Sacred Seeds

Of storms and seedlings

It seems the weather in the Bay Area is determined to be stormy this spring. We have had a ton of rain, which is both wonderful and difficult. Wonderful of course because around here, we can *always* use the rain. Difficult, for me at least, because rain means more mold and more dust mites which means more *fun* on the health front, but at least I have the sound of the rain to keep me company while I veg out on the couch.

The rain has also meant that our seedlings from the Ostara ritual are well feed and growing like … well… happy seeds! I even had enough energy today to go out and get most of them transplanted over into bigger pots so they can stretch out and grow the next steps. That of course meant I needed to take pictures

Here are the seeds getting planted at the Ostara ritual (how about that plate of cakes – er carrots and strawberries we got to share?)

the seeds in their new homes (being guarded by my younger son’s bike)

I honestly have no idea exactly what in each pot (oops!) we had a little too much fun at the ritual and lost track of what went where. I’m pretty sure that my cats were working some serious mind control on the gang though, as I did recognize a fair amount of catnip among the seedlings. I think I saw a few sunflowers and I pretty sure I one pot has lettuce seedlings in it – so that will be nice. The rest? no idea! we had seeds for Hollyhock, cucumber, a couple of different herbs, some squashes, and more sunflowers… so this should be a lot of fun once the seedlings start showing their true nature.

Here’s a couple of other photos from the ritual:

Peeps of the North Altar                                                                                                                                                        Peeps of the East Altar

The Main Altar with our Chocolate bunny statues for God and Goddess

Next up… I need to get Demeter’s altar cleaned up, its a little neglected after the winter, I have a blueberry shrub to plant, and hopefully this summer we will finally get the labyrinth finished in the front yard! Pictures for everything of course!

Blessings,

Kate

A Demeter Priestess and her garden

So remember how I said I wasn’t going to plant anything this year? (No, well I did somewhere, so bear with me). Apparently I spoke to soon. I walked into my local WholeFoods about three weeks ago and did the sapy eyed thing over a bunch of plants. Me! over plants! What the heck? Agricultural Goddesses, I tell yay!

So I yeah, I bought some plants and some potting soil. Then I rant out of soil. And pots. So I *just* had to the local plant nursery to get more supplies. And of course, since I was there, I just happened to see a few plants I liked… er… yeah… and so I filled up the back of my van with stuff.

Mind you all this was After my husband got his garden on by working on our front yard! *sigh* The House Kaleidicopia (yep, that’s what we call our home) yard project of 2009 is well and truly under way and I and up to my neck in dirt and plants and loving every minute of it all! Who’da thunk?

To begin at the beginning…

We have been needing to redo our front yard forever. About a month or so ago my hubby asks me if I would like a labyrinth in the front yard. Would I like??? He knows me far too well! Thus began the plotting of the front yard. We don’t really don’t have enough space to do a full size labyrinth, but we should be able to squeeze in a mini five circuit beastie similar to this kind:

The “Classical” Pattern. Original graphic © Shane Odom.

To do that we first have to move all the roses that are (were) where we want the labyrinth to go. That, and offering to buy my hubby a few more roses got him rolling. Over two weekends he, our youngest son and two friends moved first our ailing pear tree from what we now call the Rose side of the front yard to the back yard, where it will get much more sun and be waaaaay happier, transplant all but one of the Labyrinth side roses to the Rose side of the yard, and plant not one but nine more roses all told in the front yard! When they all the grow in we will have two hedges of yummy lavender and white simplicity roses (one on either side of the front yard). The Rose side is now a mini Rose Garden with only one rose still in shock from the transplant process.

The Labyrinth side still needs to denuded of its top layer of weed infested soil, but once that is done, I have a friend who is a wiz at building labyrinths and she has agreed to help me experiment with layouts till we find the right design for our yard. Then we can start laying down the ground cover (probably Irish moss) and pebbles to make up the pattern!

Ugh… lots of work, but it is amazing to see it all coming together!

In the back yard, my adventures in container gardening feel like they are going better this year. I have been reading up on the plants I potted, so I might actually be able to have produce by the end of the season this time!

I now have cantaloupe, watermelon, cucumbers, tomatoes, sunflowers, digitalis, mint (two kinds), sage, rosemary, Echinacea, hollyhock, California poppies, aloe, and Aeonium canariensis growing in my garden. Oh, and I have seeds sprouting for the Lupines and poppies that I am going to add to the front yard, and the cilantro that I will be growing in the back. And just today I planted my summer crop of barley. I’m keeping it in back with the rest of my produce, and hoping that without the massive rains from the winter, I might actually produce some barley plants this time. We shall see.

And last, but never least I have achieved Pomegranate! Yup. I am the proud owner of a pomegranate shrub. It now lives in an enormous faux terracotta pot a former housemate left us, and sits beside my external Demeter altar.

So somehow, in all of odd Chemically Sensitive, exhausting life, I have managed to garden. I don’t feel like I can be called a Gardener yet, maybe if I pull off an actually harvest this year, but I do feel like I am making a better connection to the earth and myself. And behind all of this has been Demeter, puttering around behind, inside and with me all the while I have doing working on myself and my plants. It’s a new sense of spirit and spirituality for me, to just be in the moment with no expectations and no requirements. I’m finding I rather like it.