. Well, it was disappointing, there were lots of beetles. On my second night I decided to take the flashlight into the garden. There were plenty of moths, busy sipping the nectar of my night blooming flowers. We don't need no stinkin black light, and so it goes. Put up the moth cloth if you don't have a night garden, otherwise forget about it!

 

National Moth Week

I have returned from a truly wonderful experience, the Cullowhee Native Plant Conference, held at the Western Carolina University. Two of those nights involved moths, it was our night entertainment. It also may have been the activity I was most excited about. And as it turns out, this is National Moth Week, July 23-31, the numbers of night flying moths will decline after this week. We were guided by Lenny Lempel, the mothman, and his nocturnal setup or lure. He works for Mecklenburg County and is responsible for their moth nights, which are very popular. 

His setup involves a white cloth and a blacklight. Apparently a blacklight works better than an incandescent, but a mercury vapor light is better yet, just hard on the eyes. 

You can see that people were photographing the moths with their smartphones, it helps to have a flashlight handy, to light up the moths. I will be setting up something much simpler at home, my night garden will be the perfect place to lure them in. I did capture a few decent photographs, all identified with Lenny's help. His favorite book is Peterson's Field Guide to Moths, the Southeastern version. 

If you scroll over the photograph it will give you the name, the above moth is commonly known as the inchworm, in its premoth form.

Aside from moths there were fieldtrips, lectures and workshops. Many were concurrent sessions, so you had to decide which one to take. The days were filled, starting with breakfast at 7:00 AM. 

I decided on the Highlands Biological Station and private gardens fieldtrip and you have to trust me when I say that I can't begin to show you all of the photographs I took. Our Highlands tour was lead by Larry Mellichamp, a brainiac in my book. As a simple overview, the zone is 6, occasionally 5, 70 to 100 inches of rain a year (we get 35 to 40"), Rhododendron maximum is a weed, and the soil is very acidic.  The altitude was 4,018 feet, which is only slightly lower than the highest peak in the Shenandoah National Park; Hawksbill Mountain.

Lilium superbum was blooming along the roadside, which lead to my first question, where are all of the deer? They have more bear than deer, or so I was told.

Some very exotic plants inhabit this special part of the country; below are some highlights of the Highlands Biological Station, a garden dedicated to the plants that William Bartram collected. Below is the lichen known as tree lungwort or Lobaria pulmonaria. Like the plant, pulmonaria, it was thought that the growth resembled a lung.

Below is Rose palustris or swamp rose, a native that lives in swampy places.

This is a climbing fern, commonly referred to as the American Climbing fern or Lycopodium palmatum.

This half day or morning was followed by 2 private gardens and a meadow planting, all stunning - of course. I will follow with them as I continue to log my photographs. 

And it rained plenty while I was gone. Maybe I should have requested less...

 

Mardi Gras

Back from the dead, or so I feel, for a full two weeks I suffered. The cough, the bronchitis, it's diminishing and I feel so happy to have it behind me. Awful, awful stuff!!! 

So on this day of festivities, the beginning of Lent and the Mardi Gras, I will share the last of my trip to New Orleans for the Michael deMeng workshop. Besides the art, there was a trip to a place called "Escape My Room". Groups of (up to) eight are formed and we are tasked with solving a murder mystery and escaping our room(s). It was great fun but we were the only group that didn't make it out within our one hour time slot. Hence our photograph with some sour faces (we were so close, so close.... really!).

Another stop is called "The Music Box" and it's another worthwhile place to visit. We were treated to a private concert, the instruments are the buildings themselves. Designed and built to play music, everything from percussion, horns, and spinning objects that make various sounds, it's just incredible. My favorite may have been the "Chateau Polet" which looks like a pergola with a peak roof, various fans are built into the sides and when pullies are turned, they each make a different sound, like wind blowing but in different pitches.  This is Lois playing "The Shake House" which sounds like clapping boards, even the floor plays.

Joanne on the horns and a few of us in the telephone booth, a very large, four sided siren was mounted on the top and your words would cause it to spin and morph the sound. Just fantastic!

A trip to the New Orleans Museum of Art was such a highlight. I have seen the sculpture garden but had never entered the museum. Three hours later, it was incredible and if time had allotted I would have stayed much longer. Since I have recently taken an online class with Michael deMeng on the surrealist artists and that time period, I was happy to see originals of many he talked about. Max Ernst, Joan Mira, even Pablo Picasso.

Our costume event was a second line parade with Tarot Cards as our theme. This is always an outstanding event and for the first time, we actually had quite a few people join us and parade with us right to the end. We are lead by a police escort and The Panorama Brass Band.

I was the card "Strength", which looks like this:

The significance of the card is control, a lack of fear, the woman is holding the lion's mouth open. It's about resilience, vitality, and balance. It's the card I chose because it felt right and it's also the art piece I had started in my studio at home. My costume was a lion mask and I am in the mouth of the lion. 

I finished my assemblage piece just tonight and am very happy with it. I believe I was able to convey the calm and keep many of the colors from the original card.

Otherwise, the shenanigans of New Orleans are required. Pat O'Briens for a Hurricane and some piano music:

Spent three nights at Preservation Hall with front row seats, that my friends is "The Bomb"!

Happy Mardi Gras to my friends near and far!

January

Before this month leaves I wanted to share a few photographs from my annual trip to New Orleans. This trip was one of the best with a full schedule and things falling into place. The workshop that I attend is planned around assemblage art with our hilarious teacher Michael deMeng. Katherine Engen is the organizer, thankfully it's a big city with lots to do because there have been 8 such trips (in 8 years) and the fun continues. Full of exploration, food, music, and drink, although many of us have become very familiar with where to go and we fill any extra time revisiting some favorite places.   

The art was so spectacular, our theme was Tarot cards, we were to pick a few to build from and also design our costumes with that in mind. For the first time I traveled with no idea what was going to happen when it came to creating, usually I have at least 2 projects, often put together (to some degree), to make sure I finish. The week goes fast!

I built my assemblage based on the cards "The Hierophant" and "The Lovers" no deep meaning here, I just worked with the cards and added some bits that make it significant. 

Some folks made more than 2 pieces, which was very impressive. Here is a small representation of the art that was made in our limited time. 

The big breaks in our schedule include 2 parades. One is our own Second Line Parade. It's a long walk with lot's of hand waving so I don't bring my big camera, but there will be photographs, I will post them in the next blog. The larger parade is the first of Mardi Gras called the Krewe du Vieux. Every year I make the trek, even though this year there was a threat of rain,  in fact the possibility for some downpours and a thunderstorm. Fortunately it was fine and the parade was a huge success. 

I have been to so many Krewe du Vieux parades that I am starting to recognize faces. This year was one of the best, the threat of rain kept big crowds away. 

This is classified as an X rated parade but I thought it was a little tamer than usual. I did blur this ladies sign, but otherwise there was the usually spanking, throwing of unusual charms, and crude floats. All in all, a good time was had by all!

 

Rockabilly Rumble

Metal, imagination, fabrication, and cars all come together at the Rockabilly Rumble! A one day event that fills a large field where rat rods, hot rods, and finely tuned race cars meet to show off. The fine details of each car sends my head a wizzin! What you may not know is that I wanted to be a car painter in my early 20's. I owned an air brush and took classes, unfortunately car shops didn't want a female painter, too much of a distraction they said. But that little love of this stuff never left. So here are 20 or so photographs. The 409 Chevy big block engine that gave the Beach Boys something to sing about, or the incredible pinstriping and hood ornaments, and humor!

yes, that is a barbed wire grill