And not a creature was stirring.....

Except for me of course, Winter Solstice Poodle! The Red Queen & CEO built a great, huge(1o foot minimum) pile of sticks and culled trees over the summer and set it blazing on the 21st. Oh, I should mention that we are completely nuts (all of us) because it was close to zero degrees with winds up to 25mph and LAKE EFFECT SNOW. By the time the CEO had set the fire, over 13 inches of new snow had fallen this day.
I had some reservations the fire would take, however with the very dry timber accompanied by the wind the conflagration was spectacular at times. Pitch black dark outside, red sparks roiling across the snow,wind whipping the flames to a cresendo....ahhhh, the beauty of it all. Tie it all together with a little homemade mead (the Red Queen drank Pinot, the meads much to sweet for her), and a dinner of root vegetables w/ venison tenderloin, and my friends you have a perfect celebration to the unconquered sun. I will end this post with two of my favorite quotes about winter....

The cold was our pride, the snow was our beauty. It fell and fell, lacing day and night together in a milky haze, making everything quieter as it fell, so that winter seemed to partake of religion in a way no other season did, hushed, solemn.
~Patricia Hampl~

Turn down the noise. Reduce the speed. Be like somnolent bears, or those other animals that slow down and almost die in the cold season. Let it be the way it is. The magic is there in it's power.
~Henry Mitchell

And yes, the fire did burn through the night, waiting for the sun to return.

Ain't no Sunshine when You're gone

After making it through the first Alberta Clipper of the winter unscathed, it became apparent that the sun was going to have to shine vicariously through Bartzella here, showing her full true colours.

Bartzella...a beautiful true Intersectional Hybrid peony developed by Roger Anderson. We are lucky enough to have two of these beauties in out gardens here at the Smiling Dog. Intersectionals are a rare cross of herbaceous & tree peonies,displaying the best of both cultivars. Along with the beauty of the bloom there is a very mild hint of lemon fragrance....truely a stunner.

She's napping now, with her blanket of snow pulled tight around her, anticipating the warmth of the spring sun and many happy days ahead.

Alberta Clipper and Brother I don't mean ship

Poodle here. 3F this morning. Remember when I mentioned Lake Effect a few posts back...well I failed to mention that along with this 'effect' there is another weather phenomena referred to as the (dun dun dun, cue scream) Alberta Clipper. This is a small low pressure system that comes to us (no not via parcel post, or even Fed-Ex) by the way of Alberta Canada and moves really, really, really fast (hence clipper). The system moves from WNW to ESE and slides along a track separating cold air from the north from warm air to the south and is usually followed by a run of cold weather, and yes, sometimes more than not, lots of Lake effect.

Now...we all know how to dress warmly up here (notice fur coat), and aren't deterred much by the chill, however when you combine the cold with wind you end up with a factor known as wind chill. Even though our outdoor temperature is registering 12F as the Red Queen types for me, it actually feels like -6F with the wind. Charming huh?

That means my toes freeze, dog snot forms little balls on my nose and in general even if everyone is dressed warmly, we don't get to play outside for very long. This early winter is a little soon for a clipper....which means from past experience that the pattern may be set for a clipper year....and leads to (OK, really big scream here) Cabin Fever! A 'been in the house way too long' manifestation. Usually not a problem until February when the BIG CHILL usually happens. But, it's been very,very grey,along with very,very dark, and now very,very cold (did I say very?), and it looks like we may have trouble my friends. As long as the Red Queen keeps

her paws off Baudelaire and Poe, and the CEO (who is always good hearted and kind) makes her go out for oxygen now and again, we might be alright. Stay tuned.

Pagan Smagan, The Evolution of the Wreath

The Red Queen (yes, she does quite frequently say "OFF with their heads!") has finished her wreath of choice for the house. Not an easy task, considering the abundance of brush and other essential ornamentation growing around the farm. Usually the wreath is done later in the season with cast offs after making wreaths for everyone else, but being in the 'spirit' early on she decided to get the damn thing done before the mood passed.

The history of the wreath is rich, steeped in ancient practices from Persia (wealth & power), to Greece (champions), to Rome (saturn,soltice). Many Celts decorated the interiors of their homes with wreaths of hollyberrries and evergreens to celebrate the end of the long winter and the strength of life, which today would be a good thing ( I AM going to digress here...) because we are having 24 mph winds with considerable Lake Effect Snow. The color of he sky from now on will be grey, offset with other shades of grey, sort of a tone on tone symphony of grey. No wonder they went for the red berries.....

I should also mention our sun rises here this morning at 8:15AM and sets at 5:04PM(lat/46.55N long/87.40W)....not exactly a great vitamin D day....no wonder the pagans hauled life into their homes...Poodle being a Germanic dog, I can totally get this Winter Solstice, Birth of the Unconquered Sun diatribe....by the time we hit December 21st, many people in our area suffer a form of depression called Seasonal Affected Disorder (SAD). The affected sit in front of light boxes to get their serotonin flowing....

So, Winter Solstice is only 20 days away.....Bonfire anyone? Burn On!

What's the BuZZZZZZZZ

Whew! It's been quite busy here at The Smiling Dog Perennial Farm. Snow has fallen, deer have been processed, and now it's time to harvest trees and assorted other accoutrement's for wreath designing. Most of the trees are Balsam, but we also cut Blue and White Spruce along with long needled White Pine.

The fellow in the photo is my CEO (Chief Entertainment Officer) and beloved husband of the Red Queen. They both have kept me pretty busy supervising and hunting for all types of novelties buried beneath the snow.

While harvesting trees we came upon a Bald Faced Hornet nest, snuggly secured in the top of a Balsam. These hornets are actually Dolichovespula maculata, really a wasp that belongs to the genus Vespa (no, not a scooter). The closest relative of the bald faced Hornet is called the Yellow Jacket. The male wasps are dead now(workers and drones) and only the queen survives the winter, hibernating behind tree bark or in a rotting log. The wasps are usually quite benign, unless of course you happen to bump or threaten their nest. They can sting multiple times and usually go for the face....best course of action...run like hell.

The Ever Darkening Sky Does Hold

a grip of chill, fast, sliding down
spineward to clutch at
unmistakable pasts.


How the dark does flow for the nether months,
until small white crystals pervade the still silent air.
Clouds perfect composites unleashing the flying and crackling
small insects of winter.

Crafted butterflies of the light, they float to ground and up again,
lacing trees with their dignified and final touch.

A. (2008)







My how a day at the lake can change a poodles outlook on life....Lake Superior, the largest of the Great Lakes and the world's largest freshwater lake by surface area (Lake Baikal in Russia is the largest lake by volume). It holds 10% of all the Earth's fresh water surface and produces the greatest lake effect snows on Earth with the lake effect extending from 20 to 30 miles inland. The average temperature for this lake is 40 degrees F and it rarely freezes over in winter.



This day was relatively quite, no wind, very dark, silent except for the punctuation of city life in the background. Until the snows come the landscape is bleak, but beautiful. The lake has a large impact upon the mind and the soul...it is a lake to be respected and has taken many, many lives.

The Beer Tree is Blooming!

Venerable Deer Hunters everywhere in this great state are now picking their beer trees along with their apples and sugar beets. Orange and camouflage is disappearing from the shelves and the ritual beards have begun to itch....just like fingers on a trigger. All different disciplines of work stops, young gents are free from the confines of public school. November 15 is soon approaching....hey where's my orange collar?

Dear, dear, how queer everything is today!

And yesterday everything went on just as usual. I wonder if I've been changed in the night? Let me think: Was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I'm not the same, the next question is : Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle!

-Lewis Carrol,

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

The world of fractal mathematics....self-similar and infinitely detailed....what a wonderous definition of so many aspects of nature.... and truely ourselves! Benoit Mandelbrot's (born, Warsaw Poland) idea of mathematics can be sumed by his statement "I don't study books, I study nature." Fractals are now used in Pixar animation, cardiology, ongoing research for cancer, forest management, and many other disciplines in science that require a different look at math. While working for IBM he investigated a problem with transmitting computer information via telephone lines. After charting out the interference, he discovered that all the interference had the same pattern, no matter what time of day or length of duration. The pattern reminded him of the mathematical "monsters" he had studied at University. His interest in this occurence and his research has opened massive doors to the understanding of nature and items that aren't geometric. For informative interviews and how this all began visit www.PBS.org and click on Hunting the Hidden Dimension. So really....who in the world am I?

It's not exactly an apple...

So, 28 degrees this morning and no hope of apples straight from the tree for another 9 months....makes a dog want to howl. Stuck inside early this morning waiting for the sun to warm the air and earth, one of my entertainment directors was researching the history of Barcelona Spain (book review of In the Shadow of the Wind to follow in another post), when she ran across a fantastic photoblog:
Barcelona Photoblog: Pomegranate (Punica Granatum) - Detailed Image

It kinda looks like an apple, but then I remembered having some of them around the house in the winter and being shooed away from such an orb like structure. But then I digress....this man has photography of the city that elicits emotion, fragrance, and old world beauty. I could smell the sights....Oh can we go there? In the car?

In Leiu of Flowers.....

Yes, the Dahlias are done for good now. Only a few hardy garden flowers remain unscathed. In a few weeks we will start to dig the tubers and prepare them for storage over the winter. Not an easy task as the dahlias require to be kept at a temperature so as not to freeze them, but not break into eyes as well. Time for a long winter's snooze.

Tuber dehydration is another concern....or too much humidity. It is a balancing act and everyone who grows Dahlias has their own ritual of over winter storage which works for them. Plants and flowers are like anything else which is perishable, sometimes you do everything right and it dies, sometimes you do everything wrong and it lives. And then there's the time when you want something to die, kick the bucket, perish, and it just keeps on, and on and on......like an old hag with nothing else to do but wine....(ahem)...whine.




Here I am traversing the frosty veld, hunting wiley bunny and deer. What no pigeons?

Frost On the Ol' Punkin, er...I mean Dahlia

This past Saturday we all awoke to a crisp killing hard frost with the thermometer hovering around 30F. Luckily I had a photo-op the day before sporting one of my favorite Dahlias, a hot pink cactus. Fall is really here, and many of the plants are going to take their big dirt nap soon. Life has been busy cleaning up the gardens, chasing sticks, and putting everyone to bed while we wait for the snow to cover them like a big down blanket.

Veggies have been under siege from long legged intruders looking to fatten up for the nearing winter. With any luck one of those intruders will be succulently served from the grill with any remaining veggies that made it past the taste test this past weekend. HMMM, HMMMM, TASTY!

Type it for me, I'm all paws

Ok, my first foray into the blogosphere. Here I will write about gardening, art, books, and tasty stuff located here where I live in Green Garden Michigan, about 8 miles south of Marquette. The entertainment directors tastes are pretty eclectic, so one day we might be discussing a new book or trying a new recipe....or just playing outside (my personal favorite...did some one say ORB?).