Winter Gardening Tips to Inspire Your Garden Designs; Green Cocktails and Gardens in Movies!

Making a pivot from my last post and its references to ballet and performance art, I thought I’d “pivot” or jeté back to the garden. Puns intended (smile).

Mac Griswold famously said, “Gardening is the slowest of the performing arts.” 

Mother Nature indeed knows how to choreograph a spectacular show: the colors, the texture, the orchestrated tempo of blooming flowers and blossoms, the dance of myriad pollinators ~ all coordinate to create a spectacular, heart-stopping show. And one of the best parts? The show changes every day! There’s no playbill noting intermissions or understudy.  The show must go on… 

Yet, let’s not forget that a garden is a planned space. I always tell my garden clients that every good garden design tells a story… When creating your garden oasis and telling your story, you need to start with a master plan to reimagine (if you’re just starting out) or to enhance your space (if you’ve already got a cultivated garden). What to do at this time of year if your garden views are white with snow or winter fog? 

Here are some tips to get your garden ready for the spring. Plus a list of movies that feature inspiring gardens, and a garden-to-glass cocktail that is sure to stimulate your green garden fantasies… 

How to Balance Career & Mental Health: My Conversation with Megan Fairchild: Ballerina, Best-Selling Author

 

One of the very best traditions of the winter Holiday season is to attend the New York City Ballet production to experience George Balanchine’s The NutcrackerⓇ ~ it just whispers legend and folklore and fantasy.  

In that spirit, as I’ve noted in some of my recent social media posts, you can understand why I had my heart set on showcasing a ballerina on my Ladies Who Lunch Conversations during the holidays. 

I was in pursuit of the magic of ballet and its ability to sprinkle us with its fairy dust and transport us to dream worlds.  I felt it in my bones that this was most especially needed in the time of a pandemic.  Art transports us… 

How did the Ladies Who Lunch Conversation come about?  Through a good friend, of course.

My 2021 Reading Journey ~ Books I Love and Recommend

 

Snow Storms and Books Go Together Like Patience and Fortitude.

It’s a whopper of a blizzard here ~ we’re getting pummeled by snow and wind. 

Therefore I figured it’s a good time to share what I think is an exciting list of books for you to consider reading. 

Despite being blessed with an oversubscribed schedule, I found more time for books last year. I say it this way ~ being blessed with work ~ because especially in a time of the pandemic, I do indeed feel gratitude for being able to do work that I love and that brings value to others. 

That’s a luxury. So is reading. 

As a writer, I often bemoan that I’m too busy working to read as much as I want. Only on vacation was I truly able to feed my insatiable appetite for books: to scarf up, devour books. 

But during the last year, I found or carved out a “sweet spot” combination of audio books I listen to on my daily “Wellness Walks,” hardcover, and Kindle editions. 

Last year, I became intoxicated with books. 

What to read, you ask? 

A Birthday 'Look Book' Celebrates Life's Mix of High Points and Sad Lows With Love and Hope

 

I just celebrated another wonderful birthday. Lucky me! And marking a birth day so close to the start of the new calendar year offers the chance to both look back and plan ahead in a tidy way. I’ve had a mix of lovely high points and some sad lows with an unexpected loss that has left me unmoored… Yet, I remain grateful and genetically happy.  Efficiency being a kind of attribute of my zodiac sign, I can happily check off a few boxes at the same time. 

While I’m preternaturally superstitious, it’s also true that I cling to the idea ~ or I daresay promise ~ of astrology. Who doesn’t look to celestial bodies and the stars to help plan their lives?  A “Look Book” portfolio beckoned…