Happy Birthday Hoohoo

October 15th is always bittersweet for me, my late aunt Hoohoo's birthday. We usually have a frost before mid-October, ending our growing season, but this year, we haven't. I was able to go into my cutting garden and pick this beautiful arrangement of dahlis, zinnias, and a geranium bloom. Above, shot with the flash, every detail is clear and shadows are obvious. The table runner was woven by my dad on a small New England Morgan inkle loom. I was so lucky to have creative people in my family to teach me and encourage me to find my own creative outlets.

The same arrangement, turned around to show the other side. This photo was shot without the flash, but with the exposure time lengthened. Dahlias and zinnias and geraniums, oh my!

On This Day in 1925

October 15, 1925 —Gloria Isabel Sanborn was born to Anita and Charles Sanborn. I called her Hoohoo from the day I met her when I was 3 years old, fresh from Germany where I'd been born at the American Army base in Stuttgart and my only home for the first few years of my life. The story goes when our car arrived in Leete's Island my grandmother called out to her younger daughter and her husband who lived with her in the family home, "Yoohoo, they're here!" Apparently I mistook that as the name of my mother's sister and we immediately "clicked" with her first hug. She was my Hoohoo from that day on.

She and her husband, my dad's brother Bill, never had any children. Yes, two sisters married two brothers and we had a very small family all told. Hoohoo and I were pretty much inseparable and in a few years I would really need that when things went south in my life.

She bought me a pair of silver candelabras for my 6th birthday as I had already been playing the piano for four years by then and we stayed up late weekend nights watching Liberace on TV. She taught me to mix wallpaper paste, to match paint colors to fabrics, to plant daffodil bulbs, to dance the Jitterbug to 78s, how to wrap presents and tie a festive curled bow all by myself. It was understood I would never tell my parents how high the speedometer in her '58 Thunderbird went on the long straightaway between our homes in Leete's Island and Mulberry Point. We laughed like no one else was in the world; when I cried she held me and told me I was her little artist and that we felt everything just a little bit deeper than other people but that everything was going to be alright. We explored every square inch of the 200+ year old family home and acreage around it. We dug for antique bottles and what-have-you in the old gardens. We traced the lines of the old tennis court, overgrown with trees, and pretended to volley balls over the long-gone nets. We found wooden wagon wheels and old family Ford and Buick artifacts in the barn destroyed in the great '38 hurricane. We were thick as honest thieves.

She saw me excel in grade school, stumble in junior high, and graduate from high school and Vassar. She gave me her last Tbird, the powder blue '64, but her hourglass was running down. Her last ten years were spent battling cancer in almost every part of her body. I still have every letter she wrote me, every card she drew for me, every gift she gave me, including the envelopes. I even still have all those thing I gave HER as I got my gift of "saving things" from her.

I'm now a year older than she was when she died in '82, taken way too soon from all of us. So many things would have been different in my life had she lived, so many paths would not have been taken, but in the past few years I've been slowly becoming again the person she knew and loved. My demons will always be there. My past will always haunt me. I will always feel everything just a little bit deeper, but I also have a feeling everything will be alright. Hoohoo's little artist will make her proud.

Happy Birthday Hoohoo. RIP

Just to my Left, Still Life in a Glass

This series of photographs began with a glance to my left as I was sitting at my desk working. I had thrown some very short nasturtiums from the garden into a short drinking glass—a nice, blue crystal glass, but a drinking glass nonetheless. Small air bubbles were forming in the water, the grain of the antique table it's resting on added to the color and texture, One of the blossoms was submerged and was forming bubbles around it, too. I took the camera and placed it right on the table with the lens at varying distances, sometimes right up to the glass. The camera was resting on the solid surface so it could be a slower exposure. I love the way every part of these images turned out, from the blurred areas to the most sharp. Bubbles became crystal pearls. I could see these enlarged and printed out as is. The impromptu arrangement, from above, is here, and all photos are clickable to enlarge. They look best big, lol!

Nasturtiums, Water-filled Blue Drinking Glass:

Pretty Inside, Too

Just a few nasturtiums in a small drinking glass. on an antique wooden table. Simplicity and beauty often go together.

Early October IndoorColour

Mid-day ambient light, southern and western exposure. Digital cam chose to "paint" the violets two different hues which I worked with instead of correcting. As the camera fades from everyday usability, I'm going to keep documenting its work.

I picked an impromptu arrangement the other day, of whatever was blooming around Pink Gardens. Still in flower are marigolds, dahlias, Joe-Pye, goldenrod, geraniums, and zinnias. They all work together beautifully. I walked around the apartment photographing the arrangement in different settings and lighting.

My camera is either possessed or in a downward spiral of effectiveness, lol. I'm going to be working with the results, but you'll notice soft focusing and odd coloring in some. I've used Photoshop to enlarge and enhance and work with the flaws instead of covering them up.

 Upstairs foyer, no direct natural light, mid-day.

 Western window, direct sunlight filtered through evergreen trees.

Overhead ceiling light, mid-day, ambient light.

Upstairs foyer, late afternoon, no direct lighting, inadvertent flash on foreground. Possessed rabbit grooms are fun.

Upstairs foyer, late afternoon, no direct lighting, inadvertent flash on foreground. Camera does whatever Camera wants to these days, lo.

Overhead ceiling light, mid-day

Overhead ceiling light, mid-day

South window, not-quite-dusk, ambient light from iMac flatscreen

Hello, Dahlia! 2012-style

Seen from four different angles, and with unique post production, this is an arrangement I made today from my flowerbeds I have created and tended for years. I gave the bouquet to a friend for doing me a huge favor! Until I win Lotto, my remunerations and gifts will have to remain food or flowers, lol. 

The arrangement has buddleia (butterfly bush), goldenrod, and Joe-Pye for an early fall look.

 

Pumpkin Spice dahlia and an orange variety surrounded by goldenrod and Joe-Pye. I love different colors and textures in arrangements.

Hissy Fitz Dahlias, the bright yellow pom-pom, mixes it up with other mid September Casey-garden blooms.

Better Late than Never!

My dahlias are just now beginning to flower. This variety is named Pumpkin Spice and the blooms are just about six-inches wide! I also have yellow pop-pom dahlias flowering called Hissy Fitz. My purple ones are still a few days away, and I'm not sure the hot pink or a second variety of orange ones will even bloom. It's already the middle of September and they don't have any buds.

"Clutter" on a mid September morning in my apartment... Colors and collectibles wherever you look. I have vintage jewelry covering the new issue of Vogue, and there is also a February 1904 The Ladie's World underneath. My favorite vintage toy, a 1920s Roly Poly, is in the center, sitting in a 1930s cobalt vase.

 

A closeup of this morning's dahlia arrangement. These are Pumpkin Spice and Hissy Fitz varieties, the only ones I have blooming at the moment. That's a little '63 Ford Falcon scale model peeking out from the left, lol. A couple of my mother's crocheted afghans in the background.

Photopourri, Floralphernalia

The first arrangement of flowers from my garden. They seem to be later than usual. Zinnias, Dahlias, Sedum and Dusty Miller sit on the arm of my late grandmother's turn-of-the-century wooden Morris chair. One of her handknit seat cushions can be seen above the flowers and one of my "Not Wrapped Too Tightly" footstools is to the right. The more colors the better!

This variety of Hydrangea is in its final color change, from white to pale blue to pale purple to this almost-burgundy.

My first Dahlia to bloom this year. I didn't get my usual corms this year, nicely marked in packages, and bought these as small plants from a stand in front of a private house. They were only $1 apiece, and I spent quite a few minutes picking out 5 plants with colors that would compliment each other. They were all marked by the homeowner/grower with the color/variety. Only thing is, all five plants are actually the same color, lol, this not quite yellow with a tinge of pink and white. They're nice though, and I'll be able to practice my arranging skills using monotones.

The second variety of Hydrangea is blooming for the first time this year. It's bright white and has very sparse flowers. I love the mix of full blossoms on the outside and the tiny closed ones on the inside. This is the fully mature flower, the center ones don't open or get any larger, I'm not sure of the name of it.

The same "tableau" as in the post below, but this time with the thin golden brocade curtains shut. This western window lets so much sun in at this time of year, I have to close the curtains most days or the apartment turns into an oven. I love the golden color that these curtains impart the whole room during the late afternoons.

Photo Potpourri

My friend's young daughter on her first Ferris Wheel ride, a few years ago, at our local country fair. Her father was with her, but can't really be seen from this angle. All photos clickable to enlarge.

Azaleas. Spring can't get here soon enough for me.

David Austin roses, known for their incomparable aroma and gazillions of inner petals.

Posters of the 1971 Chevrolets—in clockwise order from top left,  the new-for-'71 powered clamshell tailgate, translucent "wood" sided Kingswood Estate; the Camaro RS with those neat "nerf" bumperettes and Endura ring around the central grille; the Corvette; the Monte Carlo personal luxury coupe; the Chevelle sport coupe. I've had these since 1971—forty years ago!

My hybrid pink irises which I've moved from house-to-house. They always bloom for my birthday.

Pink Garden's Lilacs. This shrub must be one hundred years old.

More stuff. Items range from my mid-century modern Grundig Majestic console radio/record player at left, to my circa 1790 cherry secretary cabinet at the right, one of my prized possessions. Those small framed oil paintings surrounding it are from Germany. My parents bought them in the 1950s. My Edison Gem cylinder player is on the small table in the center, with a few of the cylinder containers in front of it.

The beautfully turned details of my 1870s marble-topped pedestal table, which I believe was a wedding present for my mother's grandparents.

One of my pieces in the midst of being created. This shows the painting layers almost finished. This image also shows the paints and polyurethane cans and brushes and tapes and all the assorted detritus that I use when creating.

Rabbit's Eye View—My pink Irises as seen from the ground. Sometimes I just like to lie on the ground and see the world from the viewpoint of the little creatures that live outside.

Progression of the Parrots

The parrot tulips Mary brought me last Friday are just gorgeous today. They're opening more and more, leaning and swaying with the slightest provocation as you walk by them. The sunlight coming through the windows behind them renders the paler orange blooms almost transparent, and the centers of the red ones are turning a deep blue. I just had to do a quick photoshoot this morning to capture them at this phase. Enjoy! All photos clickable to enlarge. Click the "Read More" jump to see five more photos.