The Angels and Nature Spirits are continually trying to help us take ourselves less seriously. Often they lighten us up by playing practical jokes on us or by having our preconceived expectations about things go awry. This is never more true than in their choice of vegetable varieties and in their arrangement of different plants in the garden. I went into my partnership with the Angels with all kinds of English garden book learning, including rules about color schemes. The Angels threw out all the rules and showed me a different, more joyful way. Here are some photos that begin to suggest the wild exuberant play with colors that is one of the Angels' and Nature Spirits' calling cards.
This shot begins to suggest the circus of colors
which is high summer in the Flower gardens.
Here is a shot of one section of the original
Eight Garden with its magical mix of colors.
Zinnias with their brilliant colors are often
a mainstay of the main vegetable garden.
This is a typical Angelic joke as far as placement goes: Two unrelated flowers, Heliotrope and Sedum have a moment when they look like color blind, kissing cousins.
Cody, out for an evening tour of the gardens.
This is another perennial bed where exuberant colors rule the day. Cody joins in by coming round the corner flashing his beautiful golden red coat.
Pushing the colors.
This is an example of a combination that looks almost garish in a photo but works in person. The vegetable garden is another place of surprise color combinations and color jokes.
Produce humor
Some seasons we have pink, purple, yellow, orange and green tomatoes with red tomatoes a distinct minority.
Small jewels of color.
The clambering of many cherry tomato vines over growing pumpkins in last year's main vegetable garden make for a beautiful moment.
Mixed greens
The Angels and Nature Spirits make an exuberant celebration even when they only have the color green to play with.
The farm's first logo.
Here the cabbage reveals a bit of its infinite mystery and beauty.
Another cabbage friend
This cabbage beauty reveals in its configuration that the leap to our new rose logo wasn't such a leap after all.