You may have met Elaine, our Vintage Gardener,
at our studio in the Distillery District, or you may have read about
her
in a favourite magazine, or even seen her on television…
What you may not know is that she has spent (what seems) a lifetime in
the garden, first, growing up on a dirt road
outside of Streetsville
within a gardening family.
Ask her to tell stories of running through a field of peonies at
the tender age of six, or shelling peas with her great
aunts, or
get her to show you the trophy her grandfather won at the New Toronto
Garden Show in 1929, or her parents’ garden columns in the Brampton
Times. And then get her on to stories of grandma, stringing
Daisies and Queen Anne’s Lace, drying, pressing, stamping
or eating flowers!
Elaine is a fifth generation Canadian Gardener, and at the studio,
you may even have met her daughter Anna –
that
makes six!
Elaine and Anna have spent twenty years gardening on their 27 acres in
the Hockley Valley, gleaning much
knowledge and many more stories
to share!
And share they are willing, they love to talk to gardeners, so please
email your questions -- all will be answered
and perhaps yours will
be posted!
Elaine and Anna also make guest appearances, so if you are looking
for a guest speaker, they are both informative and entertaining.
It’s Time to Dry Hydrangea !
And we will buy your hydrangea for $1 per stem!
Here are Elaine’s tips on drying hydrangea: The Annabelle Hydrangea (photographed above) is blooming a little ahead of season this year! Annabelles are one of the easiest garden flowers to dry, and make handsome arrangements and wreaths.
For best results you need to leave the blossoms on the shrub until they turn from white in colour to light green. If they are still white (even partially), they do not dry – in the drying process it will look like they melted! – like a bad Kleenex flower at a rainy wedding!
So resist picking them too soon. Likewise you can pick them too late. Yikes! If the blossom is already drying while on the shrub, there is a possibility that the centre of the bloom will turn brown. Really, success is all in the timing – of the harvest.
