You are here: Home / Search for "Latest updated CDCP Test Topics Pdf Spend Your Little Time and Energy to Clear CDCP exam 🌗 Open 【 www.pdfvce.com 】 enter ➤ CDCP ⮘ and obtain a free download 🔊Test CDCP Assessment"

Search Results for: Latest updated CDCP Test Topics Pdf Spend Your Little Time and Energy to Clear CDCP exam 🌗 Open 【 www.pdfvce.com 】 enter ➤ CDCP ⮘ and obtain a free download 🔊Test CDCP Assessment

Thanksgiving Day

 

I got an email today from a reader who lives in Williamsburg about their special way of decorating for and celebrating the holiday season.  She had no idea that pictures I saw 10 years ago of the wreaths, swags, garlands, and lighting at Williamsburg transformed my ideas about how to decorate for the holidays.  I do so love the Williamsburg holiday style; I find it a great source of inspiration. To follow is her letter.

 I happened upon your blog this morning while researching a bit for my holiday decorating.  I found your submission about Magnolias, and I agree they are beautiful and are a part of our holiday decorating every year.  I wanted you to know about the town where I live, because maybe one day I think you would truly appreciate a visit at the holidays, specifically at our Grand Illumination.  I live in Williamsburg, Virginia and the first weekend in December is always a big event as the Colonial part of town (restored area and living history site) decorates in colonial fashion for the holidays.  The fife and drum corps play and folks in costume walk around story telling, interacting, selling cider and ginger cakes etc.  Here is a link.  I hope you don’t find this too off the wall, but it is rare I find others who love to decorate naturally at the holidays, and therefore it is rare that I find folks who truly appreciate Williamsburg at Christmas.  Either way, I hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful and good luck with the holidays!   Julie E.   Williamsburg, Va

 http://www.history.org/foundation/journal/christmas04/grand.cfm

http://www.history.org/Foundation/journal/Christmas05/wreaths.cfm

 http://www.history.org/Foundation/journal/Autumn09/christmas.cfm

She sent me several pictures of her home in Williamsburg, decorated for the holidays.  Has she not done a beautiful job? I especially like the grass spikes that criss cross behind her wreath.  The geometric arrangement of fruit I associate with the Williamsburg holiday-this is a beautiful interpretation of that idea. 

Happy Thanksgiving to you too, Julie.  Many thanks for taking the time and effort to write.  Many more thanks to all of you who have taken the time to write-I truly appreciate it.

Posted on: November 24, 2011 1 Comment
Filed Under: Holiday Tagged With: ,

Budded Up

   

I was in bed long before midnight New Year’s Eve.  I never worry that the new year will get held up at the checkpoint unless I am watching.  Buck and I had a quiet dinner.  I turned in early; that sleep was deep. Did anyone enlist my help or interview me about the a year coming to a close, and a new year on the horizon?  Why would they? I am just one person making my best effort to garden my way through a life.  Just one gardener in a group of many tens of thousands.  Sure enough, the year, the season turned over without a hitch.  I had coffee at 5:20 am, as usual.  Everything seemed this first day of 2012 as it did the last day of 2011.

It will take two weeks for me to reliably make the change on my check date to 2012.  I may spend some time wringing my hands over my one year older age.  And then there will be the dreaded winter.  But in spite of the cold and the grey, there are signs of life in the garden.

A bud is a protuberance.  It is a growth sent forth from a previous structure.  Many trees, shrubs, and evergreen perennials put forth budded structures in advance of winter.  In early fall, the dogwoods bud up in anticipation of spring.   It is easy to tell the leaf buds from the flower buds.  I water my dogwoods copiously in the fall in anticipation of that budding, but they respond to another voice.  My dogwoods flower heavily every other year.  The spring to come will be a on year-a dogwood extravaganza.  The buds tell me so.

The forsythia start setting their flower buds not long after they bloom.  Late summer or fall pruning means you are pruning off the flowers to come in spring.  Lilacs and rhododendrons need pruning immediately after they bloom.  The summer and fall they devote their energy to next year’s flowers. The budding-a sure sign of the miracle of nature.  These fat buds will swell in the spring, giving rise to large and showy flowering trusses.  The flower heads must be 10 times the size of the bud. 

The magnolias and pachysandra bud up early in the fall.  You can spot their spring intentions in October, should you look.  I did walk my entire garden today-New Year’s Day.  My holiday obligations are done.  I have some time to myself.  Though the temperature was barely above freezing today, I was reassured, warmed by what I saw.  My garden has made plans for the spring.

All of my yews show signs of budding.  Those brown knobs contain the structure and the energy which will open up, and push new growth in the spring. In a good year, 8 inches of growth will begin and grow from each bud.  Each plant buds differently.  The structures, colors and forms are individual.  This means there is a lot to look at, even in the winter.  The winter is a tough time for me.  It seems to last at least a lifetime.  Todays tour tells me different.  Every tree and shrub has bet on spring.  I cannot really explain this, but I take great comfort from from the buds.   

 In embryology, the term budding refers to the process by which the living past gives life to the future. So simple, this sentence.  So beautifully complex and mesmerizing, the process.

 The new year finds sustenance from the compost of the previous year. Every plant has a plan to bud.  To emerge, in the spring.  It may seem that the winter is a long, quiet, and silent season.  But there is plenty going on out there. 

The roses look a little worse for wear, but for those bright red buds.  How they manage to look so juicy and alive in spite of the winter weather is nothing short of astonishing. 

  

A tree of heaven has many undesireable attributes, but that shiny brown leaf bud directly above last year’s leaf scar is quite beautiful.

This mass of forsythia is in a quiet stage of life, but inside a whole lot of yellow is brewing.

Posted on: January 3, 2012 4 Comments
Filed Under: Holiday Tagged With:

The Music In The Background

jackie-boxes.jpg

I have devoted several posts to Branch in the past week.  Over the winter, we designed and made a catalog detailing all of the products we made.  I had the idea to introduce our made in America ornament for the garden to a broader audience.  I felt we were ready.  The past 10 years has had its successes, and most certainly setbacks and failures.  Bringing a hand made object to market takes a lot of time.  There are mistakes made every step of the way.  Solving problems creatively is not about minutes.  It is about months, and years.  As Seth Godin said, “all boats leak”.  No matter the best of intentions, it takes time and effort to hone a design and a manufacturing process such that your product stays afloat, the majority of the time.

branch-studio.jpg

We were a new company that needed time to get our house in order.  Given that we are just about at 10 years sorting out who we are, and who we hope to be, I think we are ready to introduce ourselves to other people, in other places, who love the garden.  Most of that introduction via our print catalogue is visual.  But we printed a few paragraphs about who we are, and where we come from.  Much of that commentary had to do with where we are from-the rust belt.

rouge-river-plant.jpg

Our work in steel is grounded our history and experience.  I grew up in Detroit. I rode my bike to JL Hudson’s downtown, now and again, for a chocolate soda, when I was 12. And again when I was 14, 15, and 17. The gritty city-everything about that bustling urban downtown enchanted me.  I biked it.  This means I was on the ground floor whizzing by every factory and shop for 22 miles from my home. Those experiences made a big impression.  There are many many things I cannot remember, but I do remember the city. So much to see.  So much energy. The growing I could see every place I turned-loved that.

George-and-Buck.jpg

I so admire and appreciate the sculpture produced by the automobile industry.  There was a time when Detroit made the issue of transportation an art.  I am not such a fan of horsepower and speed as Buck is.  I like the shapes.  I love that the design is beautiful, functional, and made to last.   Manufacturing is an idea that not only interests me, it is part of that music that plays in the background no matter what I am doing.   Buck grew up in Texas.  His grandfather was a carpenter.  His father was a riveter at General Dynamics in Texas, in his earlier years.  He became head of production some years later, until his retirement. If you are not familiar with General Dynamics, they were and are a huge defense contractor. They built the F-111, and the F-16 fighter jets.  His Dad supervised the building of jets.  Buck comes from a long line of makers, whose work involved steel and wood, and whose work involved great precision and exacting standards of construction.

break-form-pot.jpg

The music in one’s background-what is that?  Simply stated, every person comes with an attitude, instincts, a history, a point of view, a skill set, a mind set, an aura that that makes for a particular music that plays in the background while they work.  The fabrication of the Branch boxes, Italian style vases, pergolas, and fountains are infused with the music playing in Buck’s background.

pergola-under-construction.jpgThis pergola involved making very thick steel tubing conform to a round shape.  The accumulation of a lifetime of fabricating skills, and a love of both geometry and industry is evident in all of the work he produces.  His spheres are riveted.  His pergolas are bolted together, so they can be broken down and shipped.  They also have that industrial aura about them that recalls the history of structural steel buildings and bridges.

Shinola-runwell-watch.jpgThe moment I became aware of the Runwell watch, being manufactured in Detroit, by Shinola, I knew I had found the perfect birthday present for Buck.  Everything about their philosophy, mission, and devotion to quality I knew would really appeal to him.  But most of all, the watch is a very precisely and beautifully handcrafted instrument-made by a company in Detroit.  http://www.shinola.com/

runwell-limited-edition-watch.jpg

Precision made, by hand, in Detroit.  This is music to my ears.

Posted on: July 18, 2013 1 Comment
Filed Under: The Branch Studio Tagged With: , , ,

Faiencerie

Faiencerie Figueres & Fils is a shop in Marseilles France well known to us.  Rob has been buying their glazed ceramic creations for a good many years.  It is a but one of countless small creative businesses that exist all over the planet. It is a very small family owned business.  They work very hard, producing objects of great beauty.  We happen to love their plates and bowls of fruits and vegetables.  They create sculpture from a love and appreciation from the bounty of nature.   

Their enterprise began in the 1950’s-the brainchild and passion of the Figueres family. I will admit to a fondness for this particular vintage.  Beyond the family business, Gilberte Figueres has herself spent a lifetime creating and painting china in the tradition of the Vieux Marseilles faience. She and her husband, and their children, to whom they refer with great affection, as the rookies, have made a life from their art. The first time Rob shopped with them, they insisted on a proper introduction.  To the family, and only then, to the business.    

The fruits and the vegetables of Provence inspire their work.  I remember from so many years ago Rob explaining that each piece is cast, and bisque fired.  The glazes are clear when applied.  So how would they know the application of a glaze or group of glazes that would transform a bisque fig perfectly into a convincingly colored fig?  I have no real need to know; I love the magical quality of their work.    

There are the plates.  Usually white.  There may be peas applied to that plate, or mushrooms, or apples-some whole, some cut.   The plates can be hung on a wall.  The footed dishes are piled high with fruits, nuts, figs, pears, apples, lemons.  The day all of these sculptures arrived and got unpacked-a good day. From balls of clay they fashion the individual figs-some whole, some ripe and split open.  

I made a home for these extraordinarily beautiful sculptures-why wouldn’t I? They come from a place very unlike where I live. There is a very different life, a very different aesthetic at work.  No matter what seems strange; I have no problem letting go of that.  There is a common thread.  A local person with passion and direction -I recognize what looks like passion from a long ways away, just as easily as I recognize it next door. 

This arrangement of pears is a pretty quiet affair. Should I take or have the time to focus on it, I am taken with the spots, the lumps, the bruises, and the splits.  Anyone who gardens recognizes the blush of the summer sun, the spots characteristic of a given variety, the ripe fruit splitting,  the bruises or blemishes from bugs or hail-all those signs of life.    

The signs of life-they are many.  I could read every day about the production of fruit, and in the end, not know much more about it than what I see here. 

I have very few of these beautiful sculptures left.  I am not surprised.  They appeal to me in the same way as hand made Italian terra cotta, or handmade shutters or window boxes. Once these sculptures are gone, I will be longing to have them again.  Never anywhere else have I seen anything quite like them.  This is a wordy way of saying genuinely felt and hand made objects catch my eye.  The evidence of the human hand interests me.     


The big idea here?  Handmade counts for so much.  Your handmade-as in the Christmas jam, the holiday letters, the package wrap, the Sunday dinners, the vegetable patch, the paintings and sculptures, the landscape and garden design-I am likely to pay close attention. Handmade is the real work of a particular pair of hands.  I like whenever possible to recognize and support talented people.   Handmade-you are looking at it. Read for yourself.  www.faiencerie-figuere.com.  Let me know what you think.

Posted on: January 4, 2011 Leave a Comment
Filed Under: Garden Ornament Tagged With: ,