Gone Fishing

Spending more time with family this month, last week with lots of cousins on Thorndike Pond in New Hampshire near Mt. Monadnock. The clouds looked so beautiful as they were reflected in the gently rippling water.

Julia tried some fishing with the help of her cousins Camille and Olivia. Yesterday, we went and bought her her very own fishing pole. We're off to do a little fishing and more fun stuff before the craziness and normalness of the school year sets in.


Enjoy this last week of August, where ever you are. I'll be back after Labor Day!

Looking In

What is it about looking in that is so fascinating for humans? We’re very curious creatures, aren’t we? That’s why I love visiting house museums – liscense to snoop and look and discover how people lived long ago. I’ve been doing this for years and I always learn something, whether it be about furniture, ceramics, painting and period details or the inhabitants of the home. I think it also makes me a better flea market goer and antiquer.

Julia, at this moment in time, is also interested in other people’s houses. I know this interest is probably fleeting so I have taken advantage of it this summer. Last weekend, we went to The Orchards, the home of the author Louisa May Alcott and her family (including her father, Bronson Alcott, a most famous transcendentalist and educator in the 1800’s) in Concord, Massachusetts. What a gem this place is. The tour guide was in her mid 20’s and full of enthusiasm for all things Louisa May and Bronson and Alcott in general. We were told that Louisa May was the J.K. Rowling of her day making in excess of $100,000 from Little Women and her other books. At any rate, the house is approachable and I could imagine Thoreau and Emerson sitting in the parlor enjoying the Alcott children's plays and concerts.

I especially liked that many things were not perfect at Orchard House - the walls had cracks in them and the floors went up and down. Things were in varying states of repair and restoration. One thing about house museums that I don't like is that sometimes things are just too perfect, too straight, too neat and tidy. I prefer a little decay and signs of life. There were red apples in many of the rooms which was a very nice human touch.

Julia's became fascinated with Louisa May this winter when we borrowed the newest film version of Little Women (1994, starring Winona Ryder) from the library. We discovered that parts of it were filmed near us in Historic Deerfield which made it extra special. We went on to borrow two more versions - from 1949 starring Elizabeth Taylor and Peter Lawford, and from 1933 starring Katherine Hepburn. We called it our Little Women Film Festival and it was a good way to spend winter evenings by the fire.

There's a great children's book about Louisa May and Thoreau called Louisa May and Thoreau's Flute which is illustrated by Mary Azarian. Sadly it is out of print. It does tell a fictional story about their friendship which is very sweet. Look for it at your library and share it with your kids.


This picture of Julia skipping down Louisa May's path is the way I like to think of her - happy learning and enjoying life. It has been a nice, if rather quick summer, and I'm so sad for it to end as I am sure most of you are. I hope you enjoy one of the last fleeting days!

Black Sunflowers

It's just beginning to become sunflower season here on our farm. The Farmer has been endlessly toiling in his field since June. I haven't written about the progress this year but let me just say, it is arduous. He plows and tills the field (or finds someone with the proper equipment to do it for him). Then he handplants each and every seed. In the past he tried a semi-mechanical seeder but it didn't work out because of the variety of seed sizes. And then there is the weeding which is a never ending job as any gardener knows.

Finally we've got some blooms happening. These are Moulin Rouge Sunflower - an incredibly dark sunflower which blooms in 65 to 80 days. The first blooms are sneaking out over the top of the row.


Black or blackish flowers are all the rage now. Last year, MS Living featured a beautiful spread on very dark flowers. Perhaps you saw it. The latest Domino Magazine did a feature on black flowers this month. I guess we're right on target with our gardening trend not that we try. I order a large variety of different kinds of sunflowers and enjoy them all.

Photographing these dark sunflowers is difficult but here are two shots that didn't turn out bad. The black sunflowers look gorgeous against the blue sky.


Here the same bouquet is set against a mossy green shed and the light was hitting them just right.


Sunflowers can't help but make anyone smile.

Thinking Back

Thinking back on all the time we were spending in hospitals a few years ago makes me realize how time does heal feelings. For a while there, we were visiting specialist after specialist, week after week, not knowing what to think about our little baby who had made The Farmer and I a family. Would she survive? What would she be like? Would she talk? Would she walk? There were so many questions and no answers whatsoever. The control freak in me disintegrated before my very eyes. I couldn’t do anything. I was helpless. All I could do was ask questions, find the doctors I had confidence in and live through it all.

That first year crawled by. It was torture. Still when I see a baby, I don’t insinctively want to grab at it or want to hug it or care for it. Babies just aren’t for me. But then when it was my child, she was there and she needed me. I knew it and somewhere I found it within me to hug her, cuddle her, soothe her. To lie on the couch with her and have her fall asleep on me. To dance with her in my arms to music in our empty house. I remember each moment as if they were yesterday even though those days of being able to lift her high above my head vanished long ago.

Somedays I read the blogs of others, mostly design obsessed blogs written by women who are at least twenty years younger than me. I read them and am interested in what they are liking and shopping for. I follow the bloggy trends. I find them totally entertaining. And then, I get a twinge and I almost feel pity for them, that they are so obsessed with the beautiful, the precious, the perfect. I think to myself, these girls just need something else to do with their time. But then I think, hey, I was probably like that at one point, before life hit me on the head, before my daughter was born. I realize that they too could be going through their own personal struggles – they just don’t chose to talk about them with the rest of the world. Their blogs are about the passions that they share with the world. Or their blogs are professional vehicles to find a job, a freelance gig, a book deal. That’s absolutely okay. It’s just that I have moved past that part of my life. I’m in survival mode, into helping my child find her way, hoping she will find a place in the world. I’ve put my career at the “do what you can, when you can” moment of the day. Take care of the child first – she’ll only be living and sharing our lives for a short time. Do the best I can even if it isn’t the best. Love her and make her feel loved. I know I have been given the chance and it could as easily have been taken away. It’s not that I am “super-mom” – by all means, I am not. I am way too casual for such a role and I know that I can’t control very much and so I go with the flow.

As for the precious and the beautiful…. don’t get me wrong…. I still love decorating with color and design and knitting and stitching. It’s just that it isn’t the be all and end all for me now. I use these loves and passions now as a vehicle to get through my days. I like to be creative. I like the act of creating. But sometimes I can’t see the forest from the trees. Give me a set of watercolors and paper some days and I’ll just stare at them and do nothing. I won’t be able to move a pencil across the paper.

The one thing though that has gotten me through my recent life’s stumbling blocks is my yarn and my needles – whether it be knitting or stitching. I remember one of the early visits with a neurologist in Boston with Julia. Mark and I drove to Boston with Julia and we met up with my friend Cathy who lives in town. We all went to the doctor’s appointment and after a long wait, were ushered into a small room and waited some more for the doctor. We sat in there, the four of us. I had a project going – I remember it like it was yesterday – it was going to be a zippered sweater for Julia in a 2 x 2 rib in a varying palette of odds and ends. I sat there knitting while Cathy and Mark entertained Julia while we waited for the doctor. The doctor came in finally and I sat there knitting and knitting and knitting and listening.


K3, P3, answer a question
K3, P3, answer another question
K3, P3 ask a question
K3, P3 listen to the answer
K3, P3 process the answer and ask another question

I saw the doctor staring at Cathy, then at me, with a quizzical look on her face. I could read it – she was completely confused. How could the nanny with the knitting be answering the questions for this child with the medical condition? She asked who the mother was and I told her. Me, silly, you think because I am knitting means I am not capable of being a mother and answering your questions. I put down my knitting although there was really no need to. The doctor didn’t realize how calm my knitting made me, how knitting gave me purpose to my time in the office, how this brief moment of wrapping yarn around my needles made me worry less. But then a non-knitter will never know this, will they?

It’s a rare doctor’s appointment now that I don’t have some kind of stitchery with me. I’ve just got to bring it and have it in case I get stuck for hours waiting. Most times I don’t have a minute to stitch – I’m too busy entertaining my chatty daughter and meeting other patients in the waiting room. But it is always by my side when I need it – my silent friend, that is.

The other thing that got me through those difficult days was our friends and family members. Every time, Julia was hospitalized, they took care of our many animals – our sheep, our chickens, our dogs. They drove said dogs many miles to stay with other relatives. They stayed away from the hospital and came when needed. They brought me good coffee and food to shore me up as I sat by the hospital bed. They broke up the monotony of sitting next to a small baby who couldn’t express her needs, her discomforts, her likes and dislikes. They got me through all the waiting time for doctors. They helped me organize my thoughts and questions. I can’t thank them enough and I remember every kindness to this day.

I promise you, I'm back to the regular vibe with my next post. I just had to say write these two little posts so I can remember it all. And I can't thank you all for all the comments last week. I thought long and hard about putting that last post up there.

Julia's Story

A few weeks ago, I spent a lot of time at a hospital in Boston visiting doctors with Julia. At this time of year, with her birthday rolling around, I think about what our life was like nine years ago in July.

I became pregnant when I was 39 years old – no bells, no whistles, just naturally pregnant and totally surprised. I had never really wanted to have children – being the oldest child in a large family did me in. I was always the responsible one looking after my four younger sisters. Looking in, motherhood didn’t appeal to me. The Farmer was apathetic about children also. He thought we were too old, too busy, too set in our ways. When I became pregnant, we decided that it wouldn’t be so bad – it would be a new part of our lives together – a new undertaking and beginning for us after being married for fourteen years. Heck, how hard could it be – we took care of plenty of animals, how different is a child?

Three weeks before our baby was due, my doctor sent me for an ultrasound, thinking that the baby was breech. I went in after work and met a friendly ultrasound technician. I lay on the table and she told me the drill – I should be out of there in a flash. No need to drink a lot of water – the baby was big enough that it wasn’t necessary. I lay there for 45 minutes, while she poked and prodded and added more and more jelly to the wand and kept prodding. I asked her what was wrong and she said nothing, she just kept moving the wand and taking more images. I didn’t know what to think and went home puzzled.

The next morning at work, I got a call from my OB-GYN that I should go to the hospital in Lowell to see a specialist from Boston. I called The Farmer on his cell phone and he rushed to Lowell. The doctor from Boston told us the ultrasound had found a problem with the baby. He suggested another high level ultrasound and an amniocentesis since I hadn’t had one before.

My pregnancy had been normal and easy. We were devastated. I lay on the table as they did a high level ultrasound. The doctor was straight with us, showing us the baby’s brain and discussing the implications. The baby’s head was extremely large and the ultrasound showed that the brain was full of liquid, that there was no brain tissue that he could see. He did the amnio and we met with a geneticist after. They were specialists, but could tell us nothing because they weren’t brain specialists. The amnio would tell us if there was a fatal genetic condition such as trisomy 18 which was what they suspected.

For the next few weeks, everyone told us the same thing – you’ll have to wait to see what happens when the baby is born. We spent very long days and evenings trying not to think about what lay ahead for our unborn child. I concentrated on my responsibilities at my job, editing knitting patterns for the upcoming fall season. We went to a lot of movies. I ate a steady diet of ice cream for three weeks and lost weight over the worry. I lay on the couch and cried. The baby began to hiccup and I lost my mind with sadness.

About a week before the baby was born, we were asked to go to see a neurosurgeon at New England Medical Center named Dr. Carl Heilman. We arrived at his tiny office on the top floor of NEMC. He was younger than we were but seemed smart, capable and mostly kind. He told us a radiologist saw some small activity in the ultrasounds of the baby’s brain but that most of the brain was filled with water. He didn’t know what was wrong with the baby but he told us there was a chance the baby had severe hydrocephalus and that a shunt could be put into the skull and that the water would drain off. He made no promises about the diagnosis being correct or not. When the results of the amnio came back, the doctors would know better.

A c-section was suggested because the doctors doubted I could deliver the baby vaginally. Before the date was chosen or the amnio came back, my water broke on a Thursday evening and I went into labor. We drove to Boston, expecting the worse.

We arrived very late in the evening and met an OB-GYN named Sabrina who seemed to be waiting for us along with her resident assistant. My sister Laurie was there also. The doctor told me I could try to deliver the baby vaginally. After a split second, I screamed “just get the thing out of me.” My sister told me she was relieved I opted for surgery.

I had a spinal and screamed at the anaethesiologist. Any manners that my mother had taught me had been thrown to the wind. I lay on the table as they cut me open, The Farmer by my side, him watching the whole operation. The room was full of people from the NeoNatal ICU, an anethesiologist, two OB-GYN and several nurses. I remember counting 15 people not including me and The Farmer. The whole thing is a rather large blur to me. I remember them tugging and lifting the baby out of me. Noone told me what it was – I asked and they said it was a girl. I lay there crying, not wanting to look at the baby, thinking she would die, trying to forget the whole pregnancy. They whisked the baby to the NICU and I went to the Recovery Room.

I have never been one to plan ahead. Even when I found out I was pregnant, I didn’t purchase anything for the baby. I didn’t decorate a room. I was baffled by talk of diaper genies and diaper services. I wouldn’t decide on a name until I knew the baby was born and I met it. As I lay on the table I mourned the child who would never be, the little girl I had called Gwen in my mind.

For two days, I stayed in my hospital room, drugged on painkillers, hitting the pain button incessantly, trying to make the whole situation go away. My Mom and Dad came from NJ, my sisters and some friends came from far and wide. The Farmer spent most of the time in the NICU, giving me little reports on the baby who was still nameless. He told me that if she was going to die, she should be loved. I just thought of all the love and nurturing I gave her in my belly and wanted the whole experience over. My sisters told me we really should name her. The Farmer and my sister Laurie decided on Julia and I went along (it had been on the name list – that’s one thing I had done).

My friends Sally and Missy came to visit and I decided I had the strength to physically get out of bed and meet the baby. They wheeled me down to the elevator and then to the NICU. I still remember the fear I had of what I was going to find.

There, attached to wires, computer monitors, and dressed in a little undershirt and a diaper was Julia with the largest head you could ever imagine – spongy with the cerebrospinal fluid that wasn’t draining through her ventricles to her spine. Underneath it all, she seemed alert. She had long, long eyelashes, long fingers, and the cutest little nose. Her eyes looked around. She was happy. The nurses had nicknamed her the queen of the NICU. I fell in love and I knew we had to do what we could do to make her happy.

On Monday, things happened quickly after all the specialists came back to work. Julia had test after test, CT scans, MRI’s, blood work, you name it. We met neurologists, nurses, pediatricians, toxicologists, and then re-met Dr. Heilman. After all the tests came back, Dr. Heilman suggested surgery on Tuesday to place a shunt in Julia's brain to help relieve the severe hydrocephalus she was ultimately diagnosed with.

That day, we got up very early and The Farmer wheeled me down to the NICU. The nurses had prepped Julia and she went off to surgery. We waited in my hospital room. Dr. Heilman came in after surgery and said everything went fine.

Doctor after doctor visited me in our “hotel room”, interviewing me, trying to determine what caused Julia’s condition. NEMC is a teaching hospital so you tend to meet zillions of doctors and residents. It is a great place and we continue to visit many of the specialists there to this day. In the end, the doctors couldn’t determine anything that would have caused her problem – her condition was the luck of the draw. (Dr. Heilman told us that about 50% of hydrocephalus cases occur for no determined reason.) The condition would not have shown up on an amnio. If I had known about it, would we have done something different? I don’t know. I don’t remember feeling as if I did something wrong to cause Julia’s condition, I just felt curious. I was a healthy pregnant woman – I tried to do everything right but then you can’t control things, can you? I certainly learned that lesson.

Julia stayed in the NICU for ten days. We met with plenty more doctors and as many times as we asked what her functions would be, noone would give us an answer. We took her home to care for her and to love her. In the next eight months, she had 3 more surgeries. Seven more surgeries before she was five. That first year is pretty much of a blur. Any normal mother’s first year with a baby is also a blur but mine really was. Just when Julia seemed to be doing well, we would find out she needed another operation because of the condition in her brain.

Julia never crawled - she scooted on her bottom. She didn’t walk until she was three years old. She will always have a shunt. The miracles of science right now cannot correct her problem totally. The condition has mostly affected her occipital lobe – the part of the brain that controls all her movement, math skills, and fine motor coordination. Luckily, she doesn’t have many of the other conditions some children with hydrocephalus have.

Would I chose to have a child with a disability? No, I wouldn’t. When I hear a baby has been born, the first thing I ask is if it is healthy. I overhear young mothers complaining about some little problem with their infant. I resist the urge to tell them “you don’t know how lucky you are, how small your problem is.” I also know how fortunate I am to have Julia in my life - her disability which may seem sad to many - is okay - we know it could have been much worse. We are very fortunate.

Would I give up being a mother to a child with a disability? No, I would not. Have I learned anything? Yes, more than I want to know. Having a child with a disability changes your life just as having any child does, only differently. As Julia grows, with each year, I learn new things about her disability, about her learning skills, about what we can expect of her and about what we should be patient. I know about EI (early intervention), IEPs (individual education plans), about neuropsychologists, neurosurgeons, neurologists, about PT and OT, about strabismus, the list goes on and on.

With each year, we have new challenges. People ask me, when they know what I do (knitwear and stitchery design), if Julia likes to knit or sew. I say no without an explanation. I am so proud of what my daughter can do with the tools she has been given. It took her physical therapist a year to teach her to throw a ball. She still can’t ride a bike. Tell her to move to the right and she’ll look at you like you have three heads. Eventually I hope she will get it, but it will take a while for her brain to process a command. Can she sew? Not yet and she may never be able to. (Her OT worked with her on it for a year and I told her to give up on it for now.) Does it make me sad? No, it really doesn’t. I wish we could enjoy some of the same things, but I can’t worry about it. Julia appreciates what I do and is interested in my work, but sewing and knitting won’t be for her and that’s okay.

Can Julia read and write and talk? Happily, yes, with gusto. Is she personable and friendly? Yes. Is she a happy child? Yes, very. She loves pretty clothes and handknit sweaters, she is great with animals, she is kind and loving and compassionate, she is articulate. She thinks doctors and nurses and everyone in the healthcare world is wonderful (as they are!). We go with her strengths and she’ll find her own interests and we’ll nuture them.

I think of the changes Julia has made to my life. If she had been born a healthy child, I probably wouldn’t be living here at our farm full-time. I probably would still be working at a demanding job, feeling stressed to the max that I wasn’t taking good care of my child. I would not have decided to slow down my professional track and try something new like writing books and freelance design, something that fit in with my new family life. I wouldn’t have raised pigs. I would still be running like crazy, missing out on the little things like class trips, spider webs, slugs, frogs and tadpoles. I wouldn’t be writing this blog.

I write this, our family’s story, so that other mothers with children with a disability of some kind know that there are others out here dealing with the difficulties of raising a different kind of child. I write this so that women who have teeny little problems with their kids realize they are very lucky. I write this to tell you that, mother or not, you too can deal with the curves life throws you. The outcome may not be pleasant and happy, but life goes on.

Take the challenges that life brings and try to learn from them. I do not mean this lightly – life brings many challenges along the way. Find solace where you can. And if all else fails, pick up your needles and knit and sew and stitch and create. It will help get you through your worries.

Visitors and Visiting

We’ve had a busy August few weeks here in western Massachusetts. We were delighted to entertain my friend Simmy and her family from the Cotswolds in England at the beginning of last week. Oh, how I wish we lived closer to each other. She and her family were delightful, easy going, high-spirited, and fun-loving. Simmy’s two boys, Rohan and Raj, and husband Tom helped The Farmer with some of his chores and helped me feed my chickens and pigs too. Julia idolized Amber, Simmy’s tall and beautiful daughter who was loving American Teen Vogue. I only wish she had gotten to spend time with my 13 and 14 year old fashion fanatic nieces Olivia and Celia. We showed them around our local area and we all got along splendidly. All her children are lovely, polite, smart and fun and Julia had a great time with each of them. I learned a lot about their Waldorf School which sounds like a great education. We live quite far from one so it isn't even an option for Julia.

I know it takes a long time to get to places here – something our British visitors were not used to. We do spend a lot of time and money driving here. To get to the local grocrey store, it is a 14 mile round-trip. To go to a local historic site – it is about 25 minutes one way. To get to a largish mall it is 45 minutes one-way - no wonder I barely frequent the big-box stores (not that I am wild to do so anyway). I guess we are used to the driving but for Simmy’s family, they seemed to be amazed. And this isn’t even Texas where I’ve been on driveways to someone’s house on a ranch that alone are a 45 minute ride. I guess it puts it all in perspective as to how big the USA actually is, even if we are in little old New England.

It’s amazing how you sometimes discover new things in your backyard when newcomers show you. There’s a splendid restaurant/country store up in Ashfield, MA called Elmer’s that Simmy and her family were wild about. They dragged Julia and I up there (not really dragged, we went willingly) for a great breakfast. After, the kids swam at the Potholes in Shelburne Falls. I had never been swimming there although I have visited many times and enjoyed looking at the amazing rock formations. Even if Simmy and I did visit the quilting shop instead of jumping in the water, it was great to see the kids having such fun.


We all went to Historic Deerfield and the kids patiently toured the Wells Thorn House above. Yes, it really is a bright turquoise color. I like to take guests to this home because it shows how housing in New England changed over the years. This house shows the bare bones of one room living and then morphs into a very fancy lawyer's home (hence the blue color). There is some great wall paper and colors inside along with beautiful needlework and porcelain. Julia and I are touring a new home every few days and by the end of the summer, we should have seen them all. (It was her suggestion and I gladly went along). Our house is actually older than most of the homes in Historic Deerfield so it's fun to compare and contrast our real home to the historic ones. One thing - they are much cleaner and there is no clutter!

Saturday, Marilyn of Knitting Curmudgeon fame, was here taking some photos for a feature article she is doing about me for the Winter 2007 issue of Interweave Knits. I absolultely hate having my photo taken and I’m sure I wasn’t as pleasant as I usually am. It’s funny – I don’t mind being behind the camera torturing people but make me the subject and I am miserable. Anyone else feel that way?

Marilyn is lovely to spend time with and not exactly a "curmudgeon" in real life although she is opinionated and quick witted! She worked in needlework publishing (McCall's Needlework and Crafts and MacKnit) back in the 80's when I was just beginning my career. We knew many of the same people and so it is fun to swap stories. I can't wait to see the article and am thankful that she proposed it to IK. It is perfect timing for my book since it will hit in the late fall, just a bit after the book comes out.

Mom's New Pillows

My mom's house isn't quite as colorful as mine and try as I might, she doesn't seem to want to brighten it up too much. I'm sure she thinks mine to be quite loud and garish but we like it anyway. Last summer Mom got some new porch furniture and the cushions are a pretty red, yellow and green stripe - quite loud for Mom. She probably thought the fabric was safe since it was going to be on the porch.

I gave her one of my pillow kits last year and she loved making it. My sister Lynn wants to steal it but I think Mom needs it for her porch. Mom's stitching is beautiful - smaller and neater than mine ever is.

I stitched her another pillow to coordinate with hers for the porch. It's a pattern from Colorful Stitchery but originally I stitched the vase in blue. She wanted red to match her new porch furniture. I finished it at her house last week and wanted to sew the backing on before leaving for fear she would never do it. I suggested a bright fun print for the backing and she swiftly said - "Oh no - I could never do that."

Julia, Mom and I went to Purl Patchwork and Purl Soho last week when we went to NYC. I have heard so much about the two stores - yarn and fabric - via all of your blogs. I wasn't disappointed. Lovely fabrics and yarns and wonderful displays. Helpful sales people who put up with questions. Mom decided that a print backing would ultimately be okay. She surpised me by picking a wild Pucci style print which reminded her of her sheath dresses from the 60's (in the photo below) . Maybe I am getting to her after all. There's hope for that green wall yet.

Sister Lynn's Jacket

In August, Julia and I spend as much time as we can with family since we really don't get much of a chance to visit them for any length during the year. We've just come back from NJ and had a great time with my sister Lynn and her two boys Franny and Nicholas, Mom, and my sister Jenn. It was crazy hot but thank goodness Mom has a pool to keep us cool.


My sister Lynn is still stitching madly on her denim jackets. Here are some close-ups of the latest jacket. She draws freehand designs with ball point pen and then just goes wild with straight stitch and chain stitch - those are the only two stitches she knows and she sure gets a lot accomplished with them.


Our friend Peggy came over to visit one day. Peggy is a great knitter, stitcher, seamstress, all-around fiber fanatic. She was also an art teacher for many years. She tried to get Lynn to learn some new stitches but she really wasn't interested. I thought it was quite humorous and stood up for my sister. She gets so much done and it is so beautiful why muck up the works. Lynn isn't very good at following directions - she was always the one to break the rules. She is an artist and colorist at heart. But one stitch she wants to learn and I need to teach her is french knots - I know she can turn that one into some kind of masterpiece.


This last photo shows another part of the jacket in progress. Lynn had drawn the design all over the back yoke and had done this part so far. She wanted to wear the jacket so she washed it and the ink came out. She'll start stitching again soon. I like how the denim shows through. This floss was some of the space dyed shaded kind which I have never been very good as using. I think it looks great here.

Happy Birthday Pop

Dad would have been 79 years old today. He passed away on the winter solstice in 2004 and my family still misses him daily. Dad was a passionate person – passionate about his business, his favorite sports team (The University of Pennsylvania’s Quakers), his garden, his family, and his dogs. Living in a family of women wasn’t easy for him – we were all “girly-girls” loving the domestic arts, the baking, the sewing, getting together with friends. At our house when I was young, it wasn't unusual for there to be 10 little girls giggling and laughing.

Dad was his own man - a bit of an eccentric. The lengths he would go to to support his alma mater were legend in Dover, NJ. Many times, my sisters and I would be herded into the car to endure the ride to Philadelphia to watch the Quakers play a football game. On the way home, Dad would either be happy or sad about the outcome of the game. We would have to endure the cigar smoke as he puffed away while we were coughing crammed into the back seats. (It was a long time ago - people did that back then.)

Dad was also an obsessive gardener. Being from German stock and coming of age when Victory Gardens were the norm, he learned to grow vegetables on his grandparents farm. He always had an amazing garden at our house and especially enjoyed growing vegetables, clematis, zinnias, and impatiens. The older I get, the more I realize, he also went into his garden to escape the little girl craziness. We wouldn’t see him for hours – he would pull weeds all weekend long. In the evening, we would take a tour of what he did. Honestly, I doubt I would have been able to notice the progress – but I’m sure I was supportive and told him how good it looked. All summer long, he would announce at the dinner table “I really can grow them, can’t I?” We would tell him how wonderful the beans, the zucchini, the swiss chard were.

I often think about what I learned from my dad. The list is long, for sure. Passion for something I love. Being honest and truthful. Working hard. Being kind to others. Telling it like it is. Love of family and friends. Remembering where I came from.

I often credit my love of color to my mother’s example, but that is not necessarily so. My dad loved beauty and color, mostly finding inspiration from his garden and nature. Although I would say he didn't a visible artistic side, I would be wrong. He created art through his gardens and landscape. He placed the row of impatiens in the garden just so. He chose the color themes of his annuals every year to coordinate throughout the garden. He purchased new perennial plants to add interest to his established perennial beds. I can’t count how many times – it was literally hundreds – when he would bring a bouquet of flowers into the house and place them in a vase on the kitchen table. He brought bouquets of his flowers to his office for his co-workers to enjoy. He’d expound over a scotch and dinner about the fiery orange nasturtiums, the rich red of a his spiky bergamot, the purply blue of the spiky perennial cornflowers, the luscious juicy tartness of raspberries from his berry patch, the unbelievable sourness of those bright orangey-red currents that became our winter current jam, the deep purple of his Concord grapes. Dad noticed these things and passed this love and passion onto all of us girls. We all love our gardens and the feeling we get from planting and tending a small seedling. He didn’t realize it but by his example, he was building a family of gardeners and lovers of color and nature.

Although Daddy was a gruff, unfriendly, crabby guy from the outside, he sure wasn’t that way underneath it all. He was a softie, a loving dad - I miss him every day. It is pretty impossible for me today to eat a raspberry without thinking about Dad and his devotion to his little patch of earth and his family.

Here at our house, we talk about Pop frequently. We envision him up on his star with his friend Frank watching baseball, smoking cigars and enjoying a scotch. Happy Birthday Daddy!