Nature’s Beauty

"Live simple, live well, and take time to smell the flowers along the way" Mark Twain

   Growing up with a single mom who worked around the clock meant that for the first 11 years of my life when I wasn't in school I went to work with her. She had managed a flower wholesale business in the little town I grew up in for 17 years. My mom’s sister also worked there as one of the head floral designers. So from an early age I came by my green thumb honestly. I learned everything from how the back green houses ran to how to make elaborate flower arraignments. One of my favorite scents to this day is still the smell of a fresh cut design room, and the overwellming smell of the floral preservatives in the air takes me right back to my childhood.

    So fast-forward to when I was 18 and had been out of high school for four months and I stumbles into my dream home. This was almost 7 years ago now and I am still working on transformed every inch of it inside and out. One of the first things I did though even before I officially closed on the property was to actually clear the yard of almost 15 years of overgrowth. The house was so buried beneath what looked like a boma that served as a fortress amid to protect the home from intruders. It was so dense that you it that you couldn’t hardly even see the for sale sign in the front yard. Neighbors had told me they had nicknamed it the "Jungle House" and had to cover their pets with flea powder just to walk by it. After I cleared the lot of all the overgrowth with the help of family and friends and it was a blank canvas for which I could begin to plan for my dream of having an English garden.

     Because of growing season here in the north I quickly out of time to actually plant anything. and besides that there were so many more structural problems that needed to be attended to before my first winter there. So I bided my time and wait till the following summer to begin planting. It has since taken hold and I am still adding more verity to it and moving plants around. Just last week I added 13 clumps of dark purple iris I found discarded at the community compost pile. I personally love when a garden can transition from spring to summer to fall and never quit blooming. And mine does just that, and even when plants aren’t blooming their greenery still give texture to the yard and adds additional dimension and layering.

Yours truly,

Nicklas