I've written about my dad the woodworker before. He makes incredibly beautiful furniture, blogs for Fine Woodworking, and teaches classes to other woodworkers. He's always looking for ideas for his classes, and I'm always trying to stay one step ahead and think up things we need around our house. Not long ago, I wondered if he'd be interested in making us a new front door. The old one was suffering from a terrible paint job (mine), torn and trailing weatherstripping, and a faulty doorknob and lock. Dad seized on this idea and made us a gorgeous door out of Douglas Fir. I asked for a dark, reddish-brown stain, and now we have a graceful, solid door with beautiful hardware.
I love the look of the grain.
Dad has inspired me to be more aware of craftsmanship, and he has inspired Tom to do more of his own building (and Tom has made some beautiful stuff), and he has taught both my kids how to use every tool in his shop, both manual and power. It's a real gift to make useful things that are also beautiful. I think we've lost a lot of those arts in the last 50 years.
Which brings me to the garden. My goal has always been the same; to make it both useful and beautiful. Hence, all the food PLUS flowers. (Of course flowers are both of those things already.) I'm always thinking about aesthetics. We've started to see that a working urban farm will always have a lot of crap lying around, but we both make an effort to minimize that, and instead try to cover every square inch with beauty. My love of craftsmanship came from my father, but my love of flowers definitely came from my mother, who has always had flowers in every possible place.
And the garden is certainly lovely this time of year, with all the late Spring flowers.
Looking through native clarkias to the tomatoes, and in the background the hops are climbing ever higher
Pole beans, starting the journey up
Blue-eyed grass, a CA native
Blackberries
Sprirea "Dark Knight"
The sun has come out this afternoon, and there are loads of bees taking their first flight out of the hive. I dug around in the compost pile and found beautiful soil with which to seed cosmos. Tomorrow I'm looking forward to going on an urban farm tour with a close friend. Hope you're all enjoying your weekends, too!