The Start of the Season of Advent.

Tyra wrote this post at the blog Tyra’s Garden http://waxholm.blogspot.com

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Advent Sunday

Advent Sunday is the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day.
It also marks the start of the wonderful season of Advent.

The first candle is now lit and we are entering the season of Advent. Today the family gathered to celebrate the first Sunday in Advent. Baking the wonderful Swedish saffron bread which filled the house with a most wonderful scent, the smell of fresh baked bread and saffron. I have written about it in an earlier post. I will give you the recipe in English when we are approaching the day of Saint Lucia and that is on the 13th of December. In the season of Advent we also drink ‘Glögg’ and that is a mulled wine served warm with almond and raisins, it is really nice especially when it’s cold outside. This mulled wine goes very well with the saffron bread and the traditional ginger biscuits.

Last year we were going to Kerala, India for our winter holiday so then I decorated my Advent candleholder inspired of that, a non traditional candle holder with an 'Indian elephant and spices from Kerala'.

This year we will stay at home and I have no special theme I choosed to take some moss and Ivy from the garden and a small orchid I hade at home. This is how it looks...not very traditional but I like it.

Now during Advent the house is filled with the wonderful Hyacinths, blue , white and pale pink. After they have bloomed I usually plant them in the garden and they will flower again late spring or early summer. I do love the wonderful sweet-scented Hyacinths, I know the fragrant can be very strong but no one in our family are over sensitive to the scent.

Idag har vi äntligen kommit in i Advent, som jag har längtat! Nu får vi börja njuta av decembers alla delikatesser. Jag får till och med ett par pepparkakor till morgonkaffet så att jag skall vara snäll hela dagen J. Idag har vi bakat saffranbröd och familjen har varit samlad för att dricka glögg och äta pepparkakor och annat godis, riktigt trevlig. I år har jag en ny variant på adventsljusstake igen varje år hittar jag på något nytt i år blev det med en enkel liten orchidé. Man tager vad man haver som Kajsa Varg en gång lär ha sagt.

Have a wonderful week this first week of the season of Advent!

I WONDER IF I CAN TEMPT YOU WITH AN APPLE?

Updated on the day of Thanksgiving.

DO YOU FOLLOW?

Pomona was the goddess of fruit trees, gardens, and orchards in the Roman mythology. Her name Pomona comes from the Latin word pomun – fruit.

Hello all readers of the Tyra’s Garden blog.

I have just added a new widget 'Followers' to my blog and it does look rather sad 3 followers is that all? Of course not but it is a start.

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I wonder if I can tempt you with an apple?

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Would you like to follow me into my garden? If yes, please add yourself to the 'I follow list'. I have put it right at the top so it is easy to find. I think this widget thing makes it a lot easier to find you and your blog.

Thank you for adding yourself, dear blog friend out there! / Tyra

'Is it anybody out there?'

Do you remember it? That was or is a great Pink Floyd 'song'.

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UPDATE! Thanksgiving

Thank you on this day of Thanksgiving! I whould like to say that to you all wonderful people out there in cyberspace . I have read a lot of warming and great words of thanksgiving on all your blogs and I must say these are for me the most lovely and true and they come from my dear friend Marion from Wales.

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow. ~Melody Beattie

Thank you! / Tyra

Winterland - It's snow

Tyra wrote this post at the blog Tyra’s Garden http://waxholm.blogspot.com

SNOW!

Isn't just wonderful...

Welcome into the greenhouse... and read more about the blue hour.

TYRA

Asexual reproduction and I have got a baby!

Tyra wrote this post at the blog Tyra’s Garden http://waxholm.blogspot.com. If you are not reading it at Tyra’s Garden, then this content was stolen without permission.

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Asexual reproduction

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This is the proud mother.

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Some species, as some Phalaenopsis, Dendrobium and Vanda, produce offshoots or plantlets formed from one of the nodes along the stem, through the accumulation of growth hormones at that point. These shoots are known as keiki.

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I'm so happy! I have got a Keiki, a small baby orchid, this is how it looked this summer and it bloomed until late september.

(Keiki is the Hawaiian word for baby)

Now I have just cut the 'navel string' and put it into a pot of it's own. I bought some special soil for orchids and I so hope if will grow to be a grand big Phalaenopsis.

My Keiki plant is an exact clone of the mother Phalaenopsis plant, it was flowering while still attached to the mother plant isn’t it just amazing? I think it's a small miracle.

Have a great Weekend - I love when you leave a comment/ Tyra

Pop over into the greenhouse and look at Chervena Chushka!

Mother Earth's Wild Flowers Garden - Uppland

Tyra wrote this post at the blog Tyra’s Garden http://waxholm.blogspot.com. If you are not reading it at Tyra’s Garden, then this content was stolen without permission.

Mother Earth's Garden - Uppland

I'm up at my 'summerhouse' again to make the house ready for the winter. There are a lot of things that need to be attended to, empty the water butts (?) storing all the garden furniture etc. As I was looking at some pictures last night I found these wild flower pictures taken on a walk in May this year at the Bondskärets Naturresevat. This protected area has a great flora and fauna as well as very interesting geological features. This nature reserve Bondskäret is just a few K from here and just by the sea. Meadow flowers at Bondskär Dactylorhiza sambucina. not latifolia as it says on the photo (an old name) , I don't know the english name for it, we call it Adam & Eva. Its an orchid and all the orchids in Sweden are protected species accordingly it is prohibited to pick, dig up or in other ways harm the orchids.

This is the pretty Spring Pea Lathyrus vernus - Vårärt

Meadows and Woodland at the Nature Reserve - Ängskär - Bondskär

Cowslip - Primula veris L. - Gullviva

And at last but not least a favorite the wonderful fragrant Lily-of-the-valley Convallaria majalis L. -Liljekonvalj
Om ni vill ut och göra fina promenader i Uppland rekommenderar jag verkligen att ni går in och läser på Upplandsstiftelsen sida. Den är fantastiskt bra. Massor av fina utflyktstips, promenader, läs om naturvård och lite... nej en massa annan interessant läsning.

Have a great day - Ha en bra dag / TYRA

The sun came out for a second....

Today, I'm still sad, angry and disapointed and its all that SCOUNDRAL fault that I wrote about yesterday.

But then the 'sun came out' to brighten my grey and miserable November day, a friend came along an told me that there was an article in one of the largest papers in Sweden (DN) about garden bloggers. We have great many garden bloggers here and two of my blogs where mentioned as a blogg well worth a visit, thank you! :-)

Dahlia in the potager, the most positive flower I could find, I love you dear Dahlia.

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Blogs that was mentioned in a most positive way was:

Fundera grönt

Hannu på kinnekulle

Lilla B Mias trädgårds blog

Slottsträdgårdsmästaren

Lindas trädgårdsblogg

Rubens rabatter

and two of my blogs Tyras Garden and my Swedish blog Västhus & Potager

Artikel i DN bostad om trädgårdsbloggare, artikeln kan ni läsa HÄR

Have a great weekend!

TYRA

R.E.S.P.E.C.T Don't even think about it....

HELP! WHAT IS THIS!!! SOMEONE IS STEALING OUR WORK!

LOOK AT THIS!

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http://www.silite.com/

Some one is stealing our work...again.

Look into what they are doing on this site!

What can we do? Have your work been copied!

They steal our pictures and words and doesn't even link!

My pulse is VERY high and I can feel the adrenaline pumping....

I ask you PNT silite.com if you read this - Take away all my pictures and words!

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R.E.S.P.E.C.T

Aretha Franklin

What you want (hooo)

baby I got it

What you need (hooo)

you know I got it(Hooo)

all I'm asking (hooo)

is for a little respect

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( Just a little bit) when you come home(Just a little bit) hey baby ( Just little bit)When you come home ( Just a Little Bit) Mister
I ain't gonna do you wrong while you're goneI ain't gonna do you wrong 'cause I don't wannaAll I'm asking is for a little respect when you come home(Just a Little Bit) Baby ( Just a little bit )When you come home ( Just a little Bit) Yeah
I'm about to give you all my moneyAnd all I'm asking in return honeyIs to give me my propers when you get home(Justa Justa Justa) Yeah baby when you get home
( Just a little Bit ) Yeah ( Just a little bit )
Hooo your kisses sweeter than honey and guess what so is my moneyAll I want you to do for me is give it to me whn you get home( Re re re re spect) Yeah baby whip it to me( Just a little bit) when you get home now ( Just a little bit)

R-E-S-P-E-C-T find out what it means to meR-E-S-P-E-C-T, Take care, TCB ohhhh (Sock it to me,etc.)
A little respect oh yeah ( Just a little bit)A little respect ( Just a little Bit)

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TYRA

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Calluna vulgaris & Norrpada Achipelago

Calluna vulgaris & the beautiful Archipelago of Norrpada

Missy M on the rocks

Heather Calluna vulgaris

Heather is very common out on our beautiful islands in the Stockholm archipelago. Here I want to show a couple of pictures from an island in Norrpada Archipelago that I really like. Sometimes I visualize that Mother Nature has made all this by herself, well perhaps not entirely by herself possibly with some help from a friend, such a fabulous garden.

For medical use Calluna vulgaris is slightly diuretic, take 2 teaspoons per cup as an infusion to drink between meals 2-3 times a day.

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Ljung Calluna vulgaris

Ljung är vanligt förekommande ute på våra vackra öar I Stockholm skärgård. Här vill jag visa ett par bilder utifrån några öar som jag verkligen gillar. Tänk vad naturen har gjort alldeles själv gjort en sagolik trädgård.

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The garden of Mother Earth - astonishing isn't it?

Hans Bertil Juneby skriver i sin fantastiska bok Fytomedicin att de växtdelarna på denna växt Calluna vulgaris man använder är ört med blommor, herba cum floribus. Medicinsk användning: Ljung används som urindrivande medel och som ett lätt bakteriehämmande medel vid urinvägssjukdomar, kan även vara gynnsam vid mag-tarmkatarr och diarré.

A poem from a Nobel Prize winner

Heather by E.A. Karlfeldt.

Erik Axel Karlfeldt (July 20, 1864 — April 8, 1931) was a Swedish poet whose highly symbolist poetry masquerading as regionalism was popular and won him the Nobel Prize in Literature posthumously in 1931; he had refused it in 1918.

Ljung

Ljung du fagra på hedar magra,

min bästa blomma i barndomsår!

Än får jag bida

i drömmar frida

hos dig en soldag då sunnan går.

Här badar hyddor

i doft av kryddor

från gröna enar och timjan röd,

och vinden bjuder

en dryck som sjuder

av slättens hälsa och sommarns glöd.

Hit skall hon följa

- när vindar bölja

en soldag - hon som jag fjärran fann.

Här skall jag fråga,

om med min låga

mitt sköna hedland hon älska kan.

Och in i kransen

hon bär i dansen

en kväll vars lycka jag anar blott

skall ljung jag fläta,

att ej förgäta

hon må min börd och min barndomslott.

Karlfeldt, Erik Axel (1864-1931), poet, writer, Sweden


TYRA

A GARDENERS WRAP

A Gardeners Gift Wrap

To wrap a present is so fun, I really do enjoy it and this time I wanted to do something different, I went for a stroll in the garden and ended up with this. I just adores the seed capsules of the Papaver, I think they are most fascinating, each one is a small work of art. They are so beautiful therefore I started out with the Papaver then...

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POP ART

...added a fig (picked from the fridge), some lovely green Ivy, two Cynara cardunculus and then the beautiful blueish green fragant sage. I was rather satisfied with the result if I may say, you could certainly see that it was from the a gardener :-)

Att slå in paket är ju så jätteroligt tycker jag, här gick jag en runda i trädgården och plockade lite grejer, frökapslar ifrån vallmo, härligt grön murgröna, doftande salvia också ett par kardonknoppar och till sist ett fikon ifrån kylskåpet...sedan var det bara att fästa ihop dem och vips, färdigt. Ett paket som det syns lång väg att det kommer från en trädgårds toka.

Happy birthday to Lena my dear sister in law!

Have a great week all of you!

What is up in the greenhouse?

TYRA

Full of vitamin C and so delicious!

Go out and find these golden red gems - the Rose hips! Full with vitamin C and so delicious!

I pick both the wild roses hips Rosa dumalis ( Rosa Canina L.) and...


...the hips from Rosa rugosa.

They are easy to pick it takes just a few minutes but it takes fairly long time to clean them and it is pretty boring but it is worth it.


A small and pretty frosen November Rose.

MY WILD ROSEHIPS MARMALADE

1.5 litres wild rose hips
3 big red apples
5 dl liquid
1 kg (2,2 lb) sugar with pectin

Take 1.5 litres of thoroughly cleaned but unseeded wild rose hips, 3 chopped red unpeeled apples and 5 dl juice apple/orange/grapefruit or just water. Pour everything into a big saucepan, bring to boil and then simmer for 45 min. puree them using a sieve or other straining device to remove the seeds ,then add 1 kg of sugar (with pectin). Boil for additional 10 minutes. Pour the marmalade into clean jars.


1 litre = 1,75 U.K pints = 2,11 U.S pints

ROSE HIP BREAD WITH RAISINS, NUTS AND SEEDS

Juice of an orange plus water to make 1 cup
1/2 cup chopped raisins
3/4 cup wild rose hips, seeded and chopped
2 tablespoons melted butter
1 beaten egg
1-1/2 cups of flour
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup nuts or sunflower seeds

1 cup = 240 ml

Mix the orange juice, raisins, rose hips, butter, and egg in a large bowl. Sift together and then add the dry ingredients. Mix until well blended and then gently stir in nuts or sunflower seeds.
Spoon batter into a well greased loaf pan and bake at 175 degrees C. (350F) for one hour.

UPDATE!

I made a new batch of Rose Hip Marmalade today and tried out something new. After I put the mash through the straining device I poured 2 pints of water over the remains of the hips and apples, stirred around and then strained it again. What I got now was an unsweetened Rose Hips and Apple juice. Added some lime and water, now I got myself a most lovely and guaranteed healthy drink.
Cheers and to all of you in US have a great Voting Day!
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Do you have a Rose hips recipe you would like to share? please do, send it or link to me. /TYRA

More rose hip pictures in the Greenhouse

Emma Karp Lundström - An Apple Artist

Apple painting from 2006 – ‘Äppel, päppel, pirum parum’. (nursery rhyme)

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Garden Designer, coach and apple artist Emma Karp Lundström

Artist, project managers, stress consultant and garden creator - After many years, Emma Karp Lundström moved back to Gislöv. Based on the family farm she now wants to strengthen the image of Österlen as one of Sweden's most beautiful ‘gardens’. For several years she makes the annual Apple Painting in Kivik, and last year she initiated the project, Österlen lights, which got the district to bubble with energy and the sparkle in late autumn.

WORLD'S LARGEST APPLE PICTURE/PAINTING 104 sq.meters

With 70 000 nails, 30 000 apples, 10-12 apple varieties Emma and her team of 8 workers/assemblers creats a stunning over 100 sq.m. big apple painting which has a lifetime of 4 weeks.

For five days each autumn Emma Karp Lundström along with a team of apple workers creates the annual apple painting in Kivik. Early Monday morning, the workers, warmly dressed, with thermoses and really heavy working gloves arrives. In sun, hard wind, rainfall, or cold weather, the workers chooses, loads, composes with apples and assembles or 'paint' the world's largest apple painting. On the Friday afternoon is ready. One painting -30 000 apples! Ready for the grand opening of the annual famous Kiviks Market that commence on the Saturday morning.

It was in the spring as Emma saw the amazing painting, many hundreds of years old, plentiful and so full of life. She was inspired, thinking and thinking again how to make it possible as an apple construction. Here you can see the result, in the port of Kivik.

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An Apple installation at the Hallwyl House

Hallwyl House at No 4 Hamngatan was built between 1893 - 98 to designs by Isak Gustaf Clason (1856-1930), Sweden´s most renowned architect at the time.

The 'apple painting' in Stockholm

The painting remained until the end of October. Here it is ready, the apple painting on Hallwylska palace, so hurry there that you could not see it in Kivik.

All picture are Emmas.

Thank you for letting me borrow them and show the world what a brilliant woman you are.

More Apples at Blomingwriter with the wonderful post by Jodi DeLong

How'd you like them apples ?

TYRA