DryStoneGarden

Goat Rock State Park

As I said in my last post, I made some vacation time for myself the last month or two. Not a continuous vacation, but I made it out of town for a three day weekend almost every week, to Yosemite several times and up the coast twice. While on those trips, I made an effort to do some sketches. In the scheme of things, I’m probably more partial to photos, but sketches are good too, and I find myself doing more and more drawing for work. All of these are from the Jenner area, three in the vicinity of Goat Rock and one at Fort Ross.

Goat Rock State Beach

Fort Ross

Sunset Rocks at Goat Rock State Park

It feels like summer is finally here. I’m taking a few weeks off from the blog, enjoying these long summer days outdoors instead of at the computer. Posting should resume some time next month.

We’re back. We had a great time in Belize. We were on a five acre island called Tobacco Caye for most of the time. Our big accomplishment was going five days without putting on shoes or sandals. I have some photos of the Mayan ruins at Altun Ha on the mainland, but it’ll be a little while before I find time to post them. In the meantime, here is Anita’s watercolor of the place where we stayed. A couple of photos from Tobacco Caye are below. (more…)

I’m back from vacation; this past week I’ve been catching up on work, but I should be back to posting now. I’m a little sad I missed Bloom Day and Blog Water Action Day. I’ll be teaching a class at Heather Farms next Saturday about taking out lawns and replacing them with low-water native and mediterranean plants, would have made a good topic for a post. Earlier this year, I posted photos of the sheet mulching process; I’ll probably do another post on lawn conversion as I go through the materials for the class. We’ve done this class at Heather Farms a few times now. Here’s the description:

Learn how to trade lawn for a beautiful and sustainable landscape. Reducing or eliminating lawn areas saves water and maintenance time, while welcoming birds, beneficial insects and other wildlife into your garden. This class will discuss step-by-step, how to change a lawn area into a water wise garden without tilling or chemicals by using a technique called sheet mulching. The power point presentation and photographs will also cover basic garden design principles, site-appropriate plant ideas and plant installation.
Date: Saturday, October 23
Time: 9 a.m. – Noon
Cost: $20 GHF members/$25 non-members

I’m heading up to a wedding near Smith Rock in Oregon this week and then down to another wedding in Bishop soon after that. Those are two of the renowned west coast climbing areas, so I’ll be distracted from this blog for a little while. I’ll have some posts when I get back.

Taylors Mistake

Here are some more New Zealand watercolors and drawings I scanned from another one of Anita’s notebooks. These are from an earlier trip, travelling without me. A little random, I know, to post landscape studies of New Zealand while I’m traveling in Mexico, but Mexico posts will have to wait until I get home.

Pohutakawa aka New Zealand Christmas Tree

Willow Tree in Queenstown

Cave Rock, Sumner

Akaroa

The Remarkables

Taylor’s Mistake, Cave Rock, and Akaroa are all near Christchurch. The Remarkables are in the south, near Queenstown.