That's the word around here these days. Right after my last root appointment, in late June, I decided that it was time to quit spending so much time (and money) at the "beauty saloon" as Jack calls it. So I've been growing my silver and my stylist has been cutting off the warm brown tint. I've one more haircut to go in October and all the tint will be gone. Then it's just my "original hair" growing out, which turns out to be more of an ash brown in the back, along with the silver in the front.
I feel lucky that my stylist, Joy, is so supportive. She says lots of her clients get to this point and can't get through the grow out stage. So they resort to color again. Too bad! I've discovered that having much shorter hair is so nice and easy. Maybe I'll just keep getting frequent cuts and watching the silver take over.
Here in the Rogue Valley we are experiencing an early autumn this year, it seems. Night temps in the low 40's mean that most veggies just stop doing much. Usually we have rather hot temps until almost the end of the month but not this year. Probably means we'll have a lot of green tomatoes to ripen indoors. But I'm not complaining because the cooler temps are so nice!
So I'm madly dumping pots, planting some things into the ground and putting some things in bigger pots. Time to "activate" my pot washing sink (a laundry tray that my under gardener installed mainly for just this purpose)...washing up pots before I store them away for winter. I bring out a bucket of hot, sudsy water and turn it into mud, basically, as I scrub out the insides. It usually takes several times changing out the water to get all the pots cleaned. I let them dry out for a couple of days so that if I want to stack them, they won't freeze together in the winter.
Our weather has taken a decidedly "fallish" feel so I've been gathering up all the succulents that won't survive this winter in our Sunset Zone 7. Turns out that's a lot of 'em!
But first I had to clean out and paint the interior of my tiny greenhouse. I used Miller Storm in "boxwood" which bears no resemblance to the real color of boxwood! But I like it as it is a sort of a sage green although it looks very blue here.
I added some small shelves at the back of the counters to raise up plants so I could get to them more easily.
We even activated the heater (lower left of photo) last night as it got down into the mid 40's. That's a Kalanchoe blooming away on the left. Looks like I'm almost maxed out and I still have a Meyer lemon and a geranium to shoe horn in! How did I get so many succulents anyway?
I guess we were getting antsy or something, being stuck indoors during the outdoor season. We've had wall to wall smoke for several weeks now (no surprise with 150,000 plus acres burning up around us), with only an occasional few hours when we could actually see the sky. Sometimes there were even clouds and stars...who knew?
So this morning when we could actually open the windows and enjoy a bit of fresh air, we opted for the lumber yard and a mini project.
With $90 worth of 2"x 12" cedar planks and some treated 2x4's we designed and built a small platform to hold the birdbath and assorted pots. Here I'm "head down, butt up" (thankfully photographed by the under gardener from the kind position) painting the cedar with Miller Storm in "boxwood" which is really a sage green.
Here you see the alternating pots of daylilies and dwarf boxwood NOT sinking into the gravel and clay soil beneath! Quite an improvement. And now with the help of additional gravel under the platform we may be able to level the birdbath!
We got it done just in time as the smoke is drifting back into the hills here.
My volunteer hollyhock is loving its location in the garden. I figure it free seeded from my neighbor's yard. It is over 8' tall and growing in the gravel and un-amended clay soil next to the raised beds but not in one!
I've never had any luck growing hollyhocks "on purpose." They always die on me. Obviously they thrive in heavy clay soil with little water!
When I first moved to the Rogue Valley in 1971, I couldn't buy agapanthas (Lily of the Nile) anywhere. I had to "import" them from California where they enjoyed popularity, even on freeway medians. Here the standard answer to my query about them was, "Oh no, they aren't possible in our zone!" (Sunset zone 7). And they didn't survive the cold winters so I stopped planting them back then.
HOW TIMES HAVE CHANGED!
Today they are widely available at all nurseries and garden centers in the valley. For the past several years we haven't had the extreme low temps that would kill them! Other formerly tender plants have also become available at local nurseries suggesting that our climate has indeed changed!
Yes, just looking at my little grand niece Tessa makes my milk drop! Isn't she a sweetie. And my sister-in-law is reveling in being a grandma for the first time and getting to spend lots of time with her in Texas.
