Posts Tagged ‘trumpet vine’
Summer Remnants
The end is near. The scenery is reflecting the change of seasons in a variety of places around our property. The trumpet vine sprouted one last blossom that stands out like an emphatic exclamation.
There is evidence of fruit on one of our grape vines. I fear we may have waited too long to harvest.
The spell of abnormal heat is predicted to break tomorrow, with a hint of possibility we could get a little precipitation this afternoon to help usher in the change. Any moisture will be welcome because the earth around here is much drier than our trees deserve.
Could a cold and wet October await? That would be a wonderful surprise at this point. It is time for the remnants of summer to disappear once and for all this year. That was then. This is now.
We Northlanders get a little flummoxed when the weather here stays “San Diego nice” for too long without interruption.
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Trumpet Vine
It appears we have succeeded in transplanting a vine to the gazebo beside the labyrinth. That metal frame used to have a canvas cover that provided shelter from sun or rain but it succumbed to the elements a few years ago. We decided to try crafting a natural roof, starting with weaving long sticks through the frame and then filling spaces by threading in old grape vines.
We have since transplanted multiple versions of vines in hopes they will climb the frame and take up residency in and around the sticks and old vinewood. The trumpet vine is showing the most vigor and recently began bursting forth with blossoms.
I suspect it may take a year or two more to fully cover that gazebo but we are in it for the long game. Heck, we’ve got a maple tree in the center of the labyrinth that I dream will command dominance over the space in a hundred years.
We can wait a little while for the gazebo to gain its full green crown. At least that can happen while I’m still alive. The maple tree… I’ll just have to imagine what that will look like when is has soared to its maximum height and largest diameter trunk.
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Transition Month
August seems like a transition month. It doesn’t really stand alone as a destination month that we look forward to arriving. Other spring and summer months really carry their own weight (my local geographic region-centric take). April showers and May flowers. Everything about June is great. July being smack dab in the middle of summer and including the U.S. Independence Day makes it the jewel of them all.
Then August arrives and the shortening of days becomes more noticeable and the onset of fall sports training camps begin opening. Everything about the month tends to point toward the arrival of September when sports seasons start and schools begin classes.
Sure, locally grown sweet corn becomes available in August, but we’ve been watching fields growing all summer long so it just doesn’t seem like an exclusively August thing.
Cyndie arrived home yesterday and Asher and I were both thrilled to see her again. She gathered produce from her garden and reported that her trumpet vine is going to flower. Her new pond vacuum arrived so she assembled that and gave our landscape pond a serious going-over.
While she was opening the mail and packages that had accumulated, she noticed one was for me. I hadn’t even looked. It was my tent rainfly from The North Face!
I had received no prior communication from them since sending it off to Texas for assessment. They did what I hoped they would, and what I wouldn’t have been able to achieve if I tried to do it myself. They completely resealed all the seams like new.
The North Face has made me very happy once again. Such incredible support to one of their customers!
It’s got me thinking that August is a really great month after all and deserves to be appreciated on its own merits.
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Relative Something 