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Timeless Tips for Classic Landscape Design

7pm Tuesday, May 3 Atlanta Symphony Decorator Showhouse Connoisseur Series
6:30 wine & cheese, transportation from upper IBM parking lot on 4111 Northside ParkwayAtlanta, Georgia 30327 begins at 6pm.

$25 includes tour of the spectacular showhouse. (404) 733-4864 ( or just catch bus and pay at door, no reservation necessary)

Offering useful landscape tips for any size property, any style of home or age group or income bracket, Mary Palmer is know for animated lectures on landscape design. Tonight she will discuss the language of the land and how man has traditionally divided his home landscape into four parts: the approach and arrival sequence, hub, perimeter and destinations, and passages.

Tips include how to enhance your property value…forever…by working out the seamless relationships between the classic four parts.

Dargan Landscape Architects has specialized in the fine art of landscape design since 1973.   decoratorsshowhouse.org/index.php?id=connoisseur-series

Book signing to follow.

It took 250 craftsmen and experts, to transform this property known as Lotus House, over a year’s period.

All proceeds from the Decorators’ Show House & Gardens benefit Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Dargan Lagnaippe ( LandYap)

Horray for the tenors, the sopranos and the full chorus!The Southeastern Flower Show opened last night to the full compliment of bugles and drums.Music filled the air as the Mary and Felton Norwod, co-chairs of the 24th annual event, pulled out all the stops. The show theme is In Tune with Blooms and will keep you humming all spring. Located in Atlanta,GA’s Cobb Galleria, an easily reached destination with free parking, the flower show appeals to all comers. This special opportunity to see a JURIED flower show, a rarity in the world of mass-market home shows, tips the scales. Large landscape exhibits and discovery teaching and environmental exhibits will tantilize you to start new spring projects in your garden.

Every plant entered is scrutinized for its proper botanical name. Any “moving violations” (bugs!) noted, treated and removed before passing onto the show floor. Seasoned experts from 22 states reviewed the hundreds of anonymous entries and award ribbons and trophies. Daffodils, hyacinths, quince, azaleas, african violets, herbs, cactus, bonsai and many more botanical treats await you. Hellebores alone had over 30 entries.

Not only flowers, but a stellar juried Photography exhibit awaits your view and the highly vetted Shopping Mart will loosen the purse strings. The Artistic Floral exhibits include niches with musical themes, large mass arrangements, windowboxes, doorways and a host of smaller classes of stunning entries in the fine art of flower arranging. Those are a Wow on their own!

Honor Awards received last night included the Franklinia Award to Caroline ( Mrs, Harry) Gilham, former show chair and board member, for her contributions to the Southeastern Horticultural Society.  The Cherokee Garden Library, a project of Cherokee Garden Club (GCA) located at the Atlanta History Center, received the highest award for its contribution to Southern Garden History. Pictured is Cherokee member, Terri Bond putting finishing touches on the stage set of the library’s public face at the show. The “lamp shade” is decorated with antique musical manuscripts from redundant hymnals.

Tips on how to produce a winning entry. On a personal note, Hugh and I exhibit regularly at the SFS and even sponsor a landscape trophy. It is easy to enter and fun to win. Cut specimens are brought from our garden into the kitchen; the stems not quite in bloom sit in a vase on a heating pad, others sit in the refridgerator to preserve the blossoms. It is easier to slow them down than to speed them up! Hellebore stems are seared in very hot water for a few seconds to seal and release the air lock to promote turgidity and freshness. Judges are usually generous with awards, so if your precious pet is in mint condition (no blemishes on the leaves, no torn petals), bring it to the party! Our family garners lots of bride’s maids (whites), but occasionally we manage to win a blue. This year it was for a Texas Ebony, a tropical 6″ bonsai; my first really small pet. Please come visit it and the many other worthy entries in Ultimately Small, a new class from homes with small spaces.

Let the Show BEGIN!!!



Gollly wolly, I’m in digital hyperspace with whistles and bells, links and connectivity. Our first newsletter is going to press! The 4800 images of landscapes are linked for subscribers. We announce the upcoming Oct 2011 Winghaven Symposium and design studio with Jennifer Bartley. Plus we’ll have gift certificates available for 2 hr consultations packaged with a book for holiday giving. Whew. Oh yes, I sent Fiskars a “help my broken tool request” and within four days the part arrived… FREE!  Happy Holidays, MP

On Friday, as we set up our Sylvan Sport GO mobile adventure gear, a large tribe of turkeys snacked in the underbrush between campsites. Perfect weather, an empty campground, miles of trails to walk with pristine mountain streams rife with trout and only an hour’s drive from Cashiers. What better formula for an outing close to home?

It got even better! The Mountain Life Day, held on September 20 at Oconaluftee Visitor Center in the Mountain Farm Museum Complex located in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, took us completely by surprise. Here gentlefolk in historic garb were making provisions from scratch the old-fashioned way. Applesauce from hand-peeled apples was heated to a furious bubble in a black kettle, fired by hickory wood and stirred with a long wooden spathe.  Yummy samples were in hot demand.

Raw cane syrup, a pale green color, crushed by mules on a circular tether between two stones, was poured into a set of copper toughs fired to an intense heat to dehydrate and thicken the sweet molasses. A soap maker shared his technique for adding lye created from soaked ash into lard drawn from livestock fat to make soap. The doll maker created exquisite toys fashioned from simple cornhusks and silks. Generational rocking chair makers joined growers of over 300 antique apple varieties and examples of wild crafted home remedies for arthritis and colds.

The Oconoluftee Visitor Center is in high gear as a $ 2.5 million new building complex is being erected to house audiovisual and interpretive exhibits by the  spring 2011. The old visitor center will be retained as a research and teaching facility.

Smokemont Campground is just a stones throw from Oconoluftee. We parked our adventure gear in a shady campsite, put on our boots and set out on a beautiful 4 mile hike adjacent several streams on a gently graded path. Two trout fishermen worked the banks and shared their success with landing rainbow, brook and brown trout.  Further upstream, we dipped our rods into the waters seeking the elusive trout, finding our efforts unrewarded, but the scenery well worth the effort!

Since our marriage 26 years ago, Hugh and I enjoyed backpacking mountains and lowlands in beautiful areas. We are not car campers, or “front country users”, in the parlance of the national park brochure. However, anyone who knows me, knows I am a gear junkie.

The recent arrival of the Sylvan Sport GO on the market hit gear management on the head. Made locally at Cedar Mountain, NC, the GO is a camping innovation. It is a convertible wheeled apparatus made to haul 800 lbs of kayak, bicycles, small ponies and a built-in tent behind a 4 cylinder vehicle.  It is “heaven on toast points” for anyone needing a small trailer for light duty projects, plus has a wonderful, spacious sleeping tent that parachutes out from the clever roof storage providing for a family of four.

Our trip was easy, inexpensive at $20 a night for a camping spot, and we could enjoy painting, hiking, fishing, bicycling, dining and sleeping with all our gear easily accessed.  When our car gave up the ghost with electrical problems on Sunday’s departure date, the helpful Smoky Mountain  National Park VIP volunteer rangers in their electric rescue vehicle, gave us a boost and a telephone. Sequohia tow company from Cherokee took both our CRV and the GO back to Cashiers.

After towing and car repairs, we didn’t exactly save money or catch fish on the trip, but loved every minute of our outdoor adventure.

Getting there:

The Great Smoky Mountain National Park is  located on Hwy 441 adjacent Cherokee, NC.  www.nps.gov/grsm and is about 60-75 minutes from Cashiers. 1-865-436-1200.

The Oconoluftee Visitor Center is the entry point into the park. Smokemont Campground is the closest front campground to this entry.

Reservations  1-877-444-6777 or internet above.

Sylvan Sport GO

www.sylvansport.com

Photos:

1.     Gone Fishin’

2.     Hominy Makin’

3.     Cashiers resident, Hugh Dargan checks out broom corn

4.     Molasses makin’

5.     The author on the GO

6.     The GO at Smokemont