Three Luscious Reasons to Have a Garden
– A Glass of Mint Iced Tea,
A Pitcher of Lilies of the Valley
& a Fresh Tomato

By Gretchen Gross

Two weeks ago a friend of mine confessed, almost in a whisper, that she had been very close to plugging her blow dryer into an extension cord and heating the soil in her window boxes to a temperature that she imagined would support, though perhaps only for a moment, a tiny plant with fuschia flowers. This was not a sign of emotional instability. It was merely a measure of my friend’s desperation to see living things pop up around her.

Vermonters do anything and everything to welcome Spring. Maybe we are trying to convince the reluctant season that it’s safe to return to the Green Mountains. We spend hours at flower shows, take slow strolls through greenhouses, and curl up on Sunday afternoons with a stack of seed catalogues to prove our sincerity. Really, Mother Nature, we’re ready. Come on up North! We’re beggin’ ya!

So we let our imaginations go, planning and picturing the gardens that are yet to be planted, the fire pits to be built someday, the stone paths about to be laid.

If you’re finding yourself pacing around the outside of the house picturing this and that, Rebecca Lindenmeyer recommends bravery. The Vermont certified horticulturist, landscape designer, and co-principal of Linden Landscaping and Design of West Addison endorses the courage to rip out old plantings and the vision to start over.

“Many of the houses built in this area have aging evergreens that were planted before the 1970s and now they swallow houses whole,” Lindenmeyer declares. “Houses ringed with yews and junipers can look stale and dated, and feel like someone else’s home. We have so many more options today.” She adds that updating the look of these spaces surrounding the house can increase resale value, reduce heating and cooling costs, and “make your space a place you love coming home to.”

Imagine gardens and walkways as invitations to your home, welcoming friends and guests and giving a peek into your heart. Are you drawn to tall, rangy grasses or scented cabbage roses? Quiet sitting spaces, fire pits, and ponds create intimate nooks for talks with your friends, or hours with a good book, or a vacation in the back yard as relaxing as being hours away.

Mary Cliver, Landscape Designer LLC, of Brandon, knowing that we’re chomping at the bit to get started suggests making a list, like you would for groceries, of plants that will fit your garden’s light and culture. As if to whet our palate, she describes a plant that will work well in many northern gardens called Heucheras. “Names like Citronelle, Beaujolais, Pewter Veil and Tiramisu make certain they’ll attract our interest. Beside their beautiful foliage, the flowers attract hummingbirds and butterflies. They’ve come a long way from the Coral Bells that graced your grandmother’s walk, but are just as reliable and delightful” Cliver explains.

Michele Racine, owner of The Garden Goddess in North Ferrisburgh, is sure that we will be more likely than ever to decorate our homes with colorful plants when we can’t quite afford to escape to the Cape dunes full of fuschia roses.

And if you love wild rangy dune roses, then why not try them? Kate Kennedy Butler of Labour of Love Landscaping in Glover urges gardeners, “Don’t be afraid to try things out. Knowing your planting zone is one thing, but I live in zone 3A and grow, in unprotected areas, many, many plants ‘rated’ for zone[s] 4 and 5.”

Nursery and garden owners to a person will happily share their knowledge and successes with those of us less adroit. This is a generous and kind bunch of humans. Ask and they will help.

Creativity will take center stage this summer, Garden Goddess Racine proposes. She urges people to bring new life to old containers by creating container gardens. “Use colanders, old metal bed pans, teapots – things that may bring humor or surprise. You might need to add a few holes to the bottom, but surprises and blossoms get along great.” When building a container garden, Racine goes by the rule of three: Have a thriller (the big, bold, center-stage drama queen of a plant), a filler (the shorter plants that add the color balance to the thriller), and the spiller (the plant that overflows the edges of the container and brings the word “lush” to your neighbor’s envious lips.

Beauty can be functional, too. “One of our biggest Mother’s Day sellers is a spa basket, planted with pansies, mint, and lavender,” Racine notes. And who would refuse one of her bruschetta baskets, planted with hanging tomatoes, garlic, and a couple types of basil? With one pair of snippers, you can pick fresh ingredients to serve up and take out under the tree in the back yard, snacking while you read a great book.

Sarah Holland, owner of River’s Bend Garden Design in Moretown, reminds us that simple pleasures such as fresh herbs and cutting flowers can save us money while feeling luxurious. Planting blueberry bushes and apple trees will provide beauty and delicious fruit for years. I remember clearly my mother and aunt gathering plums from the single plum tree that grew in our back yard. Together they would make plum jam and raucously laugh during the several hot summer days of this annual adventure. My dearest friend Grace, a Vermonter by birth and at death, made fresh strawberry jam each summer. We waited for it, circling her and her jam jars with lust in our hearts, licking our lips in anticipation.

Cheryl Werner, teacher of Sustainable Landscapes, Food Production and Turf Management at the Hannaford Center, and co-owner of Werner’s Christmas Tree Farm in Middlebury encourages novice and veteran gardeners to grow without pesticides or commercial fertilizers. “I grew up in a family that gardened, and there is an inherited knowledge that has been lost.” These gardening secrets may not be gone forever however. Finding a gardening elder to mentor you may be the key to the successes of the past, where families grew good food in homescale gardens. “The economy is driving us to return to the garden. And we’ll be seeing a different use of space. For folks with limited garden size who want it all, you might see vegetable plants scattered among the flowerbeds. It not only adds optical interest and a true garden surprise, it allows people to grow both types of plants in a single space. Veggies as functional yielding ornamentals is definitely the new trend.”

With Michelle Obama planning a kitchen garden on the south lawn of the White House, many of us will plant veggies to save money. In the end, though, we’ll really be reconnecting with our grandmothers who, wiping their hands on their aprons, stepped out the back door on humid summer days to snip chives and parsley and gather tomatoes –  serving them with plates of cukes and slices of cheese – or clip fresh mint for the iced tea or blossoms for the small vase on the dining room table.

Revisiting some of the peacefulness that our grandmothers found – or at least what looks like peacefulness to those of us whose lives have spun out of control – is good for the soul. So if you find yourself planting and landscaping, take some risks. Try something new. Make some beauty. Have some fun.

We deserve small havens of calm and fun in these wild economic times.

Gretchen Gross lives in So. Burlington.