it's summer now in new york and i'm so grateful for my little life here. i loathe humidity and so summer is often a time i moan and groan a lot, but after this long, depressing winter with a 1.5 year old boy bouncing off the walls in my apartment, i'm much more inclined to enjoy the warm, soft air.
today, i'm grateful for my garden. it brings me a lot of joy. i've had a few iterations of it in the past four years we've lived here at our little castle in the sky and i feel like i've finally found a good balance of plants that complement one another and provide different functions. some plants are just beautiful and enjoyable to watch bloom like my lavender, rose bush, peony, japanese maple, and bamboo. other plants provide us with food and a little bit of a harvest- our herbs, tomatoes, fig tree, and new raspberry bush (see "raspberry shortcake"). we have fresh herbs all winter long thanks to our garden which is a real treat.
and lastly, there are plants that serve the dual function. those are pretty much our blueberry bushes. we have two now and they give us a decent amount of blueberries (you'd need quite a few to have a steady supply and then harvest for canning) and turn the most beautiful red colors in the fall.
i have found the most wonderful ground cover flower for next to and under other larger plants - portulaca. it favors dry conditions, which our terrace most certainly is. and that means i don't have to baby it with water. it blooms continuously throughout the summer. i discovered it our first year here and then for some reason decided it wasn't what i wanted. i tried other ones none of which worked that well and this year was at the nursery, saw some, and thought, "hey! my old friend portulaca!"
here's a photo of it blooming next to my lavender plant. in this photo is a shell from a beach in NC where my primary family and i used to take vacations. those beaches have the best shell collecting i've found on the east coast. i brought back a bag of shells years ago and just took them out for my son to play with. i've put a few in pots and i look at them, remember the good times i had with my family, and smile.
we are going to cape cod this summer, to a town my parents and i used to go to, and i'm so excited to explore it with my new little family. it will be filled with memories of my parents which makes me a little nervous. but i think we will have fun and my son will be thrilled to play on the beach and in the ocean and lakes.
today, it's portulaca blooming on my terrace next to an old sea shell that filled my heart with love. and the thought of catching up on masterpiece mystery! the best!
