Tom’s Blog

Despite a relatively moderate summer this year, I am very glad to be heading into cooler weather. Remember to stay on top of your watering this time of year. It is very likely that sun’s lowering angle is leaving corners of your garden that were once full sun, now in complete shade. The opposite is also true. I have one patch of my garden near a big oak tree that is planted with Dianella Tasmanica and it rests in the shade of the Oak all summer long. This time of year the sun creeps below the canopy and really bakes the area. In this last month we have had temperatures that have approached triple digits. My remedy is supplementing with hand watering by hose. Although it doesn’t have the convenience of an automated irrigation system, it is much more effective to use  a hose to fill in the seasonal gaps during these transitional times. Especially keep an eye on St. Augustine and Bermuda lawns. These turf are going dormant now and as a result they have a much lower water need than they do at the peak of their growth in the spring and summer. Some people opt to overseed with an annual winter rye seed with the classic steer manure seed topper. While this does provide a bright green temporary lawn through the winter, it is not necessary. Fall is also a great time of year to add another layer of mulch all your planter beds and prep the plants for their winter slumber. Get ready for the onset of camellia and azalea blooms that will start showing up shortly. Happy Halloween!  

With the longest day of the year almost here, it is amazing to think that the year is almost half way over. Although we do have some June gloom ahead of us, the summer heat is on its way. One thing I have noticed in my own garden is the need to really monitor the irrigation. In the San Gabriel Valley, we this time of year brings overcast days of 65 degrees next to days of 100 degree searing heat. My recommendation is to really do a walkthrough in all the areas of your yard. Look closely at the planter areas and the lawn and see how much moisture is in your soil. It is the only way you can really get to know your garden’s water needs. If you see that things are really dry, you need to increase the number of days or the duration of the run times on the valves. If things are really saturated, just shut the clock down until the plants have used the moisture up. Then when you are ready to turn your clock back on, make sure that it is running only as needed. I much prefer a garden that is under-watered, rather than over-watered. You can always add more water, but it is very difficult to dry things out. So the moral of the story is: get to know your garden’s water needs and stay on top of it. Weather changes and your garden needs you to monitor it closely. Take the time to manage your irrigation and you’ll see that your garden will be a happier place. 

Having just returned from Solitude, Utah with my family, I have a renewed sense of the magic and power of snow. I spent part of my childhood in Yosemite and Colorado where the snow and skiing were religious experiences for me throughout the winter months. I had forgotten what it meant to watch the snow fall from the warmth of a fire. Sometimes you just catch lightening in a bottle. During our four days in Solitude, we watched more than two feet of snow fall in the Wasatch Mountains! Magic.

It also reinforces for me the power that diverse landscapes have had, and continue to have, on my life.

I want to wish everyone a very happy holiday season from everyone here at Mother Magnolia.

Thank you and Happy New Year!

After 2 days at the national pool conference in Las Vegas, NV., I can say that I was pleasantly surprised by the tremendous information available at the week long event.

We were there for only two of the seven days, but the educational seminars and the new products were pretty amazing.

Look for new products like an outdoor shower and custom pool covers that aren’t hideous to look at.

More soon.

T

Welcome to November! Unbelievable that we have only 2 months to go in 2007. What a year it has been. I think we all are looking forward to the holidays with good food and friends. Hope everyone recovers from the collective sugar hangover.

Tonight, my wife Kathleen and I got a rare night out. We went to hear Alice Waters speak. She has just published a new book, The Art of Simple Food, and her book tour took her to Pasadena. We sat in the front row and found ourselves in the midst of a spiritual experience.

Kathleen’s passion for food, and more specifically gastronomy, introduced me to Alice Waters’ work, and it brought us out on a Thursday night to hear what this veritable American hero had to say. Having seen a PBS documentary about Alice Waters already, we were captivated by the time we arrived at the event.

We heard Alice’s story. We heard about her passion for food and the way food is grown and shared. We found ourselves moved by her story of the perfect persimmon: the American Persimmon…said to be upstream from the Fuyu. Anyway, Alice Waters has a vision for the way gardens can transform us.

I don’t think that it is possible to listen to Alice Waters speak about food, plants and eco-gastronomy and NOT be inspired. She believes that true change and transformation in the American culture is directly related to educating children about food: where it comes from; how it is grown; and how we can prepare it and eat it together. Food is the centerpiece of Alice Waters’ life. She wants people to start where they are. Build a garden. Grow food. Share it.

We have been contemplating ways of giving back to this community that nurture the relationship between individuals and gardens. Helping develop, design and construct gardens like Alice Waters’ Edible Schoolyard are projects we are looking forward to being intricately involved with. We believe in the mission and the goal and are up for the challenge of being a part of such an important crusade. For more information about the extraordinary work that Alice Waters is doing with her Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley, look at its website, www.edibleschoolyard.org.

Water. This planet is mostly water. We are mostly water. We use it, drink it, need it. This weekend was a real affirmation for me of the transformational power of water and the way we gather in obsessive and thirsty ways around water features. Any resort, spa, restaurant or hotel relies on water features to bring home the message that this is a place to relax and unwind. I got that this weekend.

It was the culmination of a very simple yet powerful project: Reclaiming a sideyard at my own house that had been a (17′x50′) dirt patch that was used for trash, excess landscape materials and general junk. After designing and building numbers of pool-spa-backyard makeovers for numerous clients, I got to experience it firsthand in my current residence.

After the construction on a new pool and spa with the associated decking, bench walls, fencing, landscaping and lighting, this weekend marked our first “pool party.” My 5 yr old son Champe had some of his friends over. They all woke up Sunday morning as if it was Christmas day. They charged into the pool over the moon giddy with excitement. The whole day was nonstop joyous play in the water. We all logged probably four hours flopping from the warm jets of the spa into the cooler swimming pool. It was amazing. The whole weekend felt like a little getaway. Water…magic.

Everyone has been hearing rumors of water rationing. Why should we wait for water rationing to begin thinking about water conservation? I know that I could easily be more vigilant with my efforts at water conservation. I also know that many of our clients prefer more thirsty landscape designs. I don’t know why it is so hard to give up the 2,500 sf of green lawn. But it is a staple of most of our designs. “A place for the kids.” And yet everyone knows it is an incredibly water hungry element in the garden. In southern california we can have big temperatures year round which means these lawns are constantly demanding thousands of gallons of support. The fact is that there are a number of water saving measures in all aspects of a property both indoors and out.

Check out www.bewaterwise.com for a little motivation and some simple tips to save water.

Ask me about the new sprinkler timers that work from moisture sensors in the garden to determine how much water your garden needs.

Also check with your local water district before you fill your pool with water after a pool project. There are reduced rates available for water that is a “one time” usage.

I realize that in my last post I did not clarify what this blog was really about. I think that there will be a number of posts that will be specifically related to what we do at Mother Magnolia. I also will write about any number of random things that I find interesting. From Tony Bourdain to the Aurora Borealis, I may want to use the time it takes me to write this blog as a time to digest a lot of different things. I find that my life is so consumed with the daily responsibilities that most of us face that I do not make time to sit down and write.

Recently I started to excercise again after a ten year hiatus. You know the drill. With kids, work, etc. exercise is the first thing to go. Why? Because it hurts. To run up the hill or stretch in down dog hurts. Well, to a certain degree so does writing. For me that means typing. I do not type extremely well. I get by, but it is somewhat labored. Writing also forces me to think more carefully about what I really want to say. Words on a page, or a screen, mean more somehow than words that are spoken. So this blog for me will be a mixed bag of a lot of things.

On that note…

1. The new website is up and running. We are very excited. A special thanks to Seth, Jaress, Kath, Gary, and Rice. Great team effort.

2. The weather is sublime these days, which means that we are all on our toes with irrigation time clocks. Let the garden tell you if it needs more or less water. Keep adjusting it as often as necessary.

3. A great book that I am starting to sift through is The Last Child in the Woods, by Richard Louv. More on that later…

Thanks for your attention, and I hope you will come by often to check us out. Drop me a line if we can help out with a little Fall tune-up on the garden. October is the time for bulbs, mulching and some killer Iceland poppies and antiques pansies.

In keeping with the new season of Fall and the very noticeable change in sunlight and weather, I have been thinking about the way seasons affect us. Specifically, my experience has been this real sense of wanting to eat hot, saucey, dense food that fills the kitchen with great smells and warmth. I see the outdoor grill gathering a layer of dust that it didn’t have even two weeks ago. It’s not a stretch to say that it really makes me wonder what “home” means to me now. What is home? How many great answers there are to that question.
At home today we were talking about Halloween parties and even thinking about the end of the year and holiday parties. Fall is here and the season brings us back home. The long summer harvest is done.
This Fall brings with it the sense of real accomplishment and hardwork that has gone into this year. My garden is now feeling less thirsty and it knows maybe that it has made it through another brutal summer of heat. The San Gabriel Valley where my family and I call home has the potential to hold on to temperature north of 100 degrees for weeks on end in the summer. So being outside in the cooler temperatures of Fall is simply more relaxing and enjoyable.
We change our enjoyment of the yard and it changes the way that we feel. I may not be using my grill as much, but, instead, the outdoor fireplace gets roaring and we have a great time drinking hot chocolate and roasting marshmallows by the fire.
Home carries the same ebbs and flows of the seasons. I sometimes wish I had an easier time trusting that. I think of Chauncy the Gardener in the movie Being There. There are so many things that the garden can teach us. And for me, Fall is the season that brings that message home.