Winter Scenes

Nearly all of the photographs on this blog are taken by Karen Garofalo.
A bee enjoys some tasty Tuscan Rosemary blossoms.
Photos from 2013-2016

A lizard crawls over some Chickweed.

"Which is better off, a lizard basking in the sun or a philosopher?"
-  Ursula K. Le Guin, Changing Planes

Acacia tree in bloom.

Minature horses grazing in green pastures, an almond orchard in white bloom, and a dusting of snow on the Yolly Bolly mountains to the west.  Karen and I enjoyed this dramatic February view from our backyard from 1998-2016.  

The McCloud River near where it flows into Shasta Lake.

Karen enjoys the McCloud River scenery.

The Spirit of Gardening

Travels in Northern California

Happy Valentine's Day

"In Ancient Rome, Lupercalia was observed February 13–15 on behalf of Pan & Juno, pagan gods of love, marriage & fertility. It was a rite connected to purification and health, and had only slight connection to fertility (as a part of health) and none to love. 

The earliest description of February 14 as an annual celebration of love appears in the Charter of the Court of Love. The charter, allegedly issued by Charles VI of France at Mantes-la-Jolie in 1400, describes lavish festivities to be attended by several members of the royal court, including a feast, amorous song and poetry competitions, jousting and dancing. Amid these festivities, the attending ladies would hear and rule on disputes from lovers. No other record of the court exists, and none of those named in the charter were present at Mantes except Charles's queen, Isabeau of Bavaria, who may well have imagined it all while waiting out a plague."

"The rose is red, the violet's blue,
The honey's sweet, and so are you.

Thou art my love and I am thine;
I drew thee to my Valentine:
The lot was cast and then I drew,

And Fortune said it shou'd be you."

Since the 19th century, handwritten notes have given way to mass-produced greeting cards. In the UK, just under half of the population spend money on their Valentines, and around £1.9 billion was spent in 2015 on cards, flowers, chocolates and other gifts. The mid-19th century Valentine's Day trade was a harbinger of further commercialized holidays in the U.S. to follow.

Valentine's Day - Wikipedia

For my wife, Blanche Karen Eubanks-Garofalo, I offer her a nice Valentine's Day card, a few chocolates, and roses. 
We celebrate together!  

On Valentine's Day, I think about
 The people who are dear,
 How much they add to life's delight
 Whenever they are near.

You've always been a total joy,
Such pleasant company,
I very much appreciate
Our compatibility!

By Joanna Fuchs

"I love you all through February,
Not just on Valentine's Day!
I cherish you when flowers of spring,
Appear in the midst of May."

"I adore you in the summer,
When the air is filled with heat!
Without you in my life each day,
I wouldn't be complete."

"I treasure you in fall,
When leaves are turning gold!
I loved you when you were younger,
I'll love you when you're old."

"I prize you in the winter,
When colder days are here!
I love you, love you all the time,
Every minute of the year."

"So I'll give to you this Valentine,
But I want to let you know!
It's not just today, but always,
That I will love you so."

Plans for February Gardening

Repost from Febuary 2021: 

Location:  Vancouver, Washington   USDA Zone 8a

February Gardening Tips and Ideas
From Michael P. Garofalo

February Gardening Tips from Tsugawa Nursery

Here are my gardening chores for February:

Rake up fallen sticks and fir cones
Rake up all deciduous leaves
Fertilize plants and lawns
Add topsoil as needed
Add pea gravel and regular gravel as needed
Lower the level of the walking by east side of house
Scoop up all dogshit in walking areas
Keep work areas and supplies neat, covered, and out of sight
Make sure all garden pots drain properly
Water permanent indoor plants and over-wintering potted plants
Water any outdoor plants that need water
Browse seed racks in stores and catalogs
Plant shrubs when available
Look at outdoor furniture on display
Read gardening books
Add artistic touches to the garden
Repair and improve fencing
Secure the fence edge so my dog can't dig under and escape
Add level bricks and pavers for walkway paths in the garden


Here is where I shop in the Vancouver, Washington, area: 

Tsugawa Nursery, Woodland, Washington

Yard'n Garden Land, Salmon Creek, Highway 99 and 102nd Street, Vancouver, Washington

Shorty's Garden Center, Mill Plain Blvd., Vancouver, Washington

Lowes, 76 Street and 117th Ave (Lewisville Highway 503), N.E. Vancouver, Washington

Home Depot, Andresen and Paden Parkway, N.E. Vancouver, Washington

February Gardening Chores
Red Bluff, North Sacramento Valley, California, USA
USDA Zone 9

Typical Seasonal Weather for Our Area, USDA Zone 9 Normally, in February, we have high daytime temperatures of 59ºF, low nighttime temperatures of 40ºF, and get 3.4 inches of rain.

Red Bluff Gardening Notebooks of Karen and Mike Garofalo

Cloud Hands Blog Follow the seasons in the Northern California garden of Karen and Mike with their notes, links, resources, quotes, poems, and photos.

February Garden Activities and Chores in Red Bluff
USDA Zone 9

February: Quotes, Sayings, Poems.  Compiled by Mike Garofalo.  


February Gardening Chores

Browsing and ordering from seed and garden catalogs.
Pruning leafless trees and shrubs.
Weeding and tending the winter vegetable garden.
Relax and read books.  
The soil is usually too wet and cold for much digging.
Keeping cold sensitive potted plants in protected areas or indoors.
Make sure that the cuttings in protected areas do not dry out.
Repair fences.
Put straw mulch over fertilized vegetable garden areas not planted.
Distribute fertilizer and minerals.
Weed the sunny vegetable garden.  
Prune and mulch dormant perennials.
Planting bare root trees and shrubs.  
Remove dead trees, shrubs, branches, and twigs.
Enjoy the bulbs and rosemary in bloom.
Repair and sharpen tools.
Construct gardening boxes and flats.
Write a poem. Keep a gardening journal.
Fertilize with 20-9-9 or 15-15-15.
Trees without leaves need little or no watering.
Take a walk in your garden.
Sit and observe.
Turn the compost pile.  
Burn piles of gardening cuttings saved since last February.

Here are some photographs of our yard and gardens in February:

Flowers for February

 "The flowers of late winter and early spring occupy places in our hearts well out of proportion to their size." - Gertrude S. Wister

Right now, in our yard in Vancouver WA, we have two flowering plants: heather and helebores. The Rosemary has few blooms this year.

February - Quotations, Poems, Information, Facts

Flowers - Quotations, Poems, Information, Facts

Snowing in Vancouver

It has been snowing since Thursday (2/11).  There is now 10 inches of snow in our area.  Snow will continue until Monday.  This is the most snow we have ever seen around any of our homes. 

Our west side garden covered in snow.
This picture was taken on 2/12

The west side garden on 2/9.

Birds Dying in the Dead of Winter

 "February is a suitable month for dying.  Everything around is dead, the trees black and frozen so that the appearance of green shoots two months hence seems preposterous, the ground hard and cold, the snow dirty, the winter hateful, hanging on too long."

-  Anna Quindlen, One True Thing

February Quotations

Plans for February Gardening

Location:  Vancouver, Washington   USDA Zone 8a

February Gardening Tips and Ideas

From Michael P. Garofalo


February Gardening Tips from Tsugawa Nursery

Here are my gardening chores for February:

Rake up fallen sticks and fir cones
Rake up all deciduous leaves
Fertilize plants and lawns
Add topsoil as needed
Add pea gravel and regular gravel as needed
Lower the level of the walking by east side of house
Scoop up all dogshit in walking areas
Keep work areas and supplies neat, covered, and out of sight
Make sure all garden pots drain properly
Water permanent indoor plants and over-wintering potted plants
Water any outdoor plants that need water
Browse seed racks in stores and catalogs
Plant shrubs when available
Look at outdoor furniture on display
Read gardening books
Add artistic touches to the garden
Repair and improve fencing
Secure the fence edge so my dog can't dig under and escape
Add level bricks and pavers for walkway paths in the garden


Here is where I shop in the Vancouver, Washington, area: 

Tsugawa Nursery, Woodland, Washington

Yard'n Garden Land, Salmon Creek, Highway 99 and 102nd Street, Vancouver, Washington

Shorty's Garden Center, Mill Plain Blvd., Vancouver, Washington

Lowes, 76 Street and 117th Ave (Lewisville Highway 503), N.E. Vancouver, Washington

Home Depot, Andresen and Paden Parkway, N.E. Vancouver, Washington

February Gardening Chores
Red Bluff, North Sacramento Valley, California, USA
USDA Zone 9

Typical Seasonal Weather for Our Area, USDA Zone 9 Normally, in February, we have high daytime temperatures of 59ºF, low nighttime temperatures of 40ºF, and get 3.4 inches of rain.

Red Bluff Gardening Notebooks of Karen and Mike Garofalo

Cloud Hands Blog Follow the seasons in the Northern California garden of Karen and Mike with their notes, links, resources, quotes, poems, and photos.

February Garden Activities and Chores in Red Bluff
USDA Zone 9

February: Quotes, Sayings, Poems.  Compiled by Mike Garofalo.  


February Gardening Chores

Browsing and ordering from seed and garden catalogs.
Pruning leafless trees and shrubs.
Weeding and tending the winter vegetable garden.
Relax and read books.  
The soil is usually too wet and cold for much digging.
Keeping cold sensitive potted plants in protected areas or indoors.
Make sure that the cuttings in protected areas do not dry out.
Repair fences.
Put straw mulch over fertilized vegetable garden areas not planted.
Distribute fertilizer and minerals.
Weed the sunny vegetable garden.  
Prune and mulch dormant perennials.
Planting bare root trees and shrubs.  
Remove dead trees, shrubs, branches, and twigs.
Enjoy the bulbs and rosemary in bloom.
Repair and sharpen tools.
Construct gardening boxes and flats.
Write a poem. Keep a gardening journal.
Fertilize with 20-9-9 or 15-15-15.
Trees without leaves need little or no watering.
Take a walk in your garden.
Sit and observe.
Turn the compost pile.  
Burn piles of gardening cuttings saved since last February.

Here are some photographs of our yard and gardens in February:

Step Out in the Rain

Day after day, wind and rain, rain and wind. Everything is soaked in our yard and gardens.

"When you look at that nature world it becomes an icon, it becomes a holy picture that speaks of the origins of the world. Almost every mythology sees the origins of life coming out of water.  And, curiously, that's true.  It's amusing that the origin of life out of water is in myths and then again, finally, in science, we find the same thing.  It's exactly so."
- Joseph Campbell, The Hero's Journey, p. 10

"Water is a good servant, but it is a cruel master."
- John Bullein, 1562

Haiku - February

Water and Rain: Quotes, Sayings, Lore

"I am sure it is a great mistake always to know enough to go in when it rains. 
One may keep snug and dry by such knowledge, but one misses a world of loveliness."
- Adeline Knapp

One apple left on a branch of the tree.  It shares the space with a Praying Mantis egg case and a few emerging apple buds.  

A lovely apricot blossom that survived the rain and wind.  A the local almond orchards are in full bloom - white blooms.  

"Coming home
long necked geese–
Canadian-Americans.

A warm rest for
coots, geese, and ducks–
wet rice fields.

The white geese
ascend from the far fields
fleeing popping shotguns.

The honking geese
a quacking cacophony
flapping overhead.

Flocks of white
geese in the light gray fog–
this way and that way."

- Mike Garofalo

February Gardening

February Gardening Chores
Red Bluff, North Sacramento Valley, California, USA
USDA Zone 9

Typical Seasonal Weather for Our Area, USDA Zone 9 Normally, in February, we have high daytime temperatures of 59ºF, low nighttime temperatures of 40ºF, and get 3.4 inches of rain.

Red Bluff Gardening Notebooks of Karen and Mike Garofalo

Cloud Hands Blog Follow the seasons in the Northern California garden of Karen and Mike with their notes, links, resources, quotes, poems, and photos.

February Garden Activities and Chores in Red Bluff
USDA Zone 9

February: Quotes, Sayings, Poems.  Compiled by Mike Garofalo.  


February Gardening Chores

Browsing and ordering from seed and garden catalogs.
Pruning leafless trees and shrubs.
Weeding and tending the winter vegetable garden.
Relax and read books.  
The soil is usually too wet and cold for much digging.
Keeping cold sensitive potted plants in protected areas or indoors.
Make sure that the cuttings in protected areas do not dry out.
Repair fences.
Put straw mulch over fertilized vegetable garden areas not planted.
Distribute fertilizer and minerals.
Weed the sunny vegetable garden.  
Prune and mulch dormant perennials.
Planting bare root trees and shrubs.  
Remove dead trees, shrubs, branches, and twigs.
Enjoy the bulbs and rosemary in bloom.
Repair and sharpen tools.
Construct gardening boxes and flats.
Write a poem. Keep a gardening journal.
Fertilize with 20-9-9 or 15-15-15.
Trees without leaves need little or no watering.
Take a walk in your garden.
Sit and observe.
Turn the compost pile.  
Burn piles of gardening cuttings saved since last February.


Here are some photographs of our yard and gardens in February:

February Garden Chores

February Gardening Chores
Red Bluff, North Sacramento Valley, California, USA
USDA Zone 9

Typical Seasonal Weather for Our Area, USDA Zone 9 Normally, in February, we have high daytime temperatures of 59ºF, low nighttime temperatures of 40ºF, and get 3.4 inches of rain.

Red Bluff Gardening Notebooks of Karen and Mike Garofalo

Cloud Hands Blog Follow the seasons in the Northern California garden of Karen and Mike with their notes, links, resources, quotes, poems, and photos.

February Garden Activities and Chores in Red Bluff
USDA Zone 9

Browsing and ordering from seed and garden catalogs.
Pruning leafless trees and shrubs.
Weeding and tending the winter vegetable garden.
Relax and read books.  
The soil is usually too wet and cold for much digging.
Keeping cold sensitive potted plants in protected areas or indoors.
Make sure that the cuttings in protected areas do not dry out.
Repair fences.
Put straw mulch over fertilized vegetable garden areas not planted.
Distribute fertilizer and minerals.
Prune and mulch dormant perennials.
Remove dead trees, shrubs, branches, and twigs.
Enjoy the bulbs and rosemary in bloom.
Repair and sharpen tools.
Construct gardening boxes and flats.
Write a poem. Keep a gardening journal.
Fertilize with 20-9-9 or 15-15-15.
Trees without leaves need little or no watering.
Take a walk in your garden.
Sit and observe.
Burn piles of gardening cuttings saved since last February.

Here are some recent photographs of our yard and gardens in February:

Winter in the Valley

February brought more needed rain and snow.  Heavy rain in the local mountains, with snow above 4,500 feet.  It will be dray and warm all this coming week.      

“There is a privacy about winter which no other season gives you …..
In spring, summer and fall people sort of have an open season on each
other; only in the winter, in the country, can you have longer, quiet
stretches when you can savor belonging to yourself.”
- Ruth Stout




At the end of the culdesac lane that I walk on, I come to Highway 99 West (shown above). This portion of Hwy 99 was constructed in 1926, mostly right along the side of the Union Pacific railroad tracks that go back to 1870. Highway 99 is a major highway in the far western U.S., from San Diego to Seattle.  Interstate 5 replaced Highway 99 in the 1960's. 


 
The nearby Shasta Yolla Bolly mountains, and the Trinity Alps behind them, to the north west of our home in Red Bluff, sometimes get snow down to 3,000 feet (shown above). We rarely get any snow in the valley where I live.


 
The many nearby almond orchards are in full bloom in February. 


The prune plum orchards have yet to flower.
 

"Timeless thoughts of a winter’s stare;
eyes gazing over a landscape bare.
Memories drift on a blustery breeze;
dying light ushers in the freeze.
Reaching out for a grasp on the present;
stillness sets in, alone, and desolate.
Future unknown, outcome uncertain;
brilliance shadowed by a drawn curtain.
Path now set, laid before me known;
closing light now emanating from home.
Enter my homestead, heart filled with glee;
two eyes of the future peering upward at me.
Trusting in him to forge forward until fulfilled;
Basis of strength, values I have instilled.
A wary mind at last permitted to rest;
reflecting on the realization of how I am blessed.
-  Michael A. Barron, Winter's Epiphany    

 

"Winter is the time for comfort - it is the time for home."
-  Edith Sitwell

Celebration in Honor of Epicurus

On February 4th we honor the memory of Epicurus (341-270 BCE), the founder (Hegemon) of the school of philosophy in Athens, Greece, that we now call "Epicureanism."  His school was called "The Garden" (Ho Kepos).

His followers celebrated together in his honor on the 10th of Gamelion.  Gamelion was a lunar period of the Attic Calendar used by the ancient Athenian Greeks. Gamelion was the period in January or February, each Winter, occurring  after a full moon.  Consequently, the celebration of the life and philosophy of Epicurus was a movable feast.  Vincent Cook reports that Epicurus was born on February 4th.

I am content to use February 4th for the purpose of honoring the memory of Epicurus.  Friends of Epicurus, please celebrate and enjoy yourself today.  Epicurus would have encouraged us to: enjoy wholesome pleasures, be cheerful, have peace of mind (ataraxia), be uplifted by our decent friendships, practice kind speech (suavity), find beauty and factuality in the natural world, respect our bodies and our senses, flourish as human beings (eudaimonia), cultivate wisdom through good conversation, reasoning and reading, and let go of superstitious and false beliefs.  We tip our hats to the founder and master! 

Recommended Reading about Epicureanism and Epicurus

Virtue Ethics

A Philosopher's Notebooks


“Let no one be slow to seek wisdom when he is young nor weary in the search of it when he has grown old. For no age is too early or too late for the health of the soul. And to say that the season for studying philosophy has not yet come, or that it is past and gone, is like saying that the season for happiness is not yet or that it is now no more. Therefore, both old and young alike ought to seek wisdom, the former in order that, as age comes over him, he may be young in good things because of the grace of what has been, and the latter in order that, while he is young, he may at the same time be old, because he has no fear of the things which are to come. So we must exercise ourselves in the things which bring happiness, since, if that be present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed towards attaining it.” 
-  Epicurus, Letter to Menoeceus

February Scenes and Winter Moods

It rained last weekend.  We got about 2.5" of rain.  Heavy rain in the local mountains, with snow above 6,500 feet.  Winds from the southwest from 15 to 40 MPH.    

“There is a privacy about winter which no other season gives you …..
In spring, summer and fall people sort of have an open season on each
other; only in the winter, in the country, can you have longer, quiet
stretches when you can savor belonging to yourself.”
- Ruth Stout




At the end of the culdesac lane that I walk on, I come to Highway 99 West (shown above). This portion of Hwy 99 was constructed in 1926, mostly right along the side of the Union Pacific railroad tracks that go back to 1870. Highway 99 is a major highway in the far western U.S., from San Diego to Seattle.  Interstate 5 replaced Highway 99 in the 1960's. 


 
The nearby Shasta Yolla Bolly mountains, and the Trinity Alps behind them, to the north west of our home in Red Bluff, sometimes get snow down to 3,000 feet (shown above). We rarely get any snow in the valley where I live.


 
The many nearby almond orchards are in full bloom in February. 


The prune plum orchards have yet to flower.
 

"Timeless thoughts of a winter’s stare;
eyes gazing over a landscape bare.
Memories drift on a blustery breeze;
dying light ushers in the freeze.
Reaching out for a grasp on the present;
stillness sets in, alone, and desolate.
Future unknown, outcome uncertain;
brilliance shadowed by a drawn curtain.
Path now set, laid before me known;
closing light now emanating from home.
Enter my homestead, heart filled with glee;
two eyes of the future peering upward at me.
Trusting in him to forge forward until fulfilled;
Basis of strength, values I have instilled.
A wary mind at last permitted to rest;
reflecting on the realization of how I am blessed.
-  Michael A. Barron, Winter's Epiphany    

 

"Winter is the time for comfort - it is the time for home."
-  Edith Sitwell