Opa's Garden

Summer sunflowers once again.

Spring 2021. I thought that by now we might have rebuilt the garden, but the universe had some other plans this past year. From Opa’s original garden, there are three beds that are in decent enough shape to be used again. We spent an afternoon recently weeding them and prepping to plant a smaller summer garden soon. Three and a half (long) years later, #opasgardengrowsagain ♥️🌱

Fall 2020

Early spring 2020

Savoring fall figs from our mission fig tree that survived the fire and watching the new house take shape. 

A midsummer tomato haul from my parents’ garden. 

Opa’s Garden super bloom! Golden poppies (Eschscholtzia californica), the state flower of California, are blooming intensely across the state this spring after all the winter rains we had. Such a beautiful sight to see them take over the space where Opa’s Garden was too! 
For those who are curious, we will not be including the garden as part of our rebuilding yet. Our main focus at this time is to rebuild the house. There are still other obstacles to growing a garden again which we will tackle down the line (i.e. no water lines, garden bed frames need to be rebuilt, and we don’t have fences built so the garden would be very vulnerable to wildlife in the area). 
In the meantime, we are enjoying the volunteer plants and flowers that are bringing beauty to this space again.

On April 9th, exactly 1.5 years after the fires, we broke ground on the property. 

A late photo update of the property taken in March. 

This is what resiliency looks like and what hope feels like. Head up, heart strong. 

Such a gift to be able to harvest tomatoes and pick sunflowers from our property still this summer. 

So happy to see these sunflowers. 

A ripening pumpkin from another volunteer plant. 

Volunteer sunflowers that are twice as tall as I am in Opa's garden beds.

Backyard summer treats!

First ripe raspberries at my parents' house.

Wild turkeys making themselves at home.