How to Prune a Tree

31 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Gardening, Maintenance

Before Pruning - California Pepper Tree

My husband and I decided we could save the $150 our gardener would charge us to prune our Pepper Tree by pruning it ourselves. The tree should have been pruned this past fall, however time got away from us and we just didn’t get around to it.

The tree is threatening to take over our tiny front yard and the roses have begun to protest. By “protest” I mean they are stretching to find sunlight, making them look more like climbing roses than shrub roses. The tree provides our home with much needed shade in the summer months by blocking our west-facing cottage with filtered light rather than hot sun.

Even though I was Partner to a landscape business for 12 years, I never really pruned large trees. My partner and I designed cottage gardens for our clients and we had an excellent team of workers that usually implemented our ideas. That said, how hard can it be? With the help of the internet I have printed out some key instructions on pruning a pepper tree. This particular tree is less than 10 years old and the branches are still fairly small. I have observed the ‘after’ of a professional tree trimmer and honestly, they sometimes butcher the tree they are attempting to prune. I plan to keep the overall grace of the tree while removing the dead wood and unnecessary branches. My tip sheet recommends that the larger structural branches are called scaffold branches. Because my tree is still fairly young I don’t expect to have to prune any of the main scaffold branches, however the expert recommends that if you do have to remove a scaffold branch you should begin sawing from the bottom to avoid stress on the remaining joint. Once the main part of the branch is down you can cut the final 2′-3′ away from the trunk.

Start small with your cutting, it’s easier to remove more branches later then feel badly for removing too much. If you do cut too much keep in mind the branches are like hair, they will grow back. The Pepper Tree I’m attempting to prune will grow even faster once trimmed.

Tools needed: 1 pole pruner (our friend lent us an electric one, it should be easy to use), small landscape hand saw (for details that the pole prunner can’t handle), plenty of space to cut the removed branches into managable sized bundles for composting or disposal. Fortunately our city recycles and we have a ‘greens’ can. Wish me luck!

After the Tree Haircut

Food for a Rainy Day

24 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Food

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As I prepare to build an ark for the next downpour, forecast for Tuesday, my husband suggested that instead of visiting the lumber yard I should visit the grocery store instead. Since I’m not very good with the whole ‘measure twice, cut once’ thing I decided to divert my attention to ‘building’ a great, soul warming soup. And to be truthful, I had wanted to prepare the well-known Italian Wedding Soup for some time.

I have read 2 recipes for the soup, both of which sound delicious. The Barefoot Contessa (Ian Garten) has a recipe in her recent Back to Basics cookbook and Pioneer Woman had a similar version posted this past week on her website. I’m certain the internet has lots more versions of this soup. It’s a little more involved than some soup recipes because, as the name implies, weddings are important events and so there should be no ‘time expense’ too great to prepare for them (weddings and food served). The soup has bite- sized meatballs that you must prepare in advance. Believe me, its worth every step the recipe asks for.

I hope you are staying dry/warm this winter.

Rainy Day Activities

22 Friday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Food

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As Southern California is enjoying our wettest month in years, I begin to look for ways to wrap up loose ends and possibly simplify my life. This is usually a result of “cabin fever”. The rain has restricted my outdoor activities and has fostered this urge to organize and tidy up loose ends. This goal of simplifying and weeding out are always on my ‘to do’ list and the funny thing (maybe not that funny) is that no matter how much I eliminate and de-clutter there seems to always be more and more stuff!

That said, I had visited the website Taste Book http://www.tastebook.com/ , a brilliant site affiliated with Epicurious http://www.epicurious.com/ (an equally brilliant site) some months ago. I diligently uploaded recipes that I had either cut from magazines, gotten from friends, or printed off some of my favorite food websites online. I selected a cover from an incredible array of beautiful choices and ordered the first 50 pages. This left me with a credit of 50 pages more that could be ordered any time and added to my customized Taste Book. If all this sounds confusing let me explain. This website allows you to create a very professionally published-looking cookbook with all of your favorite recipes.

The pages are high quality card stock that can be wiped clean when necessary. There are tabs included for each of the categories i.e. appetizer, salads, soups, meat, chicken, dessert, etc. The cards are sent with the cover (a 3-ring binder) and voila, you have a cookbook that can be titled anything you want—Mom’s Favorite Recipes, Holiday Entertaining, Cookies, etc. WARNING: This site is seriously addicting! Especially if you are looking for something to entertain you when inclement weather has taken the region.

Anyway, back to my ‘clean up, simplify’ story…Taste Book is my weekend, Saturday, rainy-day morning project. Try it, I think you’ll have fun. Don’t worry, it’s not too complicated and the folks at Taste Book are very user friendly with their video tutorial and additional FAQ section. Stay dry!

Trimming Roses

16 Saturday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Gardening, Maintenance

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Winter in Southern California can be a bit warm at times. Like today, it was sunny and 70 degrees most of the day. I decided to take full advantage of the day by doing some much needed clean-up in the front yard. I have several Iceberg roses in the front yard and while I realize that to some, Iceberg’s are more a flowering shrub than a real rose, I find the abundant blooming pattern and ease of care to be an ideal rose for my busy life. I mean, after all, I work full time and try to keep domestic bliss by doing all of the cooking and most of the cleaning. Anyway, back to the front yard. I like to prune the roses by cutting each branch to within about 2 feet from the base. It’s nice to remove some of the branches that are small and spindly. I also make sure that when I cut the branch I leave a little eye (the small piece that peeks out of the base of a leaf). The eye needs to face outward, not inward for the next growth to grow gracefully. I like to remove all leaves on the bush—this often takes care of problems later down the line, like rust and mildew. I spread a layer of compost around the base of the roses and spray with Volk oil, which is supposed to keep insects at bay.

I also trimmed my Lace Cascade (a climbing rose related to Iceberg roses). I have the climbing rose trained to go over the wooden beam that frames the entrance walkway to our home. I remove all of the leaves and trim all of the dead wood. I cut back the small branches that grow off of the main stalks, to within 3 inches.

There is a pepper tree in the front yard that my husband and I will be pruning within the next few weeks. All in all cleaning up the garden in Winter, if you aren’t living in snow, always feels good. I think the garden reflects ‘winter’ in spirit if not with a fresh sprinkling of snow, by its starkness. I guess I have to look for winter where ever I can.

New Year’s Eve Celebrations

07 Thursday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Food

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Wemberly, Texas

New Years Eve used to be one of those holidays that I felt obliged to participate in. I never really thought staying up until midnight lived up to what I felt it should. Then about 6 years ago my husband and I were invited to join 3 other couples, who happen to be very good friends here in our neighborhood (our kids all went to grade school through high school together), in a ‘progressive dinner’. For those of you who have never heard the term—each couple are assigned a course of the meal and then, beginning with the appetizer course, we move from house to house as the meal progresses.

This happens to be a really compatible group with similar interests in wine and food.

This year I was assigned the appetizer. I prepared Roasted Shrimp Cocktail using Ina Garten’s (Barefoot Contessa) Back to Basics cookbook. This is easy and delicious. I also prepared Cheddar Puffs from Pioneer Woman Cook’s site.

http://the pioneer worman.com/cooking

The nice thing about the Cheddar Puffs is that you can make them well in advance and freeze them and then just place the number you plan on eating on a cookie sheet and bake.

The picture attached to his post doesn’t really have anything to do with New Year’s Eve but because of our visit to Austin at Christmas (with a side trip to Wemberly, Texas in the hill country) I thought I would post it—we were shopping in this quaint little town before our visit to the Salt Lick, a famous BBQ restaurant, in Driftwood, Texas

Commitments to Garden, Home and Party

03 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by Karen B. in Entertaining, Food, Gardening, Misc

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New Year

I’ve been absent from my website for some time—no excuse really except that I felt I was so busy with work, holiday planning and life I had little left to give to my site.

My husband, youngest son and I visited our oldest son and his wife in their new hometown of Austin, Texas for Christmas. If you’ve never been there I highly recommend it. For a novice foodie it’s like a visit to Disneyland for a child, or the child in all of us. There are so many unique and original places to eat, not to mention the unbelievable Central Market and Whole Foods.

Our son and daughter-in-law had mapped out an incredible list of restaurants, cafes and quick serve places for us to try, which included Torchy’s Tacos http://torchystacos.com/menu.htm Olivia’s and South Congress Cafe. I can’t begin to tell you which was my favorite since I loved them all.

I came home committed to making more of an effort to share my experiences with all aspects of GH&P with my site—I’d say “with all of you” but I’m convinced there are so many sites to visit and so little time that probably no one, other than my mom, reads my postings. Thank you mom!

So heres to New Year ‘commitments’ and the belief that it’s fun to share all things related to good food, a warm and cozy home and a relaxing garden.

Happy 2010, may it bring good things to all of us.