I just posted a brand new video about Daffodil classes right here. This video explains the different flower forms and shows you pictures of each form. So if you ever wanted to know what kind of daffodil you were looking at, (so you could find it to plant yourself of course) here’s the starting point.
Here’s one of the great writers - we garden writers like to claim him as our own - of our modern thinking on the food scene. Michael Pollan has written books about what happens when you look at the world from a plant’s point of view - I invite you to do this kind of thing in your own garden.
Check out this video and see if it doesn’t make you look at the world in a slightly different way.
I’m not sure there’s anybody on the Net who hasn’t heard of youtube.com I’ve been using them to host some of my videos and have just finished creating Doug’s Youtube Channel
What I’d like to ask you to do is take a few minutes, check out a video (or three) and rate them for me. I really like seeing the stars beside the video and they help in promoting the channel and videos to other gardeners.
I do appreciate your help on this. Plus you get to see all the videos in one spot.
I’m starting a series of color in the garden with this short video of Cantigny Gardens (a public garden outside of Chicago, Illinois). These folks do a tremendous job on designing for bold and brassy color (as well as relaxed formal designs) and for showing off plants to their best effect.
OK - just when you think you’ve seen it all. Here’s a vegetable orchestra. Yes, they play vegetables for musical instruments. The instruments are crafted from different veggies rather than just one.
But feel free to try it yourself.
Me? I do well to get a tune out of a bottle or a blade of grass.
I think we’re “supposed” to write about what happened, what’s going to happen and what we’d like to see happen in this post. What a commonplace way to organize a blog post. So - you want to know that I intend to (finally-really) drop the excess weight? That I’m not going to build a new flower garden (building the veg garden instead)? This is interesting?
Nah. It’ just more of the same. You’ll know all about it as it happens… or not.
I’m a guy. What’s fun are the toys of life.
Never mind plants, let’s talk “toys”.
07 saw me upgrade the cameras in my life. Went from my first “learning” digital to a Pentax 10D and I’m loving it. Naturally, I want more lenses for it (a macro and a telephoto) and both are justified in this garden writing world. Hey, you never know when you’re going to have to take a picture of a flower from across a chasm while on a nature hike. So this camera now justifies the size of my camera bag and tripod (both used to run my Nikon), looks like a camera, acts like a camera and takes great pics. You’re going to see more and more of my photography over the next year.
I also took the big plunge and decided that it was time to invest in video making equipment and I’m glad I did. I’m having way too much fun with this stuff. In fact, if I was starting out again, I think I’d rather be a film maker than a gardener. So this gives me the best of both worlds and now my toys are being applied to the garden world. I’m using a Sanyo Xacti and it’s everything a good guy-toy should be. It is so easy to use with a manual that doesn’t have to be read (always an indication of a great guy toy) and effective at capturing good enough video for me to use on my websites - I really like it dontcha know.
The biggest toy this year (note to Revenue Canada: these are all work related!) is my new laptop. My better-half “convinced” me that I was just spinning wheels trying to make video on a 5 year old system that was so outdated that no modern software would run on it. And the Linux lover in me ran right into the fact that Linux isn’t video friendly yet. The MacBook Pro that sits on my desk is so darn tiny but so wonderfully powerful that I’m simply loving it. I now have a pro-level editing suite and a very steep learning curve ahead of me. When it comes to toys, these are some of the best.
But luckily I’m also taking a course on how to do a ton of stuff like this so I have high hopes you’ll see these last three toys all merge into a great package for 2008. I think we’ll see a massive difference between the starting videos and the ones we’ll be looking at by Dec. While I hope you enjoy them, I confess that I’m really doing it because it’s fun.
Because we bought a new house and are going to be doing renovations on it, the garden designs are going to have to wait a few years. I’ll be working at finding and planting shrubs and trees instead of flowers as these can be put far enough away from the house the construction guys won’t destroy them. Expect to see videos of me planting shrubs and trimming trees. Naturally, if I can’t garden, I’m going to have to sail. Good thing the new house has a great dock and I expect to have several of my sailboats ready for the water this season. Anchors aweigh. And yes, I’ll take videos of that as well. New electronic toys meet old wood toys.
Toys! That’s what’s important to guy gardeners. Never mind the mamby-pamby stuff of “new plants” and “new tools” (hey, if I wanted a new gardening tool, I’d ask somebody to invent it) Never mind what designer doyen says is *the* color of the month. Never mind “indoor-outdoor garden spaces”. Never mind “communicating” with fellow gardeners. And for goodness sake, never mind how much weight we’re going to lose and how fit we’re going to be.
here’s the starting point.
and rate them for me. I really like seeing the stars beside the video and they help in promoting the channel and videos to other gardeners.
