The Cavanaugh backyard, a shady paradise. / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

WELL, I THOUGHT, I could write about gardening. 

That was in June of 2016, when I was searching for a perch at Bird, and fashion, and food, health, and design had already been claimed. That was 504 columns ago. At an average of 700 words per story, that would be 352,800 words. That’s longer than any Stephen King novel except for The Stand.

I don’t know about you, but I’m impressed. 

Returning to the subject at hand: Sure, I thought, I have a garden and I’ve been planting and tending it for more than 30 years, though not always successfully. 

There was the blight of the apricot tree (not my fault, it came with the house) that was replaced by the kwanzan cherry,  whose massive canopy accounts for our lack of zinnias and sad roses.

I do adore invasives and have warned you and warned you—even while planting them myself. Wisteria is really irresistible. Oh, the scent. And honeysuckle, trumpet vine, and autumn clematis—which I did not plant, by the way; some seeds blew by from somewhere and said to theirselves: What a nice place to live. Loving that garage roof. 

I’ve done battle with postal-persons tramping across the front garden, careless dog owners, raccoons sleeping on the back-porch sofa, a family of opossums,  mice,  bugs, and feral cats.  

There was the, alas, temporary joy of my little greenhouse, where I could overwinter the jasmine, orange,  lemon, and flowering tropicals like hibiscus that I can’t live without. Built on a porch next to my office, home to my parakeets who flitted about cage free, it was my little slice of paradise. The scent on a sunny winter day was enough to put me in a coma. 

Permanent is the pleasure I take in our five window boxes, which change with the seasons, fancy with bows and lights at the holidays, spring and fall bulbs and pansies, and flowery summers.  The occasional fabulous fake. 

I’ve learned a great deal over the years, such as that potatoes can actually grow on those frilly potato vines we plant as ornamentals. I had one once. You can also cut up a sprouted potato, plant the bits and create a leafy border, for nearly nothing. And avocados? Did you know they grow on those plants you grow from pits? This has never happened for me, but it’s apparently so. 

The column has forced me to stay on top of the weeding and mulching, feeding and pruning. Ordering bulbs and falling for new plants. When I say me, I do mean me and My Prince, who digs the (deep) holes, schleps mulch and dirt, and often takes over the unpleasant work, particularly the clean-up, when I’m having the vapors and must lie on the porch sofa like a sleepy raccoon—but with wine and a book. 

Now we’re done, this is my final column. Editors Nancy McKeon and Janet Kelly will be working on Grownup Girl Fashion on the Substack platform, following style and beauty trends. I might contribute something, though I’ve been cautioned about mentioning peacock feathers.

What is life without peacock feathers? Shall we find out?

Total word count, 505 columns: 353,321.

Says author Stephanie: “My tricked-out cloche stands in front of an ornamental bird cage that [husband] Greg found on the street, in front of a painting bought at a thrift shop in Juno Beach, Florida. Yes, we’re very fancy people.” / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

THERE’S NOT MUCH to be said about the garden in January. It’s brown ground studded with leafless trees with patches of color from the ferns and evergreens, like one of those hand-tinted black-and-white photos. 

One wanders the usual route and along the curbs at this time of year, finds a discarded Cuisinart, or some such, that was replaced at Christmas. Or a more mysterious discard, such as the cloche I came across the other day. 

This cloche is not a hat. It is a glass dome, bell-shaped, and otherwise known as a bell jar. Victorians loved them for displaying precious items and for planting and displaying small landscapes. They were also used in the garden itself to protect tender plants as they began to sprout.

I’ve seen these planted out in some garden shops, accompanied by price tags boasting a string of zeros. 

These are not fairy gardens, which I hope have had their day. No little gnomes and plastic princesses, but real gardens made in delightfully small scale, with miniature plants, dew-dropped leaves, mosses, delicate ferns and flowers, and (perhaps) something ornamental. 

Sometimes, they just display an object of beauty or interest, with no plants at all. Using them for display sets them apart from terrariums, whose primary purpose is growing plants. (Don’t examine that statement too closely, I fear there are holes.)

Bonus! If the primary purpose is display, and all the plants go belly-up, you can replace them with an interesting tch0tchke or, to be fancy, bibelot.

Moving right along. I don’t think I ever wanted a cloche. I’m sure I never asked for one. But there one was, abandoned on the sidewalk, a few steps from home. There wasn’t a finger smudge on it, nor a chip or crack, it was either new or kept in a cabinet, like a bell jar for a bell jar. 

Finding it, you might say, was a cloche call.  There. I’ve  amused myself. 

The set-up I found is easy. If the cloche comes with a base, add a half inch of fine gravel, top it with an inch or so of soil, add your plants and/or ornaments and nestle them in moss. If there is no base, set the cloche on a high-sided dish. The idea is to create a self-sustaining environment, one that needs little water, no fertilizer, and moderate light. 

My experiment came together in about 15 minutes, once I trotted home with a small pot of moss-topped crocus bulbs from Safeway. There was enough soil and moss in the pot to cover my gravel bed. I planted the bulbs and added a beautiful, if broken, Meissen figurine, and a sprig of asparagus fern to increase the height. Don’t use wood or fabric or paper in these things; they will rot and get moldy. 

Less than a week after planting, the crocuses have started to bloom. When they die, I’m thinking miniature orchids, begonias, or African violets. I’ll certainly want ferns. Maybe a pond? I have an oyster shell that would be charming . . .

If you don’t have a cloche, Etsy has nice ones. But you can also turn just about any glass vase or container—a hurricane shade, for instance—into a garden under glass. Just flip it upside down and set it on a plate.    

For inspiration, visit NCYPGarden.com. And for something to do with a small boy on a snowy day, check out this tutorial on building a dinosaur terrarium.  

It’s not too late to plant those spring bulbs! / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

HAPPY NEW Year, Procrastinators!

It’s not too late to plant your spring bulbs!

I managed to bury mine (bully for me) by the end of November, not the ideal time, battling with piles of tree leaves to find the earth. But now, in Washington DC, with leaves raked and bagged, and a hard freeze yet to be seen, there’s even an occasional 60-degree day, ideal for such athletic outdoor work. 

If the bulbs have been stored in a cool, dark place, they may have already sprouted. That’s fine. Hack away at the cold garden soil and plant them as you should have a month ago. 

But hold some back for forcing to create a little bit of Spring right when that seasonal affective disorder kicks in and the world seems bleak, and will it ever this time out . . . anyway . . . it’s time for a spot of forced cheer!

You’ve seen this done with paperwhite narcissus and amaryllis, may even have bought a pre-planted pot. (If you’re too lethargic to bother, Trader Joe’s has them all potted up for, like, three bucks). But, you can easily do it yourself, along with hyacinth, tulip, and daffodil bulbs. 

Pull out some pots, some pretty containers, maybe those “one-offs” you can’t bear to part with. Bury the bulbs in shallow soil (if they’re already sprouting leave those tips above the surface), water them, and set in a cool, dark spot. If you’re using a large pot, you can really cram the bulbs in for a spectacularly fulsome display.  

You can also plant bulbs in a dish of water. Set them atop a layer of pebbles and add water to just the base of the bulb (you don’t want it to rot). 

Then forget about them until green tips pop up; they’ll now grow rapidly and bloom when given a bit of sunlight.    

Ah, the challenge, though, is finding bulbs in January. Costco is already busy with Easter bunnies, and online vendors have settled in for a long winter’s nap. But rummage about your local garden center and you may find a bag of bulbs or a handful of narcissus, and at this point they’re nearly giving them away.  

I got totally lucky: Baby forgot she had bulbs in the chilly trunk of her car and gave me a bag of grape hyacinth that are near ready to pop. 

For you without a forgetful daughter, there’s Kathy Jentz to the rescue. The author, podcaster, speaker, and editor of Washington Gardener magazine, has opened an online shop with a range of beautiful spring bloomers, many on sale, absolute bargains. She also offer the terrific Cobra Head garden cultivator that makes short work of planting in tough soil. 

Next week, more bulbish* tips and an experiment in creating a garden in a cloche. 

*Not a word, but should be. 

iStock

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

I DON’T remember the last time Christmas Day and the first night of Hanukkah collided. But this year they do. So, in our mixed-up home, the Prince and I and our guests will light the first holiday candle then settle beside the Christmas tree for a feast of rib roast, creamed spinach, apple sauce and . . . latkes. 

You may recall the following from last year, or the year before, maybe the year before that. . . . It’s a tradition! And potatoes are plants. So’s spinach. And apples. Except for the cow, this is also a gardening column. Here’s what I wrote then and holds true now:

Besides throwing off gloriously ruffled vines that grow to fabulous lengths in one’s window boxes, potatoes are also useful for potato pancakes, or latkes, the essence of the Jewish holiday of Chanukah, or Hanukkah, or to get technical, חֲנֻכָּה.

In a time before food processors, Mama would grate the potatoes by hand, which always involved adding a bit of skinned knuckle and a drop or two of blood. She would also hand-grate onion into the mash so there would also be tears. This all feels very symbolic but isn’t. It was just painful and a little gory.

The pancakes were, and are, fried in oil until golden, a cast-iron pan giving the best color. Mama would stand in the kitchen over the hot oil frying and serving batch after batch, which guests would eat before she got to the table, since she didn’t want them getting cold, and latkes grow unpleasantly heavy and flaccid if left to warm in the oven.

The master recipe, as laid down by my mother, makes enough for two or three little piggies (or the kosher equivalent, which is what?).

Potato Pancakes

4 servings (you don’t want to know the calorie count)

2 large russet or Idaho potatoes, peeled

1 small onion, peeled

1 egg

Scant teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon ground pepper

½ cup matzoh meal* (or flour)

Peanut or corn oil

Cut the potatoes and onion into large chunks** and place in the food-processor bowl fitted with the steel blade. Chop—do not grate!—until the potatoes are about the texture of oatmeal (about 10 to 15 seconds, depending on the size of your chunks). Dump into a large bowl. Add egg, salt, and pepper, and matzoh meal (or flour) and combine well. Do not squeeze out or drain the moisture the potatoes release (I don’t care what you’ve read).

The mixture should just hold together when stirred. If it is runny, add more matzoh meal.

Heat enough oil in a frying pan for the potatoes to float. When sizzling (but not smoking) drop serving spoonfuls of batter into the oil, flattening slightly with the back of the spoon (don’t mash them down or they’ll stick to the pan), and fry until golden brown on one side, flipping and frying the other side, about 10 minutes total. You should get eight in a 12-inch frying pan.

Remove and drain on paper towel or brown paper.

While it’s reasonable to prepare such a small batch while you’re putting dinner together, making latkes for many may mean you’ll never leave the kitchen.

My mother’s recipe is straightforwardly doubled or tripled or more, the only possible adjustment being to add a little matzoh meal or flour if the batter is too runny.

Pause for extremely brief history lesson: Hanukkah is considered a miraculous holiday, the Festival of Lights. The Jews, who had just beaten back the Greeks, needed oil for the temple lights but had only enough to last a single day. Yet the oil lasted for eight, time enough to keep the candelabrum called the menorah ablaze until a new supply of oil could be prepared.

And so oil becomes a holiday theme, herein represented by latkes. Interesting side note: Jewish holidays, with few exceptions, involve eating extraordinary quantities of particularly cholesterol-rich food, and yet we are often, miraculously, long-lived. 

The miracle of cooking a party quantity of latkes is to pre-fry them.

I usually make them around noon and consider a few testers to be my lunch. Fry them until cooked through, about 8 minutes total, and light brown, drain on a wire rack, which saves paper towels and therefore trees. Do NOT refrigerate, which lends an offish taste.*** There’s nothing that will spoil during a few hours’ rest.

It’s essentially like the double-fry method you use for making French fries. Reheat your oil (or use fresh if it’s a mess) until burbling and, when you’re just about ready to serve dinner, drop in the precooked latkes and fry 15 to 20 seconds on one side and flip for another 15 or so (experiment!). They quickly crisp up and heat through and taste as good as fresh.

I’ve been known to fry 100 for my occasional annual Hanukkah party and have them on the table within 10 minutes.

With numerous decades of latke experimentation under my increasingly large belt, and a recipe that has brought grown men to tears, I do not know why so many people doubt that this method works. While I might embellish and exaggerate from time to time (alas, a family shortcoming), I do not lie, if I can help it.

And so I will here repeat: The large-batch process uses the same double-fry technique that’s used for French fries. The end result should be pancakes that are brown and deliciously crisp on the outside, warm and almost creamy within—and done in time for you to sit down with your guests and eat them.

Additional notes:

*Matzoh meal makes for a lighter latke.

**Cut your potatoes into chunks just small enough to fit in the bowl without jamming the blades—quarters or sixths. Do not try to chop more than two potatoes at a time; they quickly go from oatmeal-coarse to liquefied.

***If you do have leftovers, they can be frozen or refrigerated and are not terrible reheated, as long as you bring them to room temperature before briefly refrying, not baking, them. No matter how hot your oven, an oven-heated latke will never taste as fresh or crisp as one that’s been refried.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

DAMMIT. I forgot again. 

I had planned that this year I would do something different with the holiday mantel. Something really dramatic, lush, gorgeous, and a little off-kilter. 

Not that what I’ve done looks bad; it looks great, if I say so myself. The peacock feather boa once again stretches its fluffy length across the top. There are sparkly stems and sparkly birds and sparkly lights threaded through. In short, it sparkles. 

And wasn’t I happy with myself, until this morning, chomping on a bagel, when my eye tripped across a mantel in the online pages of British design magazine Homes & Gardens that was like a ballotin of the most divine chocolates for breakfast. 

It was an asymmetrical garland of fluffy greenery hung with lights and glittery stuffs that began at the hearth and drifted up and across the mantel and up to the ceiling in most spectacular fashion.

On second thought, some of it was just a bit creepy. Something about the old blood red of the ribbons that run through it like a seeping wound, and the matching red candles. Melania would love it—watch for it in next year’s White House display.  

But the point!

Asymmetry was what I was thinking about last year, and the basics of this one are inspiring. Should I redo?

Pause, for thought. 

From Britain’s Homes & Gardens magazine, an offbeat and definitely asymmetrical mantel decoration by designer Drew Michael Scott, the “Face & Hands behind Lone Fox,” the company that showcases his design projects and offers home goods for sale.

Helpfully, Drew Michael Scott, the mantel’s designer, included a step by step for his creation. It’s all based on the use of long tree branches, bought or scavenged, that are wired together and plonked in a basket to the side of the hearth. 

The intertwined branches are then artfully bent across the wall above the mantel, stretched toward the ceiling, and “just hammered it to the wall with a few small nails.” *

That said, my excess of wisteria branches would be brilliant.

There! You’ve created the frame. Now add fake and real greenery and berries. Scott, who goes by the moniker Lone Fox, uses great poofs of frilly asparagus fern and tucks in white amaranthus flowers, which he says gives the effect of “white snow or icicles.”  

Then come ribbons, sparkly baubles and lights.

The key to this mantel, he says, is mixing faux and real so everything overall looks real in the end. 

My gardening philosophy, exactly. 

Crate and Barrel has a simpler take on the asymmetrical mantel concept, with a 15’ faux cypress garland that can start at one end and drape quite fabulously across to pool on the floor at the other end—and be trotted out year after year. They show it studded with red berries (presumably fake), which is quite striking. 

You might mix in other greens (Trader Joe’s is my go-to for that), letting them dry in place, use a ton of baby’s breath for a snowy explosion, and certainly take it all up a notch with lights. 

Of course, if you enjoy twice-daily vacuuming you can buy a fresh garland and pluck berries and flowers from the garden. Dried hydrangeas would be good.

For more unusual and dramatic mantel designs, check out Pinterest. 

If you’re a “less is less” sort, polish an apple. Set it on the mantel. Done.

Less is more is fine, more or less.

Martini time.

*A few small nails is all you need to tie a garland across a mantel: Just wire the garland to the nails. I suspect you’ll need more than a few small nails to support a large construct crawling up the wall—best to consult someone who knows his/her way around a hammer. I have My Prince, but I don’t share. 

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

WOW. LAST WEEK was Thanksgiving (I hope yours was lovely and not contentious) and here we are hell bent for the holidays, a mere three weeks away. Gift shopping done? No? Best get to it. Here’s a sampling of garden-adjacent gifts from places familiar and new, each one deserving a poke-about for lots of rare and delightful treasures.

But first. Shop locally! Support your local florist or garden center. Museum shops too. Check out what they offer for the holidays—isn’t it fun to touch the things you buy before you buy them?

Plant identifiers. There are numerous apps for your phone for identifying strange things growing in the garden, along the roadside, in flower arrangements, etc. The New York Times suggests downloading a winner that is not only free but French, making it pretty haute. Can a gift be free? Pourquoi pas? Plantnet can be downloaded from the AppStore and on Google Play. If you like it, feel free to donate to support their horticultural projects around the world.

Leafriends, plant propagation buddies, above, prop up the stems of plant cuttings you’re starting in water. I’m not sure how hugging the stems of plants makes them grow better, but that’s what they say and if they say it, must be true. Right? Anyway, these little green men are kind of cute and cheap and so a clever stocking stuffer. $4 for three at Walmart.

‘Tis the season for wreaths and garlands and Terrain offers fresh, preserved, and faux beauties (and plenty of ideas for the creative). Wrap a garland with golden laurel leaves, above. The 72-inch-long iron strand can drape the mantel, twirl through the tree or around a wreath, climb the staircase, decorate a table, or wrap a gift. $58.

Have a bird-watching buddy? Or someone who should be? How about a bird feeder with  a solar-powered camera that can not only feed and photograph feathered visitors, but employs an app to identify 6,000 bird species as well. Plus! Said one purchaser: “Picture clarity is better than most of my ring cameras! . . . Tempted to buy multiples to replace some of the ring cameras around my house, they work so well, and get the plus side of seeing birds.” On sale at Walmart for $199.99.

Or let them watch the birds make a stylish splash in a colorfully torched or hammered copper bird bath, above, from Pottery Barn. Choose either the simple disk on a pole  or one with two copper birds perched on the rim, perhaps for encouraging scaredy-birds to bathe. $159.

Have someone you love to hate but have to gift anyway? How about a sack of bronze or gold metallic-finished natural pine needles, above. Suggested for adding a “shimmering flourish” to the mantel, tabletop, or under the tree. Guaranteed to get embedded in carpet, stuck in bare feet, and cling to clothes worse than dog hair. A gift that truly says: Here’s poking at you. At Terrain, again, $68.

Years ago, a frequently traveling friend (hey, Jill!) swore off indoor plants and gave me hers along with a most wonderful watering can with an extra-long neck that was miraculous for watering plants in our upper window boxes, which must be watered from inside the house. For the snooty on your list, Haws watering cans, made in England since 1886, are beautifully balanced, and very long in the nose, for reaching hard-to-get-to plants. The Rowley Ripple, above, from Celtic Farm, comes in an array of colors of coated metal with brass accents. It’s popular, but still in stock are the White Granite, Pink Clay, and a swell Lichen Green. They’re on sale for $89.99 with new stock coming . . . sometime.

For the mushroom lover. Even (sophisticated) kids might find the Shiitake Mushroom Log from Williams Sonoma interesting. Hand-seeded and said to sprout in as little as a week, putting out a fresh crop every two months for a couple of years, and only $29.95.

I’m looking at my arms, so scratched and scarred: Gardening injuries R us. Gauntlet gardening gloves to the rescue (though one has to remember where they are and to put them on. There’s no app for that). These gorgeous leather  elbow-length gauntlets, above, from Amazing Garden are handsome enough to . . . just wear. They are $29.99 or $32.99, depending on color.

Or, and I’ve mentioned these before, make like a butterfly with Monarch-adorned above-the-elbow sleeves, matching gloves, and a sun hat. (Available in other patterns and colors.) From Farmers Defense, on sale for $67.50.

It’s a Wrap!  Enough with Terrain already, right? BUT I’ve been a little mean to them (see above!), and this flowery velvet ribbon with the artfully frayed edges is just so lovely in red, moss, or purple. 11 yards for $54 or $62, depending on width. On second thought, I might buy it for myself.

The “Eagle’s Nest” arrangement from Roots Floral, $750.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

I HATE dead things, says the Prince, eyeing a bunch of dried flowers. So do a lot of people. Though one might argue that cut flowers are also dead, they just don’t know it yet. 

There are a lot of dried flowers about the house. The biggest arrangement grew from a base of hydrangeas stuffed into a cast-iron urn into which I poked the remains of roses and statice and other gift flowers past. It was all simply dried in place, with the previously dried blooms supporting the newly dead, and has grown quite massive. 

Another arrangement is just hydrangeas, bursting out of an Art Deco vase that won’t hold water, so what else can you do with it?

When you air-dry flowers they’ll still have color and shape, for a while. Over months, most of the colors fade to shades that vary from white to tan. The blues of statice last the longest; I’ve kept some for many years. 

To really keep the color as well as the flower’s form, you need to use a desiccant, usually silica gel beads that gently cover the blossoms, soaking up the moisture for a week or so. You can then use them in an arrangement. There are numerous brands, and it’s easy to come by; a two-pound bag of reusable Wisedry Gel is about $17 from Amazon.*

Sounds like a great hobby if there’s another pandemic, yes? 

Which brings us to . . .  a little shop called Roots Floral, brand new to the Georgetown neighborhood of DC, that’s like wandering into a fairy tale. Massed together, centerstage, is a fantasy of flowers billowing up toward the ceiling. Among them are roses, peonies, ageratum, cabbages, and daisies in watercolor shades punctuated by moss and plumes of grasses.  

It’s hard not to gasp. 

You can buy individual stems (even one in a bud vase is a statement), gather a posy, or have the artist-owner, Joe Xui, create an arrangement for you. 

If you want to do it yourself but would like expert guidance, Joe’s offering a two-session workshop in early December, timed so you can create your own fabulous holiday centerpiece, or create one for a gift. Call him at 202-713-3534 to enroll; the shop is tiny so space is extremely limited! 

Roots Floral nests above another newcomer, Hunter & Huntress, a charming boutique of home curiosities, as interior designer Lily Zingman and her husband, Cobi Tionkin, call their collection of home accents. These are carefully curated pieces you won’t see coming and going, like wall art, bird cages, antiques, jewelry, lighting, and barware, things you’d hope a designer would find for you—and she has.

Not planning a trip to DC soon? You can also see LilyZ Designs interior work on her website, lilyzdesigns.com, and a sampling of Hunter & Huntress objets at lilyzdesigns.com/shop-hunter-huntress/.

Roots Floral (rootsfloraldc.com) is upstairs and Hunter & Huntress (the website is under construction) is on the main level at 1665 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington DC. 

*The Wisedry website directs you to Amazon to purchase.

If the winter weather is mild, cyclamen can fill a window box or provide a colorful accent.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

WINDOW boxes, Part Two.

Oh, you didn’t know last week was Part One? Neither did I.

But I was passing a house in Washington DC’s Capitol Hill neighborhood that I photographed last year for a real estate agent, a cute little place (though you’d never say that in real estate speak), with two coir-lined wire window boxes upstairs and one below. 

They looked sweet (another word you never use) stuffed with red geraniums, with more stuffed into the little (oof!) patch of garden beside the front door.

I don’t know who bought the place—my work ends when the brochures are printed—but whoever it was didn’t give two petunias for window boxes. They’ve been empty since the geraniums dropped at the first frost. 

This is dreary, when window boxes bring such pleasure to the house, the owner, and the passersby. One (meaning me) imagines a sour-faced bureaucrat grumping home from a job with some mean-minded member of Congress, after another day spent cutting benefits and polluting streams, to this cold and stingy . . . can I even say home? There is no excuse for this.

If you don’t have window boxes, we’ll deal with you next spring. 

For those with boxes that sit empty from frost to spring, this may be the perfect time to plant the bones of a year-round display. Simple solution: a centerpiece that stands tall(ish) and trailing plants for the corners and maybe along the front. Leave space on either side of the centerpiece for seasonal flowers. 

If you act fast, there are plenty of possibilities.

With the holidays coming around, many garden centers, florists, and online garden purveyors offer live miniature bushes that are often tarted up like Christmas trees, and can serve as a centerpiece. Look for dwarf conifers, boxwood, spruce, cypress, holly, or juniper. Any of these should last for years—and can be moved to the garden if they grow too big. 

For trailing plants in the corners, or along the front border, nothing is simpler or more easily found than ivy. Sturdy, evergreen, and drapable, it will keep growing for decades. 

The empty spots that flank that centerpiece are a bit trickier in cold weather. Pansies, if you can find them, will last well into spring, even with a hard freeze. Don’t be put off if you find some wilted-looking offerings on sale somewhere;  these will usually perk up with water or after a little talking to.* 

Ornamental cabbages and kale will too, though good luck finding smallish ones, which you may need if you’re space- challenged. These tend to sell out early in the season. 

If the weather remains mild, meaning not much below freezing, cyclamen will bring color through the holidays. Rosemary and lavender are great for added fragrance, and can withstand a pretty deep chill.

You might also punt and jam those naked spots with baby’s breath, eucalyptus, or holly, or a mix, letting the stems dry in place. The eucalyptus variety called silver dollar, with its rounded leaves and graceful droop, would be spectacular. Add a scallop of dried moss for extra oomph. 

In fact, you can just pack the whole box with stuff that can dry in place and forget about it until spring. Check out the bunches in the flower section of Trader Joe’s, which has what they call filler greens for a one-stop-and-it’s-martini-time shop.  

*If you haven’t seen the series Good Omens with David Tennant and Michael Sheen on Amazon . . . well, you’re missing something. 

Persimmon-colored pyracantha berries and some cushion mums from Trader Joe’s hold the fort, in this case the window box, until it gets its festive holiday trimmings. / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

IF YOU’RE reading this today, may I ask why? If I were you, I’d be sitting in a funk that I’m pretty sure is permanent. Think about gardening? Surely you jest. 

However! Needs must a column be produced, and here it is. 

When we left me last week, I’d just come home from a relaxing week in the hospital, recovering from a surprise bout of pneumonia, which immediately followed a superb annual physical. Really first-rate. Surprise!

I’d also just received my shipment of tulip bulbs, which I’m still staring at. 

And, it seemed, between heat, lack of rain, and neglect, my newly replanted window boxes were in dismal shape. We have five boxes, two in the main-level windows and three across the top. These are up all year and change with the seasons; each with a planting area on either side of a dwarf fir, and a drape of ivy in each corner. 

Just days before my hospital sojourn, the dusty burgundy-and-pink caladium that spent the summer flanking the firs were pulled and their  bulbs buried in sawdust for the winter. These were replaced with pansies, which looked quite cheerful. 

On my return, the pansies had flumpshed irretrievably*, leaving nothing but naked earth with a few sad frizzles of leaves.

So here we (meaning me) are, gliding toward the holidays, which always require a Grand Window Box Renovation involving big purple satin bows, fir boughs, glittery stems, lights, and shiny things. Even if I could find a pansy now, there’d scarcely be a point in buying them, just to replace them in short order. We’ll leave those for spring.

Thankfully, Trader Joe’s brilliantly filled the gap with persimmon-colored pyracantha berries, fistfuls of greens, and sprigs of itty-bitty purple cushion mums. None have roots, all are just jabbed into the soil; if the weather stays chilly and the boxes are kept watered, the display should take us well past Thanksgiving Day.

If the greens grow dull, there’s always spray paint. 

I return to staring at the sack of bulbs. If I wait long enough, perhaps someone will lend a planting hand. 

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Budgie news? All quiet on that front. Only one egg in the coconut, which Cooper carefully tends. 

We wait. 

*Or is that irretrievably flumpshed? You might be surprised at how long I pondered this. Flumpshed, by the way, is pronounced as one syllable and is not  a word. But it should be. 

A parrot tulip bulb promises this delicious, frilly result.

I’M GLARING at a box of tulip bulbs. 

It’s a lovely haul from Dutch importers K. Van Bourgondien, Inc. that includes cocktails of what they describe as Pinot Noir and Pinot Grigio tulips (they’re shades of pink and purple), 100 of each, and 25 Green Wave parrot tulips, because the photo was irresistible. 

Van Bourgondien ships when it’s time to plant, which is apparently right now, since the box just arrived. Unfortunately, I’m hooked up to a 40-foot oxygen hose that snakes through the house, letting me wander from the basement laundry to our upstairs bedroom. 

Caution! Do not light gas stove within 10 feet of tank. Do not light fireplace within 10 feet of tank. 

Post notice on door: Oxygen in use.

Call fire department and warn them that oxygen is in use. 

Hold up a cross if anyone comes at you with a lit cigarette. 

And here I was, just two weeks ago, in fine fettle, having just returned from a regular check-up. Perfect! I was perfect.

Two days later I’m in intensive care, tubes sprouting like weeds (ahem, gardening column. Right). And there I lolled for a week, being doted upon by doctors, nurses, and My Prince, who sat for hour after boring hour and brought me things to eat, as the hospital food was inedible. HOW can you ruin applesauce?

I came home last weekend with an oxygen monitor, oxygen tanks—one stationary, a couple of portables, and one for date night that looks like a trendy shoulder bag, possibly Prada, and many many cords.

Pneumonia they said, a virus they said.  You’ll live! 

Cool.

I’m not glued to the tanks, thankfully. I just take a snort when my oxygen level gets low, but a bout of pneumonia and a week of lying about takes a toll. I have yet to move or re-pot my jasmines, lemon, hibiscus, and other tropicals, which must be done before bulbs go in, and the leaves are falling fast from the cherry, making it more difficult to work. Meanwhile, that bag of bulbs sneers.

I begin to hyperventilate.  

Maybe I’ll toss the veggies from the fridge bin and pack it with tulips. I can just plant them in March. You can do that, you know, give bulbs a few months of chill and up they pop. You can even do that in the tropics. 

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Budgie News. In our last installment, Cooper had tossed her defective eggs out of the coconut shell and resumed her passionate romance with Goldie. They really are embarrassing. 

Kamala, their beautiful baby, is ignored, neglected, with the promise of a playmate shattered on the cage floor.

This just in! Cooper has laid two new eggs, and I have gone from No more, I beg you to Just one, please, for Kami!

By now we’re familiar with the charming garage at the end of the Cavanaugh garden. Stephanie points out the two parlor palms that flank the door, planted with trailing sweet-potato vine. The palms will spend a few weeks on the back porch before being moved to the parlor for the winter. / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

I HATE THIS time of year, this moment in time when frosty days are near (for you, perhaps, they’re already here) but much of the garden is still at its peak. What a sad, sad thing it is to dismantle. But needs must!

The impatiens are particularly upsetting. Why do they wait until cooler weather to really flourish, spilling over their pots, and finally filling the empty spots they were supposed to fill in July. 

And now they are about to die—by mine own hand, I might add. 

With frosty nights approaching and bulbs to plant, the impatiens must be lifted and tossed (there’s nothing else to do with them). The saddest part will be destroying the thick flush of pink blooms that surround the parlor palms, which now need to be moved to the parlor, where they add an exotic touch. Outdoors, these palms, with their underskirts of sweet potato vine, flank the garage door in rather stately fashion. 

I wonder if I’ve grown a potato?

The rest of the tropical plants must also be rescued. Those that grew happily in the ground now need containers. Those already in pots may need larger quarters. Tip: If you lift the pot and see roots coming out the drain hole, take it as a sign. 

Before coming into the house, the pots should be treated for fly eggs and/or fungus gnats, else you’ll be watching Dancing With the Stars to the slap-slap sound of the fly swatter. In my house the swatter is wielded by My Prince, who dances around in front of the screen cursing as he swats. This is doubly irritating. 

According to the University of California Pest Management Program, pyrethrins or a pyrethroid insecticide may provide temporary, fast-acting control. Spray the surface of potting soil and plant parts where adults typically rest. Do not aerially fog indoors or attempt to spray adult gnats in flight. Make sure the spray is labeled for house plants. You can also, they say, use cut-up potatoes or sticky paper to trap them.

I’m glad they added the part about spraying gnats in flight—though it would be amusing to watch the Prince having at it. 

We won’t be moving the plants indoors until we’re up against a weather crisis. They’ll live on the back porch, huddled like cows in a storm,* catching the remaining warmth from the bricks. In the meantime, they can enjoy a bit more sunshine before the air turns too frigid.

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In other news, Cooper’s clutch of three eggs is no more. A few days ago she tossed them out of the coconut shell, where she’d been nesting for the past few weeks. Parakeets discard their eggs when they realize they are not fertile. I know this because I looked it up. 

They landed on the cage floor where Cooper, Goldie, and Kamala (their firstborn) attacked them, cracking the eggs, eating the yolky contents and then the shells themselves. In moments it was over, as if the eggs had never existed. 

I give thanks. Six birds was a horror story.

*I read an article last week about cows and horses riding out Hurricane Milton in open fields. They turn their backs and huddle in a clump to stay safe. Animal instincts are amazing. 

Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

IN THIS ISSUE of Do As I Say, Not As I Do, I certainly hope you bought your spring bulbs last month and didn’t foot-drag until now and try to scramble Spring together. I might add, you won’t have much luck finding small ornamental cabbages either. Though the big frillies are still abundant.

Neither Lowe’s nor Home Depot has a bulb in sight; and forget Costco, where it’s
already Christmas. Halloween? Pfft. So last month.

Buying bulbs in October is like trying to find a bathing suit in June. In this zone, at least,
Spring bulbs can be planted into December, or as long as the soil is workable. Plant
much earlier than now and you’re disturbing the last of summer’s blossoms, which is
tragic.

Colorblends, my go-to for buying tulips online, was sold out of all the pinks and purples,
offering only a meager selection of reds and oranges, which just won’t do beneath the
cherry blossoms. I had more success with Van Engelen, the Connecticut-based Dutch
bulb importer, grabbing up a few hundred bulbs of the trust-us-we-know-what-we’re-
doing-grab-bag variety. At least I’m assured that the colors are shades of pink. I think.

If you like mums, of which I’m not a great fan, there are still plenty to be had in garden
centers and big-box stores. Huge pots and small ones in the usual yellows and purples
and pinks. Enjoy them for a week(end) or so before some combination of heat or cold or
animal does them in—though they’re lovely as a host/ess gift (thank you, MK).

On the positive side, there are still pansies. Yesterday, I lucked into a ridiculous sale at
Home Depot, or maybe Lowe’s, I never remember. Out front there were four-packs of
spriglings for $4.99 while out back, on the sale racks, they were selling six-packs for two
bucks each. They were a little leggy, but nothing a pinch here and there won’t fix.

Yesterday I started redoing the window boxes, pulling up the caladium bulbs (I should
have gotten the green and white, which look fresher than the burgundy and pink, which
are a tad dusty- and depressing-looking, though they’ve had plenty of sidewalk admirers)
and plonking in the pansies.

I really should water more frequently.

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In an aha! moment (these tend to happen while I’m otherwise occupied) I suddenly
understood what the phrase Feather your nest means. Cooper, my pure white budgie,
mother of Kamala and paramour of Goldie, has been dropping feathers in her coconut
shell, giving her three new eggs a softer cushion than the floor of the hard shell.
It’s been nearly three weeks since she dropped this clutch (as they’re called) and the
babies should be appearing momentarily. The shells are increasingly pink—could that be
blood flow?

I have no clue what I’m going to do when they’re grown—which takes mere weeks. But
they are already named: Coco, Doug, and Tim.

Do let me know if you’re interested. Please.

And VOTE!

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

WITH THE LEAVES hanging in on the trees, there’s still not much to be done around the garden—though it is a good time to march about and decide what did and did not do well and where and plan for next year.

The trick to making a garden work, said a recent column in the New York Times, is to find your sweet spot and work from there. Just locate the thing that you’re doing in your garden that brings you the most happiness and satisfaction.

For me, that’s easier said than done. My tiny garden is governed by the Kwanzan cherry,  which forms an ever higher, wider, denser umbrella over the entire space. 

We do get the most happiness and satisfaction when it blooms for a week or a day once a year, and then there’s the enjoyment of flowers falling on the river-stone path that wends between the borders, drifting and accumulating like pink snow. Until the pink turns to brown on its way to decay, which is not so pleasant. 

With ever-increasing shade, each year fewer and fewer perennial flowers bloom. I still have hope for the kiwi, which was a small highly fragrant shrub when it was planted five or six years ago, and is now a tall skinny tree which might—might—straggle into the sun and flower again in another year or so. I do not have much hope for the pittosporum, purchased for its intoxicating scent.  In its third year, it sits there. 

Early Fall is the best time to move them to a sunnier spot—but god knows where that is. Perhaps I should leave them be. Both are happy and green all year. I can always tie on fake flowers  and spritz perfume. Sigh.

Until the cherry tree fills out, there’s enough sun for some flowers: tulips, a weakly blooming rose, impatiens, the blessedly stalwart hydrangeas. Is that it? Yes. Then we have green season, which extends from June through kaput. 

Year after year I keep trying. Heading for the garden center with hope in my eyes that this time I’ll have a pretty something in view from the porch that will last more than a month. 

So ferns, I’m thinking. I am never frustrated by ferns. Neither am I overly excited, but the few I have do look sweet along the path and hanging over the pond like a frilly bridge. 

I should plant more this fall. Just give up and go into the woods. It might be . . . soothing. 

There’s enough variety in evergreen ferns to make it interesting: Holly Fern (Cyrtomium), Leatherleaf Fern (Rumohra adiantiformis), and the particularly hardy Christmas Fern (Polystichum acrostichoides) are all evergreen, which not only makes a pleasant sight all year but gives an endless supply of filler for flower arrangements.* 

Don’t worry about not being able to plant bulbs in the same area: They’ll make their way up through the fern foliage. 

Keep in mind that not all ferns are evergreen, or even hardy enough to survive northern or mid-Atlantic winters. It would be lovely if Boston Ferns survived the cold, but they will not. These mainstays of hanging baskets go flumpsht at first frost, as will the delicately lacy asparagus ferns. (Both, however, can be wintered over indoors and trotted out again next spring. If you’re unsure, ask: Cultivating a good garden shop is a wise idea.*)

For a little variety, garden purveyor Terrain offers a collection of mushroom sculptures (and mushroom-themed creations for the mushroom aficionado, such as printed scarves) in ceramic and teak, both garden friendly. I quite like the idea of mushrooms for creating a forest floor. Though I suppose I could just grow them. 

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Meanwhile in the bird cage. Kamala is now the same size as her mom, Cooper, and dad, Goldie. She’s 2 months old with a gorgeous seafoam-blue belly with a green head and wings—just like her dad, with whom she has long and serious conversations when they’re not playing. This bonding is going on because Cooper is back in the coconut shell, currently sitting on three more eggs. Oh my.

WHAT are you going to do with all those birds, Mom? Baby yowled.

Well, sweetie, I said, with an evil smirk. Xmas is coming. 

* Visit the National Arboretum’s Fern Valley Native Plant collection, where wildflowers blossom amid the ferns from spring through frost and you can see the varieties of fern in action. 

The Pantop Lamp by Danish artist Verner Panton has a shade shaped like a jolly bell, comes in lipgloss-shiny shades of red, yellow, and blue, and costs $150 at the Museum of Modern Art shop.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

THERE’S SOMETHING about a lamp on the dining table. It’s the Orient Express. Supper clubs. Bogie and Bacall . . . oh, the romance.

With early fall nights still balmy, and the mosquitoes bedding down for the winter, it’s a pleasant time for dining on the porch or the patio, or in the garden.  Candles are swell, but a gust of wind and pfft. Adding a lamp requires a cord snaking across the floor, a fearsome thing after the cognac course. Trust me on that.

I’ve been looking for a cordless lamp for years, but all I’ve found are clunky rechargeables better suited for camping. I even looked into making one…taking a lamp apart and installing a battery. I really don’t think you want to do this (but just in case). 

And then, last winter, on the terrace of a south Florida restaurant there they were. Slender metal columns about a foot high, topped with tiny triangular hats from which light pooled on the tablecloths. Not exactly what I was looking for but whimsical, which made them almost better.

Oh my, I said and said again. Gotta have, gotta have. 

Lifting the little lamp from the table I read off and wrote down the tag info (thankfully not removed). Italian. Lira signs flashed before my eyes. 

From Zafferano comes the Pino Pro rechargeable. It’s shown in Gold Leaf, but there are 11 other colors, at Lumens.com.

And indeed, as I found out, the gold leaf Pina Pro, by Zefferano America, was priced at $300 at the time, a little rich for something I was certain would be dead in a few months* —or become so ubiquitous that it would lose my favor. 

Amazon, of course, to the rescue. There I found a knock-off of the little hatted guy—two for $80—and now just $49.99.

And something a tad more classic from Newsee; foot tall lamps with curved caps like mushrooms, which diffuse the light quite nicely, and come in three intensities—warm light, warmer light, and Aunt-Mil-needs-to-be-able-to- read-the-Haggadah bright. I paid $80, but they’re now $36.99 for two and available in seven colors.  

What a difference a few months make. There’s an explosion of cordless models in shops and online, high-end to low-priced.  You’ve probably already encountered them—that little dunce-cap item seems particularly popular in restaurants.

How does this happen? Did dozens of manufacturers suddenly wake up one morning [see light bulb above heads] and think cordless lamps! Just what we need! But we do.

They’re charming for the patio, or any spot that lacks an outlet and could use a little illumination, now or come winter: coffee tables, end tables, buffets, kitchen counters, bookshelves, mantels. 

Take a tour . . . 

MoMa: The museum store offers a surprising number of cordless lamps that escape the camping vibe. The Pantop Lamp (see top picture) by Danish artist Verner Panton has a shade shaped like a jolly bell, comes in lipgloss-shiny shades of red, yellow, and blue, and costs $150.

At 1stdibs.com, the Flos Bon Jour from Philippe Starck, sets a roaring ’20s mood. Offered in six colorways and, at $390 per, you won’t see this one coming and going. 

Visual Comfort has a traditionally styled crystal (or white or blue) based lamp with a linen shade, the Talia by Julie Neill, for $449 that’s just 13 inches from base to top. Plus it has a dozen or more other rechargeable lamps, mostly modern in style, from $160 on up.

The Pina Pro at Lumens,  the original of the triangular hatted lamp I saw months ago in Florida, is now priced at a more reasonable $160 and available in 10 colors.

Walmart has an elegant pair of brass beauties with white linen shades for $59.98. Never thought I’d have Walmart and elegant in the same sentence, but there it is. 

*So far so good on the durability. Recharged several times and they’re holding up fine. 

Caladium in the garden and window boxes keep getting better and better. / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

THERE’S NOT MUCH to be done in the garden in mid-September but admire what worked and bemoan what didn’t.

Last week it was cool, fresh, with sunny skies. This week the sky remains blue, but the temperature is rising and there’s no rain in the forecast. Mainly it’s nice for lazing about on the back porch doused with high-octane mosquito spray.  

The leaves on the shrubs and trees are as green as in mid-summer, with not a hint of fall color. The flowers that flower are flowering; the others aren’t.  

It’s too late to do some things, too early to do others. The stores may be stocked with candy corn, pumpkins, and mums, but it’s too early for Halloween (though it’s been October since July at Costco)—the squirrels will do in the pumpkins, and the mums will frizzle in the heat.

Mums in this heat are such an interesting subject. Year after year you’re beguiled by them (in this case I do mean YOU, not me). How cheerful they look marching up the front steps, plonked in pots in the front garden. So yellow! So orange! So fall! Makes you want to pull your boots out of the closet and kick some leaves.  

Tomorrow the first flowers will start to shrivel and blacken. You deadhead them. The next day more of them will have wilted. You clip off their nasty little heads. As a handful of days pass, you snip and snip and suddenly! Pffft. Well. That was a waste.

(Boots in this heat are another interesting subject. Have you noticed all the young ladies trotting about in their leather boots and mini-skirts this summer (I trust this is not you), their perfectly pedicured feet sloshing about in sweat. Not sexy.) 

It’s too early to plant spring flowering bulbs, such as tulips: There needs to be a snap in the air. Later October is good, but you can foot-drag into December.  I know the bulbs are  being sold now, but hold off. You don’t want to disturb the last gasps of summer with your little hole puncher. 

Pansies are tricky. Thay are coming in now, and they’ll bloom through the winter and well into spring, making them a great addition to the garden. The issue is lifting annuals that are still delightful, in some cases at their best, my window-box caladium being an example, to plant the pretty-faced blooms. 

If you buy the pansies now, you’ll have to figure out how to keep them happy until it’s time to transplant to borders and window boxes and such. I confess that there have been years when I’ve hidden a flat so well that I forgot about watering, with the expected results. On the other hand, if you wait to buy pansies, you’ll be chasing around looking for them, eventually settling for droopy, stringy leftovers. 

Same goes for ornamental cabbage and kale, which come in for far too much disrespect. Much as I dislike twee, and most particularly fairy gardens, these ruffly pops of purple and pink and white are such delightful fillers. Get the smallest you can find for window boxes; it’s easier to get them settled. As with pansies, they’ll keep going through snowstorms and winter freeze, and be an even more splendid sight come spring. 

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Baby bird update! Kamala has been tiptoeing out of her box and is feeding herself from a little dish of bird seed softened with water. I added finely minced carrot the other day and her expression was positively orgasmic. 

Mama Cooper still watches over her, but Papa Goldie is losing patience—fluffing his jealous feathers, chasing Kam around the cage floor and back into her box, then snuggling up to Cooper for a little romance. 

I have to tear myself away from the family drama. 

Here’s . . . Kamala, almost fully feathered! / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

I HAVE elephant ears coming out of my ears. Sadly, the wrong sort. 

Elephant ears are members of the arum or, to be fancier, araceae family, which includes about 4,000 varieties, including caladium, philodendron, and calla lily. 

But generally what people, meaning me, call elephant ears are the plants that grow enormous leaves, typically dark green, that resemble in shape and size the ears of an elephant. 

They arrive as bulbs (tubers) and can be stuck in any sort of reasonable soil with some degree of light, and given time will bolt out of the ground and start tossing off monster-scale leaves. 

While there are plenty of instructions online for the best ways of growing them, the plants tend to ignore them and grow whenever they feel in the mood. This can be irritating. 

This spring I tried to be particularly encouraging, putting a very large pot on the front porch, which gets more sun than anywhere in the garden, gave it some nice soil, stuck six or seven bulbs in the pot and settled myself down to wait. 

Since one thing I do know is that they get off to a faster start in a pot, I figured this would give me a jump start on growth, moving them to the garden beds when they deigned to emerge. 

Great idea! I thought. 

Unfortunately, when they popped up and I tried to move them, the roots were impossibly tangled. 

Giving it a try, I accidentally broke off the foliage from the one plant I managed to wrestle out of the bunch.  Potting up the sad-looking, now bald, bulb, I put it in a pot in a corner of the back garden, where it sat and sulked, and continues to sit and sulk.

Meanwhile, the rest of the clump went into a single large hole, where it has grown quite large and flopped about so badly that the Prince tied it to the wall with some extremely unattractive string.

This is NOT the effect I was going for. 

This is the effect LittleBird Stephanie was going for: Elephant ears on the left, monstera philodendron leaves on the right, plus some hydrangea, to make a moody mid-winter arrangement in the hallway of the Victorian Cavanaugh manse in Washington DC. / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

Worst of all, these were the wrong variety of elephant ears for my ultimate purpose, which was cutting the stems for a vase in the living room, where they would spread their fabulous leaves behind the sofa or in the front hall and, when spotlit from below, cast magnificent shadows on the night ceiling. In past years, the leaves would last for weeks of winter. (I’d keep the mother plants growing elsewhere in the house so I could clip more to refresh the display.)

These, when cut, look okay for a day, then go flumpsht, drooping listlessly over the sides of the vase. 

What I had inadvertently bought were colocasia bulbs when what I wanted were alocasia. You might get either in a bag at a big-box store; they look awfully alike in the photo on the bag, with their enormous leaves and fabulous spread, and the bags don’t bother to identify the variety. They’re also usually cheap.

But the alocasia leaves grow horizontally, a flat surface looking at the sky. Colocasias face forward. If you’re just growing them in the garden, you might not notice or care. Both are fabulous and dramatic and so forth. But if you want to add them to display the leaves as I do, or add them to flower arrangements, only the alocasias will do.

Unless you have a greenhouse, or sunroom, don’t try to start bulbs now—in any case,  many are sold out for the season. Next spring, I’d suggest letting your fingers tickle the computer keyboard. That’s what I intend to do. Here’s looking at you, Dutch Bulbs.

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Meanwhile, Kamala, my baby budgie, is almost out of her box. There’s a one-inch drop from the box to the cage floor that seems to be intimidating her. I was watching her yesterday, pulling her body over the opening, so her wings flapped in the air. Goldie, her dad, was sitting on a nearby branch watching her, just watching. Proud Papa, baby’s about to . . .  and . . .

Mama Cooper, who was sitting on a top branch suddenly realizes what is happening, swoops down, and pushes Kam back into the box with a lot of squawking and feather flapping and accusatory stares at Goldie. 

Damn, how familiar this is. Papa’s thinking, Go fly, my little star. Mama’s like, Not so fast buster, she’s still a baby.  

Kamala, born in a coconut shell (hence the name), isn’t hopping around yet, but her feathers are starting to come in, and Mom and Dad (Cooper and Goldie) couldn’t be more proud of themselves! / Photo by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

THE COLORBLENDS catalogue hath arrived.

Best hop to it: Some of their spectacular collections of tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, and allium are already sold out. 

I come to them for tulips alone, since I’d rather buy a bunch of daffs for a buck than deal with their foliage. A single whiff of a neighbor’s hyacinth is quite enough, thank you, and allium, though I love it, never works for me.

Tulips are their specialty, with terrific variety and excellent prices, and their customer service, judging from past phone calls, is top-notch and personable. Like actually dealing with a human who knows flowers. 

So, I wander the catalogue (which you can also see online, but I prefer dripping coffee and crumbs on actual pages).  

Oh, do I lust after Akebono (shown on the front), which is described as “a full-figured tulip from Japan,” but the pale yellow washed with soft red and a hint of green doesn’t suit my borders. Likewise, Three Kings, which are lily-flowered (their leaves are pointed at the tips and fold outward like a jester’s cap, or your less ostentatious royal crown) and a blazing clash of purple, red, yellow and orange blooms. 

Three Kings tulips from the Colorblends catalogue.

My garden is happiest in shades of purple and pink—a child’s birthday card minus the glitter. When those flowers open beneath the Kwanzan cherry, itself a blast of double pink blossoms with a wingspan that reaches from back porch to the garage and side wall to side wall, it is fabulous sight. (That’s for the three days or two weeks it’s all in bloom before a premature blast of heat or spring monsoons destroys the show). 

Smooch tulips from the Colorblends catalogue.

There are plenty of pinks in the catalogue: Smooch is a tempting mix of deep rose and soft pink bulbs that blooms in early spring; mid-spring is Pink Ardour, a blast of pure fuchsia; Mellow Drama brings together deep purple, mauve, and an eye-popping pink for a late spring show; and Pink Squared features two pinks, one an early bloomer, the other late, so you’ve made way for summer flowers just as summer begins. 

Mellow Drama tulip mix from the Colorblends catalogue.

Note that there’s a $60 minimum order (split it with a friend), and bulbs are shipped when you’re supposed to be planting them in your area, not early so they hang in the coat closet for a month or so—or lie forgotten in the garden shed. 

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Update on Kamala! As said last week, my baby parakeet was born in a coconut shell. She’s now two and a half weeks old and growing so fast. It’s a wonder I do anything but sit and watch her change.  

Last week I found the perfect little box for her on the street. This neighborhood is great for strolling out for bananas and finding things like a bird box with a sign saying FREE. It’s twice the size of the coconut shell and flat bottomed so it sits on the floor of the cage, so when she gets the guts to venture out, she won’t fall far. 

Her feathers are coming in fast, though I’m still not sure what her final colors will be. Mama Coop is pure white, Papa Goldie is predominantly green with yellow and black highlights and a tropical blue tail. It looks like Kami might have a white or pale blue body with a green head and wings. Such excitement!

Meanwhile, Cooper and Goldie snuggle with her much of the day, now that she’s recognizable as a bird, not a fat pink lagniappe.

When they’re not in the box they make-out passionately on an upper branch, eyes glazed over, as if congratulating themselves on a job well done. I hope that’s all they’re doing. Three birds are quite enough. 

This coconut shell is where parakeet Cooper lays her eggs. This time a baby budgie developed. / On the front, Cooper, left, and Goldie. Photos by Stephanie Cavanaugh.

By Stephanie Cavanaugh

OUR BABY BUDGIE was born in a coconut shell, so of course her name had to be Kamala. 

Rather a surprise she was, making her presence known with tiny cheeps, like the little mice that secrete themselves around the house, occasionally darting from this hidey-hole to that, as quiet as . . . mice. 

These cheeps were different from Cooper and Goldie’s, the parental parakeets. Their voices are deeper, louder, often involved in raucous conversation with each other—and with the neighborhood birds that visit on the back porch, where Cooper and Goldie spend their summer days. 

Kamala’s cheeps are one note: Hey, I’m hungry, feed me. She’s hungry a lot. 

Actually, we have no clue if Kam is a she or a he, that won’t be known for six months or so. We had the same issue with Cooper and Goldie, who were very young when they came into our lives. Parakeets have a hard little bit around their nostrils that starts out beige but becomes blue if the bird is male and deep tan in females. Pure white Cooper (who turned out to be female) was named for Anderson Cooper. The only male Goldies I’ve heard of were Jewish gangsters. Goldie is all boy. So, oops. 

Cooper is an amazing mother, spending most of her days inside the coconut shell, which dangles from the roof of their cage and was given to them as a toy many months ago. They like snuggling in it. Cooper also finds it a fine place to drop her eggs, which are astonishingly large, the size of marbles. It must be like giving birth to a 15-pound baby.

The eggs arrive several times a month, but up until now have been infertile. She sits on them for a couple of days, then tosses them out onto the cage floor if nothing’s happening. Perfectly normal behavior, say the approximately 632 Internet sites I consulted. 

(My, these sites are opinionated. It’s like talking to the La Leche League, 40 years ago. How they preached at me while my baby was screaming for food. Firstly, the parakeet sites say, NEVER give birds coconut shells. Oops again.)

It took Goldie a long time to figure out how to “do it,” if you catch my drift. While they spent a great deal of time kissing and grooming each other, it was only a month or so ago that he got the mechanics of the act down and clambered onto her back. 

Kamala arrived on August 4. Hearing the peeps, I put down my coffee and peeked in to find a tiny featherless pink thing, kind of disgusting-looking, but alive. As I understand it, Cooper gets food, chews it, and spits it into the baby’s mouth for the first weeks, sitting on her/him/it/them for warmth (I think).  

For days, Goldie paced back and forth on one of the branches suspended in the cage, like a dad in a hospital waiting room circa 1955. They both seem frazzled: Cooper’s white feathers rumpled, her expression unhinged; Goldie muttering to himself as he paced, waiting for his woman to get bored with that weird-looking thing.

This week, Coop is back to making out on a branch with Goldie and spending less time in the coconut, even as Kam sprouts bristles, like a two-day beard, that will soon become feathers, and tries standing on wobbly legs. This morning her eyes finally opened. What a miracle this is. I just hope it doesn’t happen again. Are there itty-bitty bird condoms, I wonder.

Speaking of babies, mine just popped out a daughter. Piper Jean was born on July 30, five weeks early. She’s small, but so fine, and looks exactly like her brother, Wesley, which is a very good thing. I hope she gets his eyelashes.

Wes is 4½ and besotted with his little sister, though that did not keep him from saying to his dad, who picked him up from camp the other day, Why don’t we go to the movies and leave the girls at home?  

I ask you. Where do they get this stuff?