Awards

I have been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award by Michelle A. Potter 

http://thesagebutterfly.blogspot.com/

Thank you, Michelle, I am honored to receive this award!

I am grateful that you had a time to visit my blog and to nominate it. My wish is for to share the joy of gardening with my blog visitors.

Rules

1. Write a post thanking the person who nominated you and include a link to their blog.

2. Include the Versatile Blogger Award.

3. Select 15 blogs/bloggers that you have recently discovered or follow regularly and nominate .them for the award.

4. Include a link to their site.

5. Inform each of the bloggers that they have been nominated by posting a comment on each of their blogs.

6. Include these rules in the post.

7. In the post, include seven things about yourself.

Versatile Blogger Award Nominees

1. North Country Gardening.           - Neil Moran’s Simple Secrets to Successful Northern Gardening

2. Astrid’s Garden Design               - Astrid tells great tips about plants and design.

3. Gardening in the Lines                 - Erin, a 29-year-old mother of two wonderful girls, discovered the beautiful world of designing a garden

4. My little vegetable garden            - Bangchik and Kakdah try to blend inclination towards vegetable growing

5. Bonsai Japanese gardening         - Monica Wachman and her Silent Garden

6. Northern Exposure Gardening    - Gardenista was taking great photos of the northern lights

7. Suburban Veg Plot                     - Jules and Georgie, a new sheriff in town..

8. Allotment Adventures of Plot 58 - Stacy Drury, passionate about growing Veggies

9. Vriksha Nursery                        - Shaan Lalwani owner of a nursery based in Mumbai

10. Window on George                 - Dalene P had wonderful photos of The Dragon

11. Moss and Stone Gardens         - David Spain: hardscaping, shade gardening, and, of course, moss

12. Matilija Schoolyard Habitat      - The use of native plants for landscaping

13. Greenside Up                          - tells about interesting Gardening with Kids

14. Desi Fellow                             - Aman Dhanoa has wonderful photos of Chrysanthemum

15.The Hortiholic                           - Karen Geisler likes to track bloom times, bulb locations

    Seven Things about Me

1. I love my family, I’m proud of my sons

2. I enjoy knitting, and cross stitching.

3. I like to teach kids and study  languages

4. I traveled a lot and I enjoy to meet people in different countries

5. My favorite colours are green and purple.

6. My favorite movie star is Audrey Hepburn

   




    There are so many great blogs out there, I appreciate all of them. 

    You all deserve much praise and support for your hard work

Frost becomes stronger

Frost becomes stronger. It is -15 C ( 2 F ) in the morning.

Snow fell out, wind strengthened. It has blown clouds away, the sun came out.

Waxwings arrived, and began to peck berries remaining from the autumn.

The wood became mysterious and quiet.

     

I made a cross stitching picture of Waxwing. 

Lianas in my garden

     Climbing plants are widely known, thanks to the accelerated growth of their shoots, which are mounted on support structures. We quickly realized that vertical gardening is a very exciting experience. 

    My husband and my son have built trellises and a pergola in our garden. The choice of lianas is large enough; we had only to decide which of them will grow well in our climate.

Virginia creeper

     We also decided to divide space with the trellis, to create a garden pond area and to decorate a path along the house with green arches and pergola. The first year we planted Virginia creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia), Honeysuckle (Lonicera caprifolium) and clematis (Clematis х Jackmanii) near trellises and pergola. Clematis blooms once a year, for a long time before frost. It grows fast; its large purple flowers adorn the Vine (Parthenocissus quinquefolia).

Clematis

Honeysuckle

    A year later  another lianas came : Actinidia kolomikta, Oriental bittersweet (Celastrus orbiculata) and sweet peas. Celastrus orbiculata is also liana, with dense branching and foliage. Leaves are dark green, flowers are small, greenish. In the autumn it has bright yellow or orange berries that remain all winter on the plant. 

Actinidia kolomikta

Oriental bittersweet

    All our planted lianas are well and hardy. My favorite is Celastrus orbiculata, because  quickly  fills the entire trellis space, has no pests. I constantly direct its young shoots to the trellis direction. Last autumn it began to bloom, bore berries.

    I plant annual sweet peas in a large pot. I put it next to the Actinidia, and sweet peas completely twine  all the Actinidia shoots.

sweet peas

watch my video:

 

Willow Garden Bonsai, Niwaki

         While traveling, I always pay attention to the plants that adorn the gardens, the streets, the hotel lobby, patios and houses. Once I was sitting in a chair near the vase with very strange plant that had an interesting trunk. On closer examination it turned out to be five thin stems of ficus Benjamin, braided "pigtail" and tightly tiered. The entwined trunks seemed to be very stable and in good condition.

When I thought about my garden style, remembered that tree. I decided to grow some of my garden trees in such way. Of course, to use outdoors the ficus in our climate was impossible and I began to look for trees that are perfectly adapted to our climate. Four slender young willows were chosen, and  brought to our garden.
 

    
Willow is woody plant genus of the family Salicaceae. Some kinds of willows are mostly shrubs. Their appearance is very diverse: there are high trees and bushes, sometimes quite small, squat, creeping along ground. Some of the willows are blooming in early spring before leafing, others  in the early summer, simultaneously with first leaves, or even later. Willows grow on all soils, but more of them are suitable for friable and moderately humid.

   We planted the brought plants very close, then willows took roots, began to grow, and leaves appeared. The following spring I have to work with willow trees, as their trunks quickly thickened and hardened.
 

 

I braided their trunks to the first branching of the crown, fastened up with old, soft enough electric wire as the rope and left for a year. After a year I removed the lower crown branches, braided again even higher, fastened the wire up above branches.

This happened some years, as long as I considered that the intertwining of trunks is already quite high. Now niwaki tree is 6 years old, its trunks hardened. A tree is quite stable in the gusts of strong wind.

  
It's not difficult to look after such a little tree. I remove all branches that grow into the crown, forming the shape, leave the extreme horizontal branches and clip the top runners. I fertilize willow in spring and after flowering, put compost, ashes. Of course, the niwaki trunks and crowns can be pruned the gardener likes more.

Here is my video about willow-niwaki: