Exactly. Listen to your ants. Have you ever realized it’s impossible to hear the sound of one single ant marching through the forest? But if you bend down over thousands of ants building and repairing their anthill in the warming sunshine of spring – then you can actually HEAR the ants. Try for yourself.
Slowly, slowly spring is approaching and everything is coming to life. Good for me, to be able to enjoy the awakening during a longer period of time. Some samples:
Well, now, look what came by today in my garden! A really royal visit, the “queen of the forest”. This time a mother and her two one year old calves. They banged through my too tiny fence, broke a post on the way, hurried down the slope, missed the roses and the tulips – and were chased away by me so they couldn´t have their usual apple buds meal. But before that I had the chance of taking a picture!
If the Dutch are famous for growing and knowing everything about tulips – the Swedes are known to be the people buying most tulips in the world. A fact confirmed by statistics. Right now I am part of all those crazy Swedes, with my mind only tuned in on tulips, tulips, tulips.
I see tulips – and only tulips – everywhere. And buy them. And arrange them in different groups depending on color, form, size, state of ripeness.
Sometimes I let the tulips stay in the vase, when the decay is setting in. There is a beauty in the changing of color, in the petals falling off and leaving only the pistils on the stem. 
And of course do crazy things like hanging them upside down outside, with the bulbs still there! It was an experiment. It was winter and freezing cold outside, and I let the tulip with its bulb hang from the bird feeder. That was one
month ago, and it has met wind, snow, ice – and is still alive. Seems like the bud is waiting for spring, because it has not yet started to blossom. So yesterday I bought some company for this courageous flower – six different kinds of tulips, all attached to their bulbs .
And of course I am waiting with eagerness to see the tulips in my “A heart for the world”, showing themselves. But that will take some weeks still, before they are peeking up through the soil in
the garden. If you are interested, go to the post called “A heart for the world” and read more about how I made a huge heart flowering bed in the garden.
Blinding white snow. Fifteen degrees Celsius below zero. Winter sunshine dressing all nature in a coat of freezing beauty. I cannot have enough of it, it is so so beautiful. From the smallest branch to the bigger sceneries – it is one of these times when I feel very humble and thankful for being who I am and where I am, and being able to take in the magic of nature. I took a tour around the garden with my camera …
The birds in my garden give so much joy, and also are huge helpers in fending off harmful insects during the growing season. So I care for them a little extra during the cold part of the year. I have three feeding areas in the garden, but I have noticed that a lot of the seeds I feed them seem to be eaten up by deers or mooses. Okay, I suppose everyone would LOVE to have a moose in their garden. Hmpf! But try to imagine how much they eat, and how much they destroy in the process.
So, at least I would like to help the small birds keep some of the food I give to them.
I got the idea to use a piece of chicken wire, a rectangular one left over from some other project. With four tiny apple branches from last years trimming, I fram
ed the wire and got a board, nearly like a picture, to be filled with different goodies.
And so to the joy of filling the “picture” with bird treats. Natural coconut butter mixed with seeds, nuts and raisins. Tallow balls. Pieces of apple tied to the board by strings. Fir cones.
I guess I will come up with more things to offer them as time goes by. But this will do for a start.
Then my plan is to tie ropes to the left and right upper corners, throw the ends of the ropes over a high branch in the cherry tree and hoist the “picture” of food up into the tree. We will see if that makes it stay clear from the deers and any occational moose …
The photos of the actual placing in the tree you see on top of this page 🙂
With a little help from the ice in the birds’ frozen water bowl and a bunch of small candles, I wish all of you a HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Whenever I visit The Old Town in Stockholm, especially at Christmas times, there is a shop I cannot avoid – the one with all the unique and very personal “Tomte” figures. They come in different sizes and are handmade in every detail, and you just have to have one in your home. They look a bit like Santa Claus, but the “Tomte” is, according to nordic folklore, a sweet little figure who was supposed to guard your home and spread a good feeling in your home all year round. But he could also be quite mean, if you neglected your home or the atmosphere was bad.
The new one I bought for this year is standing in the window, right now overlooking the living room. In the old days it was said that if you were kind to each other, tended to your home and gave the “Tomte” a plate of porridge at Christmas – then he would thank you by guarding your home.
Of course, we also have the “Jultomte”, and that is Santa Claus, coming on Christmas Eve – but that is another story.
Two months ago, we took down a huge fir tree, it was bending dangerously towards the house. A winter storm, and it could have fallen into the roof. When I saw the long, beautiful upper branches, with its magnificent cones, I decided to save them for later. I did not know right then what to use them for, I just had the intuition it would be handy somewhere.
And one day the solution was right there! The upper part of the railing on
our veranda is of whitepainted wood. What if I put the fir branches on top of that, tied onto it with some roughlooking string from the garden store.
With a helping hand from my husband, to hold the branches into place while I tied them, a fairy tale landscape took form. The irregularity of the branches hanging from the rail accentuated the feeling of fairy tale.
To finish off, I tied silvery Christmas tree balls all along the front side of the railing. For a little while I considered brightening up the whole with electric Christmas lights, but decided not to. The sharp lights would have taken away the mysterious fairy tale feeling. Enjoy 🙂
The second bird bath was smaller, but nontheless impressing when turned into an ice sculpture. On the table of the veranda, I started the building of an ice house. But, alas, the weather was against me and the ice house was never finished. You just wait until next time the weather goes into freezing temperatures. Nontheless, with the winter sun reflecting in the ice – isn´t it beautiful?
Crazy Swedish Gardener 