Flowers in the House, Asemic Musings, and Being Particular About Notebooks

I want to start this week with flowers in the house. 

Years ago, a florist and blogger who went by the moniker Flower Jane would initiate a monthly blog chain called Flowers in the House, in which she posted several photos of flower arrangements she had placed in different rooms, and invited other bloggers to share links to their own pages showing their flowers. Even though her arrangements were quite impressive, she never made anyone feel that their simple bouquets were any less delightful, and would visit and comment on every blog that participated. As an occasional participant, I always enjoyed visiting blogs from all over, admiring their flowers, commenting and receiving comments, and reveling in the conviviality of the whole exchange.  

I don't know what became of Flower Jane, she hasn't posted on her blog since 2016. I know people get tired of blogging, or burnt out, and it really has become kind of a quaint way of sharing yourself online anymore. Everyone is on Instagram, it seems, or TikTok or whatever. I have an Instagram account, and Facebook, and Pinterest, and I find them all both inspirational and a little overwhelming.

If you care to share your own photos on Instagram or wherever about the flowers in your house this week, please comment and share a link. I'd love to see them.

My 100-Day Project this Week: More Asemic Doodles, with a Brush

Last week I mentioned a book, Asemic: The Art of Writing, by Peter Schwenger, which I said I would be picking up from the library, and indeed I did. I've only just begun reading it, but I did find the answer to my burning question: Where did this term come from?

It seems that the word was borrowed into English in the 1980s from French linguistics, in which it described an unintended absence of meaning or sense, such as occurs with a typo. The word is derived from the Greek root "sema," meaning "sign," which gives us words like semaphore, semiotics and semantics. "Sign" here relates to "signify"— to convey meaning. Adding the prefix "a-" changes it to not signifying anything, not having meaning.

Schwenger attributes this coinage to two men he describes as visual poets, Tim Gaze and Jim Leftwich. (Here's an interesting interview with Gaze from 2009).

In my continued exploration of this art form, I decided to try working with a brush, in particular one called a liner brush, which is very thin and long and used for lettering as well as other things where a fine line is desired. I found a nice little six minute tutorial by Andy Jones that proved to be a fine introduction. (I used my watercolor paint instead of the acrylic paint thinned with water that he is promoting.) I combined practice and note-taking as I watched, and after. So I guess some of this is asemic, and some of it is semic.

I realized that what I'm looking to develop are the same skills used in hand lettering and calligraphy, and that I have a couple of nice resources about that already. One is a book that was my grandfather's (I know because he wrote his name in it). Published in 1922, Principles and Practice of Show-Card Writing is filled with elegant examples from that era.

The other is a relatively more recent paperback, the Speedball Textbook for Pen and Brush Lettering. Mine is the 20th edition, published in 1972. I may have bought it back then, or someone might have given it to me, I really don't remember, but I've hung on to it all these years and it was kind of fun taking another look at it this week. The current edition is the 25th.

Probably the most valuable thing I've learned from all of these is that you have to practice using a brush just as you would practice a musical instrument. The various brush strokes — asemic marks, really — are like playing scales and etudes. I don't know why I haven't thought about it that way before, but it's kind of freeing and revelatory to me. Who knew?

On My Work Table

I like notebooks, but not just any notebooks. I like them to be small and easy to take places, have attractive covers, be reasonably sturdy, have a pocket in the back, with gridded lines that are pretty faint so they offer guidelines but don't dominate, and that are sewn rather than stapled.

You can probably see how this would lead me to making my own notebooks, and being an artist with an Etsy shop, how I might decide to make a few extras and offer them for sale, in case there are others who like those same things and don't mind paying for handmade. I actually only make two of a given design in order to create a listing on Etsy, then offer them as made-to-order items, so I don't invest a lot of time and resources in multiples of something that I don't know if anybody will buy. If nobody does buy them, I'll use them eventually. Having said that, I will note that I have sold a few of these, from time to time.

Shown here are two of my mini notebooks (about 2.75" wide by 4.25" high), I also have some that are half letter size (5.5" wide by 8.5" high), which have numbered pages and a different style of pocket.

I make the notebooks and most of my zines with a pamphlet stitch, which is quite easy and gives a satisfying result, in my opinion. I then run a glue stick up and down the spine and smooth it with my finger to reinforce the stitching. 

In case you're interested, here's where to find the notebooks and zines in my Etsy shop.

Thanks for looking. Show me your flowers! (If you want to.)

Flowers in the house as we wait for flowers outside

It's April in Minnesota, which means that today is lovely and sunny and about 60 degrees, and there are tulips and crocuses just poking their green tips up out of the soil.

And tomorrow, a snowstorm is coming.

So I have been trying to complete my late winter/early spring pruning of trees and shrubs that I was supposed to do in March, except there was way too much snow on the ground and I needed to buy a new pruning saw and shears, which I didn't get around to until a week ago. For that, a not-so-early spring is actually helpful.

But for my spirits,  I have taken to buying bouquets at the co-op during my weekly grocery shopping trips, so I can enjoy some flowers and greenery in the house while not-so-patiently waiting for them to appear outside.

A recent article on one of my favorite eye-candy websites, Gardenista, offered some tips on arranging flowers like a Frenchwoman. I find myself torn between falling into dreamy idolizing of all things French, and Oh, Please. Really? But it was fun to look at the photos, so there's that. And some of the tips were actually helpful, in that they helped me articulate what I am attracted to when I see a flower arrangement that I really like, such as a limited color palette and a touch of wildness.

I started some seeds in January, including some pink pansies that have been languishing. I should have invested in some supplemental plant lighting a little sooner, I have concluded. I have the seedlings in the porch now, which is enclosed but unheated, with south and west windows, and I added a grow light, but they remain tiny. I'll end up buying pansies at the local garden center for my front step urn, but my tiny pansies will surely bloom eventually. Other flowers I have started from seed are looking pretty good, and giving me some hope for the near future.

I also started some Dutch white clover, for St. Patrick's Day, by which time they looked pretty cute.

But I decided to keep them going, and now they've become quite lanky. I've changed up their companion figurines from elves to something more Easterlike, and I'm rather enjoying them as quirky houseplants. I may repot them in something that will go in an Easter basket, although I am enjoying them in their cute little planters, so maybe not. They'll eventually join the compost pile out back.

Meanwhile, I'll be trying to finish up that pruning before new growth starts, and checking to see what new bouquets Seward Co-op has to offer this Friday.

Stormy Monday Flowers

Today has been quite gloomy and dramatic, with rain and thunderstorms going all day long. But I knew it was coming, so I managed to get out in the garden on Sunday, and besides planting beans and cukes and doing a little weeding, I did scavenge a wee bit of pickable flowers for Jane's flowery house party today. Do go feast your eyes, and gather some creative inspiration, from Jane's lush bouquets as well as the others who've joined the fun this month.

This green carafe seemed like just the right size for a modest bouquet of a couple of daffodils, some wild columbine, a twig or two from the dogwood, a couple of branches from the rosa glauca, which has such wonderful foliage, and a few leaves of lady's mantle. (The lovely tile behind it is from local artist Wendy Penta of Stone Hollow Tile, in case you're wondering.)

Our spring flowers have slept in a bit here in Minnesota, and who can blame them after the winter we all endured? Adding to that, my gardens are still in formation, so they wouldn't be all that lush this spring even if everything bloomed on schedule.

We bought the house in the summer of 2010, and the following spring I was delighted to see all the daffodils and muscari everywhere. But, unfortunately, as the house had sat empty for a couple of years, the weeds were thoroughly entangled with the flowers—especially creeping bellflower, and raspberries! We love raspberries, but it is a challenge to keep them contained.

A successfully transplanted muscari. Yay!

So we have done a lot of digging things up and transplanting what we can save as we go about remaking the gardens. I'm afraid there were a lot of daffodils and muscari among the casualties, and I'm making a point to photo-document the beds this spring so I know where to plant more bulbs come fall.

But sometimes we uncovered a delight that we didn't even know we had because it was hidden under the weeds, like this bloodroot (which has finished blooming; this photo is from a couple of weeks ago).

One corner in the front that was the first garden I worked on reclaiming is coming along quite nicely. The tulips that I planted there are more magenta than the pink that this one appears to be (I really must learn how to use this camera better!), and the ground covers of periwinkle and sweet woodruff are really filling in nicely. You almost don't see the mulch at all.

And I'm really delighted that the periwinkle has finally matured enough to bloom this spring.

I think the sweet woodruff will soon follow. Perhaps I'll have enough of those blossoms for May wine  — though I might have to call it June wine this year.

April Snow Showers and Flowers in the House

April 4, 2014 -- no kidding! There's a garden under there somewhere.

Just last week a long winter's worth of snow was nearly all gone, and then on Friday we got dumped on with six inches of the heavy wet white stuff! But today, as I was out riding my bike and wearing a cotton sweater and no gloves, I noticed that it's all gone, again. Isn't April just a barrel of fun, though?

So I'm delighted that another floriferous blog tour has rolled around courtesy of Flower Jane so I can look longingly at the lovely blossoms plucked from people's gardens, even as I bloomify my home's interior using my frequent excuse that I'm supporting a local independent business, while eyeing my patches of dirt for any sign of emerging life.

I've had this sweet little orchid since early February, when I brought it home from the co-op, and I'm so pleased that it's blossoms are so long lasting. I think it must like this cool spot on the buffet in a north window.









These daffodils, which I bought today, aren't really ready for their closeup yet, but I'm guessing they'll open up and look quite cheery and bright by the weekend, when we're supposed to get another round of slushy snow.

Tres (the big white-and-gray cat in the window) eyes the daffodils.

And orange tulips! What fun! I placed them in a heavy pitcher and set that in a big ceramic bowl, hoping that will be sufficient to keep my three bad kitties from knocking them over.

The daffodils in their little glass tumbler cut from a Carlsberg beer bottle I may need to move to a safer spot, though.

Bad kitty! (This is Phinney, about 9 months old.)

What?! More snow?! No! We want flowers in the house!

Here's today's forecast for Minneapolis, courtesy the National Weather Service:

"Snow likely before 1pm, then a chance of light snow between 1pm and 2pm, then snow with patchy blowing snow after 2pm."

Can you use "snow" four times in one sentence? That's on top of the 7 or 8 inches already sitting on the ground. You might notice how white it looks through those windows.

Ah, but I see from visiting Jane's flower party, that I'm not the only one with shoveling rather than gardening on my day's agenda. Actually, I expect gardening won't be one of my tasks for several more weeks, but that's pretty standard around here. All the more reason for flowers in the house.

If you're new to flowers in the house, you really must click the link on "flower party" above and have a look at all the lovely blogs featuring flowers today, thanks to Flower Jane and her Small but Charming blog. Thank you, Jane, for continuing this cheerful monthly tradition. Come to think of it, I have nothing to complain about.

And, fortunately, somebody knows how to grow flowers at this time of year around here, because when I went to the co-op, I was pleased to not only find a rather decent selection of flowers, but a sign indicating that they are locally grown. (Well, not outdoors, obviously.) So I selected some cheery orange tulips and a bundle labeled "filler." I chose a filler bouquet with a bit of violet purple in it to complement the orange.

I feel better already.

And it looks like the big meltdown begins on the weekend, with temps in the high 30s.

Cheers!

Tres on a balmy day last summer

And as you can see, I'm not the only one dreaming of spring! (Did someone invite cats to the party? Oh, yeah; they invite themselves.)

Flowers and flour

The autumn clematis, shown here in September, is still green in November.

Flowers in the house didn't happen this month, apparently because of everyone's preoccupation with flour of a different sort and a certain feasting holiday. I would have been late to the party anyway, for much the same reason.

Still, I have found the monthly floral blog crawl to be a nice motivator to do some sort of botanical arrangement in my house, as well as an opportunity to feast my eyes on and be inspired by the floral and artistic talents of the other participants, so I paid a visit to a local florist and made a couple of arrangements anyway.

My son's apartment is just one block from Roger Beck Florist, so when I dropped him off yesterday after he was done borrowing the car, I stopped in. I picked up a disparate assortment of elements, and I think the nice fellow helping me had his understandable doubts about their combining into a pleasing display, because I intended to supplement them with what I could find still in my yard and garden.

In fact, when I got home and started playing around with the blue and white mop head hydrangea, sprig of rose hips, purple seeded eucalyptus, tall green-purple foliage thingy (protea, maybe?), and branch of curly willow, I quickly surmised that they weren't all going to go together no matter what else I introduced into the mix.

So I added the willow to my existing front step urn.




The rose hips and mystery foliage branch, plus a few more quirky black orbs from the black-eyed Susans in my yard, helped fill out the small gilded pail in my front porch, which I had filled with sand to hold the cuttings from the too-long dogwood when I made the front step urn display.

The porch bouquet

For the indoor display, I cut a whole bunch of lavender from the back garden, which was still looking perky and smelling wonderful, and several tangly leafy stems of the autumn clematis, which appears to be largely undaunted by the several frosts we've had so far.

The hydrangea proved a disappointment, since it had wilted by this morning, so into the compost it went. I had cut the stem and put it in fresh water, so I'm not sure what the problem was. I will admit the mop heads are not my favorite hydrangeas, I much prefer our native Annabel and the panicles and lacecaps. Maybe it knew I didn't think much of it and went into a sulk.

The resulting arrangement is all foliage and no flowers, but I rather like it. The afternoon sunlight was a bit harsh when I took this photo, but when the sun isn't shining in on this spot, it's too dark to photograph it at all. Maybe next time I want to photograph something on the buffet we'll have a cloudy day, and then the afternoon light will be just right.