The Notable and Special Roses of Bellemaison. Some are notable in and of themselves, most are special because of someone else. We will do that you know. Plant roses in honor of someone. The Chows and I grow 'Gruss an Aachen' for Julie; she LOVES this rose. 'Golden Showers' for that wild man in Pasadena. He loves that rose. 'Dolly Parton' for Tisa. 'Sunsprite' for Hope. 'Altissimo' for Julia. 'Bow Bells' for Jane. "Sombrueil" for Vonny. I also planted one for Ken, who is gone now, having left too early. 'Joseph's Coat' for Gerry. 'Angel Face' for YouKnowWho and 'Happy Child' for, well, guess.

Once I got a note from Malcolm, in Florida, asking if I wanted a cutting from his grandmother's white rose. He moved it from Pennsylvania down to the Orlando area and after a time, decided that the rose really wasn't too happy. So he made a series of cuttings for his friends and then shoveled pruned Grandma's rose. I was thrilled to get a piece of her rose here in Bellemaison and it's done well. And it's white. Other than that, Malcolm can't tell me much about it and he has a PhD in horticulture. And so these things go. We share these sensual embodiments of friendship and fulfillment with each other and year after year, try to remember them in winter and dutifully stalk them in summer, on recon for aphids and mildew. How is it we get so attached? Why do they mean so much?

The Romans were smitten with roses, to the point that their infatuation became idolatry. Julius Caesar popularized wearing rose chaplets in public to camouflage his premature baldness. Nero spent 6,000,000 sesterces on roses for a dinner party--a sum that would pay one full Roman legion for an entire year. Heliogabalus created to the rose petal drop, causing rose petals to flutter over the dining room as his guests feasted. The Romans grew 'Campania', described by Pliny as the most famous; 'Milesian', a vibrant red named for a Greek town on the Aegean; and 'Praeneste', a longer blooming variety that gave them roses well past the season. Their cultural dispositions toward roses are still held today, with some roses, 'Peace', selling widely still after being introduced 70 years ago. It's said that 'Peace' is the most famous rose of our time. Today, the hybridizers give the roses names for people and places--John Paul II just got his rose, a white, highly-acclaimed recent release of Jackson Perkins. I grow 'Barbara Bush', a tall, sturdy, forgiving pink hybrid tea. And of course, with global distributions networks what they are in 2007, I can have lovely, inexpensive roses of any variety in a vase in my kitchen twelve months of the year. Read that: South America.


The French do things today with roses that I do not see anywhere. They acknowledge the rose as a component of the good life, the life to be lived. And to see a red rose in bloom on a July day in Paris is a sensual experience practically unparallelled. Is it the light? Is it the red? The Chows and I grow the same rose here in Bellemaison, but it's not the same. Just isn't. The Empress Josephine made it her life's work, turning her avocation into a vocation, to grow and catalogue all existing species of roses in perhaps the most famous rose garden of all time, Malmaison. She scoured the world for new and unacquired species and as she had certain connections, ships laden with roses from far and wide enjoyed diplomatic immunity on the high seas, giving them safe passage back Josephine as her husband, Emperor Napoleon waged war. Ships and navys came and went but Josephine's roses remained untouched to thrive and flourish at Malmaison. She engaged Redoute to make drawings of each species and variety, such drawings now having become art treasures. Josephine and Redoute made one of history's all time most notable gardens, with immaculate illustrations and botanical records that exist to this day, but she still died young when she caught a cold at a party. And so this is life, then as now.

I grow 'Miss All American Beauty' for my mother. I grow the White Rose of York and The Red Rose of Lancashire. Yes, the same icons of Tudor England. I have 'Quatre Saison' which grew in Pompeii. I have 'Coeur d'Alene', a hot pink, crinkly leaved, tissue paper rose named for my beloved hometown. I have one whole bed planted in purple roses, for the National Champions Portland Pilots Women's Soccer Team. The two lions that stand guard at the garden gate are Bill and Clive, the coaches of the team. Clive is gone now, too; early; from cancer. But his roses remain and this year, they will bloom again in fragrant reminder of how dear and how unique each season of life is. And what grace we get with notable and special people and experiences in our life. So I think of you today.

And when the fall comes and we prune each rose back, strip it and shroud it with dirt and pine needles, the Chows and I will huddle up together and wait for the winter snows as the wind howls around us. But we'll remember.

We'll remember.

JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

It's Garden Week here at Bellemaison. The Chows are practically giddy with joy because with all the comings and going of bags of steer and peat and the lugging of big pots around and the replacement of bird houses and planting of seeds, there is plenty of time to get in some good games of ball. Previously this spring, against all good advice, we pruned the Loch Ness of Roses, New Dawn. This rose is flat crazy. She is a rambler, bred by Somerset. She is hardy, she is wild, she throws canes around like a drunken sailor on a Saturday night and she produces the most delicately beautiful, delightfully feminine, dainty roses of an exquisite shell pink. The first time I saw her ablaze in bloom was in St. Alban's Hertfordshire in the UK at the headquarters of the Royal Horticulture Society Headquarters. She is royal in every sense of the word. She rambles along the walls of the garden and comprises the arch to the garden entrance. She creates such a tangle of fierce thorns that the birds like to nest in mine, atop the fence, where I can look out my bedroom window, right into their turquoise blue eggs. Ah, spring. So New Dawn is a favorite, on many levels.







Another favorite is 'Paradise', (Weeks). Paradise is a lovely bluey lavender, whose petals are tipped in soft ruby red. It has exquisite fragrance, as most lavender roses do, and such a beautiful presence with these lovely red-tipped lavender blooms nestled in a shiny, dark leathery bush of foliage. 'Paradise' is a secret gift that I give to me. No one knows....

Oh, and Fragrant Cloud. What a rose! She also is magnificently fragrant (are you beginning to see a trend here?) and a funny, corrally-reddy color that looks like a grandma color to me. I would never pick this color. But I love this rose. God, what a fragrance. It's citrus and fresh and soft, but sharp? See, that's the thing with this rose: contradicts me and itself on every level and just won't leave my consciousness. I will cross 4 lanes of traffic to buy a Fragrant Cloud rose on sale and have been know to buy 2 dozen at a shot. True, I'm afraid. sigh.



Okay, let's talk about white roses, my very favorites. The favorite of the favorites is 'Jacqueline du Pre', bred by Peter Harkness, whom I have met. In St. Alban's. Why do I love this rose? Oh my word. First, it is a creamy white, like cream from the carton, not a startling white, like copy paper from the printer. It has delicate purple stamens and orangey centers. It's fragrant with a lovely, musky, sexy scent. It's a cupped rose, which means the petals form a little cup as they unfold. It has beautiful dark green leaves. This rose is a masterpiece, white or not, and for you who need to know, is the cross between 'Radox Boqet' and 'Maigold' and of course, was named for the cellist who died from Multiple Sclerosis in 1987. If you are going to grow one rose, grow this one. full stop.



And then there's Eden. Oh I know some of you will tell me she balls. Yes, we rosarians talk about our roses this way. Perfectly acceptable. Means if it rains as she is beginning to bloom, she changes her mind, balks and balls up. Undoubtedly a phrase the English coined. To help her get past her stubbornness, you have to take the rose bloom in your clean hands, and gently coax the petals into unfolding with your thumbs. Hmmm. Eden is a delicate ivory and pink cabbage rose, with no scent, but with apple green leaves. She is a perfect wedding rose, the perfect bathroom sink rose, the perfect evening stroll rose. I grow her on the other side of the fence and she crawls up and flops over to my side, giving the Chows and me a spectacular cascade of blooms and foliage. I LOVE Eden.


And yellow roses, along with the lavenders, the most fragrant of all roses: I am particularly fond of Austin's 'Charlotte' and his 'Happy Child', too. Both wonderfully fragrant, lovely, well-behaved roses with good garden-behavior habits.



Next up: The Notable and Special Roses of Bellemaison
~many thanks to rosarians of the world for their Google images

JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

The Chow Nation is quite inspired by Gardener Girl's Garden 101 over at her place. They called me out to Club Chow, where we composed our own Garden 101. It's going to be the best year yet at Bellemaison.

We are a coffee grounds-banana peel-epsom salt operation here. We plant with 'em; we amend the soil with 'em; we swear by 'em. Potassium, rich, leathery foliage and sturdy new growth. Yum.

We don't do chemicals here. We use steer manure and peat moss. But I know I mentioned that now peat moss is ecologically irresponsible. Good lord, what are we ever gonna do without peat moss? We bath most everything regularly; if the pesty bugs remain, we wash them with soap water. We farm lady bugs who are ravenous and will eat the nasties right up. We plant companions in an effort to encourage natural predators, as we use the food chain to help Bellemaison flourish. We love the birds and the bees and the birds and do whatever we can to maintain a healthy environment for them and for the plants. No chemicals.

We are fearsome deadheaders, pruners, shovel pruners. No weak links to attract pests. We mulch up. Keep an eye on the water supply, although we just don't ever have water issues here at Bellemaion.

We brew alfalfa tea for the roses. They love it. We fertilize them every two weeks with a weak solution of fish oil fertilizer. They will be dressed in two weeks with coffee grounds, steer, and peat. They got epsom salts today. They will get more June 1. Again August 15. And I will water and fertilize the hell out of them. But I will stop all fertilizer and soil amendments September 1 but continue to water and in fact, begin to deep water them. In return, they will produce prodigious armsful of fragrant pink, yellow, white, orange, purple and red roses until October 15. sigh.

This year I will hard prune the rhoddies after the 4th of July in an effort to talk some sense into them. The grow thing they do has to get some order and purpose to it! god! Next weekend, I will dress the hydrangeas with ammonium sulfate to make the blues bluer. mmmmm.

I have bird baths and water features literally everywhere in Bellemaison. Everyone loves 'em. They need 'em too. I also have houses every place I can put a house. For the bats, the butterflies and all the birds.

I'll feed those razorbacks that some people call squirrels. Maybe they'll leave the vegetables and everything else alone?

We do a few annuals and lots of perennials and bet the farm on flowering shrubs. I think one of the most admirable professions in all of the world is Head Gardener in a garden anywhere in the United Kingdom.

Next up: favorite roses.


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

The broken are not always gathered together, of course, and not all mysteries of the flesh are solved. We speak of "senseless tragedies,", but really: Is there any other kind? Mothers and wives disappear without a trace. Children are killed. Madmen ravage the world, leaving wounds immeasurably deep, and endlessly mourned. Loved ones whose presence once filled us move into the distance; our eyes follow them as long as possible as they recede from view. Maybe we chase them -- clumsily, across railroad tracks and trafficked streets; over roads new-printed with their footsteps, the dust still whirling in the wake of them; through impossibly big cities people with strangers whose faces and bodies carry fragments of their faces and bodies, whose laughter, steadiness, pluck , stubbornness, remind us of the beloved we seek. Maybe we stay put, left behind, and look for them in our dreams. But we never stop looking, not even after those we love become part of the unreachable horizon. We can never top carrying the heavy weight of love on this pilgrimage; we can only transfigure what we carry. We can only shatter it and send it whirling into the world so that it can take shape in some new way.


--Stephanie Kallos
'Broken For You'


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

The Dante's Inferno Test has sent you to Purgatory!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Extreme
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	High
Level 2 (Lustful)	Moderate
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	High
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Low
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Low
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Very Low
Level 7 (Violent)	Low
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	Low
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Very Low

Take the Dante's" Inferno Hell Test

Oh, I loved this one. Got it from Gayle over at Scribal Terror. Guess those peanut butter cup smores and that dessert wine are skewing my score. And like Gayle, I'm just not sorry. And you will never, ever know for sure why I'm moderately lustful.

JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

For Wendy

JBelle

Bellemaison

The 'Kan EWA

okay. This from Julia. I thought it was amusing. Don't like green so much anyway. Had a terrible time getting it posted as my HTML sucks. Link that works is below the link that seduces you into thinking it works. so what color green are you? You Are Emerald Green

Deep and mysterious, it often seems like no one truly gets you.Inside, you are very emotional and moody - though you don't let it show.People usually have a strong reaction to you... profound love or deep hate.But you can even get those who hate you to come around. There's something naturally harmonious about you.

What Color Green Are You?

http://www.blogthings.com/whatcolorgreenareyouquiz/

We are genuinely unapproachable this week but it concerns us that you may think we don't think of you. Untrue. We think of you every morning, with thankfulness and amazement. You inspire us. So you know, here's some of one of my favorites:



Spring
Song, from Act V, Scene 2 of Love’s Labors Lost by William Shakespeare (1598)

When daisies pied, and violets blue,
And lady-smocks all silver-white,
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue
Do paint the meadows with delight,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,
Mocks married men, for thus sings he: “Cuckoo!
Cuckoo, cuckoo!” O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear.

When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,
And merry larks are ploughmen’s clocks,
When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws,
And maidens bleach their summer smocks,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,
Mocks married men, for thus sings he: “Cuckoo!
Cuckoo, cuckoo!” O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear.


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

[WE ARE AN EASTER PEOPLE AND ALLELUIA IS OUR SONG!]
~St. Augustine


i thank You God for this most amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life and love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)
~e.e. cummings


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

I love Easter. I always have. I know the roots of this romance were born in new clothes each and every year as a child. Of course, as a very small child, that included not just a new dress, coat and shoes, but gloves and hats and handbags as well. Every year. My mother usually made my dress and that one that stands out in my memory is my buttercup dress. Filmy, gauzy yellow cotton with buttercups and a dropped waist and lace. I LOVED that dress.

I loved dressing my little kids up. I made my oldest son's clothes until he was about 7. That was because I couldn't afford the type of clothes I wanted to dress him in so I made his clothes. I was challenged and intrigued by how hard boys' clothing was to make compared to girls'. I loved that time of my life. By that time in my mother's life, she was completely out of new clothes and into Easter decorations. She made bunnies and eggs. I have boxes of them. And the boxes she never got to finish, all half ready to be painted and finished. Life is beautiful and life is cruel. Life is Easter, eh?

Easter then became a break in the frenetic pace of out of towners each weekend and all nighters meetings deadlines during the week. I loved Easter. I would still dress my children up; the days of the home sewn clothes were far gone, however. Maybe it's just my imagination but I believe the smiles shone just as bright. I loved getting my husband a new shirt and tie, too. I started getting flowers in the house, then. Pots of flowers that made my soul rise and sing. We all spent the day together, in a proper manner and fell exhausted and happy into bed, to rise the next morning and head straight back into the fray.

These new Easters are much, much quieter and in fact, are genuinely still. Last year we were at Cape Cod for Easter. Went to the Kennedys' church and heard a beautiful homily. Easter before that we were at St Jude's in Seattle for an adult confirmation. We don't dress up much these days because the day has completely morphed into a haven where we get together and be together. We will be home this year and eagerly await a very special guest. The house is full of flowers and a few groceries. We will cook a little and go out some as we welcome our beloved daughter. I bought her new shoes. She picked them out. We miss our boys. We love our dogs. The sun shines clear and bright. Tim's dad died and Tim's baby is due any minute. And for this and for pinecones, clear streams and the Big Sky, we give thanks and praise the day in joy and peace.


JBelle
Bellemaison
The 'Kan EWA

Went out to Home Depot in the Spokane Valley last weekend. A quintessential shopping experience always. On the way, you go through quite a few neighborhoods that are all ready for Easter. These are some of the better Easter statements around town. Country Club, bah.

JBelle

Bellemaison

The 'Kan EWA

JBelle

Bellemaison

The 'Kan EWA