Hair and Garden Update

Whew, it’s hot and HUMID here in Michigan! Here’s a little photo update of the garden in mid-late Summer. This tends to be a time of fewer blooms. The trick is regular deadheading (popping off the spent flowers). Many plants will rebloom to complement new bloomers like hummingbird mint, hibiscus, hostas, echinacea and cosmos. Before long, it will be aster and mum season.

The garden continues to yield more produce for less work, so I’m liking that! Between massive amounts of greens from the enclosed Garden Tower 2 and cucumbers, squash, herbs, banana peppers, carrots and eggplant in the open beds, every day brings a sizable harvest. It’s not the over-abundance I used to need to deal with while quasi-farming in Goshen: rather, a steady supply of fresh flavors and nutrients.

Some photos from today:

dinner plate hibiscus

 

Garden Tower 2 Update

For those wondering how the Garden Tower 2‘s producing, here’s a photo series taken from each side. I rotate it daily or every other day. You can see some sides have more growth. Those would be the days I didn’t rotate so those plants got more southern exposure. This is a heavily harvested tower and still producing. I made a huge batch of pesto last weekend, mostly from the tower, and it looks like this weekend will be pesto time again.

Turning the tower seems to have kept most of my lettuce from bolting even in our many days of 90+ degree heat. As long as the tender greens get periodic afternoon shade, they seem to think it’s still earlier in the season. I can’t believe how much produce I’m getting from 4 square feet of space!

So far so good with the fencing and mesh cage. A groundhog sniffed around and tried to figure out how to break in, but the 2 foot metal fencing and gate around the bottom are just high and wobbly enough that it gave up after just one “window warning” (opened and slammed shut).

The other advantage so far is that the white cabbage moths can’t fit through the mesh to lay eggs on my kale. Major score! Usually by this time of year, those little green caterpillars do major damage or it becomes a near full time job picking off the eggs. It felt soooo satisfying yesterday to watch a moth try to enter from every angle and eventually move onto sipping catmint flowers. 🙂

Now …. if we can just get the groundhog to move out of our shed. I had enough extra kale to give my neighbor a bunch when she dropped off a bucket of used kitty litter to drop down the new burrow. Fun times! She said, “I’m trying to wrap my head around this. I’m leaving a bucket of used kitty litter on neighbor’s porch — and I like her.” Always an adventure, even with plenty of yummies.

I also need to figure out how to prop up the dwarf tomato plant without ripping the mesh sides or ceiling. Even with pruning, it’s getting too big to rotate without hitting the top or sides.

Overall, this garden season feels much more fun than past years in Kalamazoo. The front yard is mostly herbs, flowers, hot peppers, cucumbers and eggplant, but so far so good even there for lettuce. The front yard beds get afternoon shade, and the cucumber vines now shade the lettuce even in the sunniest parts of the day.

The weirdest thing is that something — I think a deer — is leaving all my edibles alone but decimating my “critter resistant” large sedum and one other plant that I only purchased due to its resistance. I forget the name now, but it starts with an “a” and it’s totally gone. I’ll take it, though. If something wants to concentrate on non-edibles that I only planted so I’d for sure have plants there even if an animal ate my more prized items, I’ll play along. Munch away … far, far away from the things I want to eat. 🙂

Ann Kreilkamp ~ The Great Conjunction Jupiter/Saturn: Grounding Energy for Lift-Off

With Summer Solstice and a powerful Solar Eclipse behind us, friend, astrologer and permaculturist Ann Kreilkamp looks ahead to the powerful planetary alignments on Winter Solstice. While no one can definitively say when the Age of Aquarius began or begins, Winter Solstice 2020 seems a likely candidate with Jupiter and Saturn conjuncting at 0 degrees 28 minutes Aquarius.

As usual, this happens in very key spots of my natal chart and life. My Moon sits at 1 degrees 14 minutes Aquarius, so this Jupiter/Saturn conjunction closely conjuncts my Moon, which, in turn activates an exact Grand Trine in Air among my Aquarius Moon, Gemini Sun and Libra Pluto. Some astrologers theorize that the Star of Bethlehem occurred at a Jupiter/Saturn conjunction, and I grew up in “The Christmas City,” Bethlehem, PA. David and I got married on Winter Solstice 2016.

On the Eve of Last Winter Solstice, I experienced a surreal and spontaneous “initiation” involving a Womb exhibit, powerful death and rebirth imagery, including a huge synchronicity with my birth time, owls and then finding a dead coyote frozen on the edge of Lake Michigan — right at dusk on this longest night of the year. I described some of that experience and included photos in a blog post, but the full tale remains complex and deeply personal. In any case, for me and for many others, it doesn’t feel too soon to bring Winter Solstice 2020 into our awareness. Here’s Ann encouraging us to find greater context from the previous conjunction in May 2000:

The Great Conjunction Jupiter/Saturn: Grounding Energy for Lift-Off

by Ann Kreilkamp

Note: Hold on to your hats, this is a long post!

Please keep in mind that this turbulent year’s finale will occur on Winter Solstice, December 21, the holiest day of the year, which will just so happen to feature what is known as a Great Conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn, at, guess what? 0° Aquarius!

Yes, I’d say that if we have been waiting all these decades for the Age of Aquarius to begin, it will finally ignite! But, a note of caution: electric Aquarius ramps up to warp speed only after death/rebirth Pluto itself also moves into Aquarius, in 2024. Between 2021 and 2024, expect a see-sawing between old and new: vertical, control-obsessed New World Order hierarchy vs. horizontal decentralized permacultural networking; the 1% (Capricorn) versus the 99% (Aquarius); doing things in old, stuck ways, versus using our imagination to explore and invent entirely new (and, paradoxically, ancient) ways of being and doing on planet Earth and out to the Great Beyond. For if any sign indicates space exploration, it’s Aquarius.

Wikipedia:

When studying the Great Conjunction of 1603, Joannes Kepler. thought that the Star of Bethlehem might be the occurrence of a Great Conjunction, which occurred in 7 BC.

(If so, I imagine the Star of Bethlehem included a conjunction of Mars, or maybe Venus for a short while, to give that bright spot in the sky extra punch for the Three Wise Men.)

What’s important here, is that Great Conjunctions of  Jupiter and Saturn, the two planets that function as a bridge between the individualized consciousness (short cycled planets, including Sun, Moon, Venus, Mercury, Mars) and the planets of the collective unconscious (Uranus, Neptune Pluto and beyond), concern the manifestation of goals, plans, structures (Saturn) that are granted extra oomph (Jupiter) during each 20 year period.

And when did the last Great Conjunction begin? May 2000. We are only a few weeks from a 20 year anniversary during this month of June 2020. And what sign was it in then? Taurus, the most earthy earth sign, fixed, security-oriented, stable, and stubborn as hell. If there is any single sign that correlates with the natural world, it is Taurus.

Garden and Portal Update

I’m busy with sessions and painting portal number 22, then need to work on July’s North Node Horoscopes. I painted and coded the back and hope to finish this mini “door” sometime this week. Meanwhile, the garden continues to bloom and produce, which makes a garden update the easiest blog post available. I thought I’d share this mix of herbs, edibles and flowers in back and front yards. Enjoy!

First lily of the season!

Love in a Mist, marigolds and just-about-to-flower purple kale

Purple bok choy, marigolds, chard, and chamomile

Magenta yarrow

floppy chamomile leaning against an evergreen for support

Robinhood rose by the back patio

Groundhog proof Garden Tower 2

Clematis on the shed

foxglove by the back patio

 

Garden Update ~ Garden Tower 2 Setup and Spring Planting

I haven’t posted a Garden Update in a long time, so I decided to document the assembly of our upgraded Garden Tower 2. I had this in Goshen as part of a demo garden showcasing different ways of growing crops — permaculture, raised beds, Garden Towers 1 and 2, Square Foot Gardening, tiered/circular raised beds, Big Bag Beds, Smart Pots, wood mulch gardening, food forest, etc. I had not set up the Garden Tower 2 in Kalamazoo, though, because doing so required me figuring out where to put it, building a patio, and also fencing it in from critters.

I’ve detailed three years of groundhog adventureshere — from Kalamazoo Kal to all his very hungry relations. Last year, I switched the front yard beds primarily to rabbit/deer/groundhog resistant herbs and perennials and had all but given up on annual vegetable gardening. It’s just too frustrating to fight all the critters. Our fenced backyard is even worse than the open front yard, as the groundhogs have generations of tunnels and ancestral habits.

A dream on April 4, 2020 told me that my future self would really appreciate if I assembled the Garden Tower 2 that lay unassembled in our shed. I followed the advice, ordered seeds, got everything needed for assembly, only to learn that that weekend was the last time I could have done so prior to Michigan’s Governor declaring gardening “non-essential” and making it illegal to buy what I’d need. Score one, Dream Guys! A “mix-up” led to me ordering some extra parts for the GT2, and we ended up with an extra tier. For me, this changes the entire aesthetic of the GT2, and I love it so much more now. I don’t know why that one extra layer makes its form so much more appealing, but it does.

In any case, David and I spent a long Memorial Day weekend celebrating my birthday, going on wooded walks and drives, building a patio, and setting up and planting the Garden Tower 2. For anyone interested in the process, we documented some of the highlights.

The “Before” space, slightly in process, since I forgot to take a Before photo! This required moving three Smart Pots to the other side of this existing raised bed. Moving those turned out way easier than anticipated. In the photo below, you can see the patio blocks before digging out and leveling the ground. We’ve got the base of the GT2 there for reference, to see where we wanted this rotating tower:

Garden Tower Project + Face Mask Frames

Last night, I asked my future self in my dreams, “What are you grateful I put into play earlier? What do you wish I had done now?”

As a result, Crazy Plant Lady spent this morning figuring out how to set up our Garden Tower 2 in an animal proof way, since all the critters have made for much smaller scale gardening than I did in Goshen with two fully permacultured yards. I also ordered seeds for crop varieties I’d given up growing due to our many groundhog “friends.” We mostly have perennial herbs, rhubarb, alpine strawberries, aronia, elderberry and blueberry bushes, plus some edible ornamentals scattered among the flowers.

The Garden Tower 2 inside a mesh pop up cage, on top of concrete pavers surrounded by wire fencing, in our fenced backyard should allow me to grow carrots, collards and other goodies normally devoured by rabbits, groundhogs and deer. With some of my crops protected, I can focus attention more on those, and feel relaxed about the other beds planted with more critter resistant varieties.

We have a yard with lots of raised beds, but the Garden Tower 2 allows you to grow 50 plants and compost in a very small space. For those people looking to garden more, here’s a list of my favorite permaculture and edible yard resources.

I also see that The Garden Tower Project is now manufacturing face mask frames for men, women and children. You can add your own filter, bandana, or whatever fabric you have on hand.

I know both Colin Cudmore (inventor of The Garden Tower Project) and his mom, Ann Kreilkamp, but I have no financial connection to these resources. Just sharing here in case anyone else feels led to increase garden yields or make their own face masks. Remember to breathe! As the Hopi say, “This could be a good time.”

A Tale of Two Timelines

Below is an updated version of a post I wrote in 2014, a time that seemed so intensely polarized. I have to laugh as I recall 2014, because the split grows wider and wider each year. Compared to today, 2014 was mellow!

I’ve received emails from some very anxious people begging me to blog about current events. I only do so when I feel led, and you won’t find me taking sides here. Some people have asked why I no longer blog directly about vaccines, BigPharma, GMO’s, and other Shadow topics. I used to, but at some point I found my blog getting censored. WordPress wouldn’t let me post if I included certain words; several search engines dropped my blog for two years. Even if I searched “Laura Bruno, Medical Intuitive,” my blog would not appear. My YouTube channel got censored into non-existence way back in 2011. I was one of the original ones booted off that platform for sharing non-mainstream, empowering information.

I consolidated five websites into this one blog. Forgoing YouTube and social media, this blog is the only online presence I now have. The risk of total censorship outweighs what I feel I can accomplish anymore by posting about certain topics. You can search the blog if you want to see what I’ve written over the years, although I removed some of that content, too. I feel like we’ve entered a new phase, where portal painting, orgone gridding, Reiki, energetic intervention and other under the radar actions produce stronger results with far less risk. And yes, more Divine Doorways and Portal Paintings are in the works. Those I’ll share. 🙂

My own path — along with many clients and blog readers — involves embracing paradox and the integration of seeming opposites. Best of the old, best of the new: what would create healing, harmony, generous yields and soul soothing beauty? These are the questions I ask, and most public work I do occurs very much behind the scenes. I will always support free will to choose creation or destruction, realizing that many times creation follows destruction. That said, the opportunities to choose keep ramping up. In any case, here’s a post from 2014, which if anything, seems even more true today:

A Tale of Two Timelines:

Garden Update: September Beauty and Bounty

It seemed like Autumn was in the air for awhile, but we’re back in the 80’s. Meanwhile, a mixture of heavy rainstorms and scorching sunshine have the somewhat neglected garden producing well. I’ve harvested several golden beets, plus continued kale and chard. Radicchio has survived multiple groundhog and earwig attacks, and we’ve got some reseeded lettuce and cilantro popping up in the raised beds. It’s officially pesto season, and the zinnias know it’s September:

Also, we finally have some love-in-a-mist to keep the snapdragons company!

Perhaps the biggest news in the gardening world

Garden, Groundhog, and Writing Updates

You may have noticed me blogging less this month, and that has a bit to do with increased groundhog patrol and much to do with working to finish my Lyme disease book. The garden took a turn towards Autumn with new mum’s and the tall sedum starting to put on its show:

The August Garden

Some photos of Dra’Faven’s front yard cottage garden: