October 15

I felt somewhere between a witch, chef, and gardener today while working in my mom's garden. A sprinkle of coffee grounds with a dash of smoked paprika powder along the border of a newly amended and seeded bed of lettuce greens, should do the trick. From what I've read cats do not like strong smells such as these. It's another game gardening in the city versus in the country. The rules are different and so are the challenges, such as stray cats pooping and peeing in your garden (yuck!)!

Luckily for us, the problem is not so severe, in fact, no poop found yesterday morning on the burlap sack I used to cover the newly sewn lettuce seeds to keep them moist for germination, reported Mom. Though, it may have been just a lucky morning, so since I don't want to take chances, I played with the magic of coffee grounds and smoked paprika today. We'll see what unfolds.

Getting my Garden on with these clogs! Jorris would appreciate.

Playing with magic of chili and coffee to deter cats from garden. 

Strong scents like coffee grounds and smoked paprika are said to deter cats. 

I’ve been home from France for a month and a half now, since September. It’s been a lot of yoga, reading, resting, creating new projects (a blog post to come!), reconnecting with friends and family. It’s also been about reconnecting to old spaces, like mom’s garden, my first solo garden project I began many moons ago. Much has changed in her garden over the years. I’ve been traveling and my mom isn’t a gardener. My Grandma Lee, her mom, is the gardner. She grew all sorts of things with strange methods I would just crinkle my nose at when I saw her as I played outside, but she could grow anything. Perhaps that’s where my passion for gardening comes from. 

The Succulent Egg project I made for mom in Spring of 2015. 

Some of them now, Fall of 2016! Mom has done a great job watering!

But, Mom actually surprised me this time with her gardening commitment. Before I left for France last Spring, I had instructed her to water this basket of succulents, without much hope since she’s failed in the past to keep plants alive, in fact these succulents were part of that failure. They were cuttings from the succulents that lined my sidewalk when I lived in Silverlake and which I had propagated in egg shells, sharing them with my school, students, encouraging people to plant them and watch them grow. Before I had left for France the first time in the Summer of 2015, I had asked her to water them. Upon my return that Winter, they were sad, all alone, out in the back yard, as dry as the Sahara Desert but still alive and waiting for love. So, I tried to save some and transplanted them in this empty planter basket which I had planted herbs in for a lesson during my Master Gardener class the year prior. This time, returning to Mom’s garden, I see the basket brimming with beautiful and happy succulents, sitting like a trophy on the fountain!! She’s been modest about her success, since she never spoke about how well they were doing while I was in France. I suppose taking care of the succulent basket was like taking care of me, even though I was far away. It's fantastic to have a relic of my time living in Silverlake and to know that some of my gardening skills are rubbing off on my mom.

Gardening piece by piece, first repotting, Mom's favorite Gardenia. 

Repotting is so simple and really changes the atmosphere, here Lavender. 

Amending pieces of the garden, here had to scoop out poop first. 

Then, mix in organic compost but no tilling, just add on top of existent soil.

Water, cover, leave a few days and then sew lettuce seeds!

Cover again with burlap or other cover material to keep seeds protected. 

With the temperatures cooling off, since it has been torrid upon my return to LA, I’ve been more motivated to get back into the garden, and frankly, couldn't wait any longer. I’ve been itching to get back into the soil, and I was about to get back in, weather permitting or not. I’m starting piece by piece. Amending soil here and there. Repotting old pots with Gardenia and Lavender, two of Mom’s favorites. Sewing lettuce seeds. Scooping up poop. I have to admit that I can't put all the blame on the wild cats of Azusa for the poopy mess, our precious Malti-Poo (cross between a Maltese and Poodle), Jet, is also to blame. I've seen him in the past jump up into the beds and do his business in the green sorrel, though it's really not his fault either because Mom and I never laid the rules on him and since he was a puppy, he was trained to do his business on green and since the backyard is cemented floor, the garden is the closest thing to what Jet is familiar with. But, I've told him now not to poop there and have been keeping an eye on him. So far, he's been a pretty good listener.

The flower & herb garden of the farm house in Villetale Haute, France. 

You're all probably wondering why and how I could ever leave the beautiful French Alps and this picture above, but sometimes, a girl's just got to seek comfort in the familiar again, to find new perspective in an old place. It was a very successful season in Villetale Haute, and I promise I won't forget to share some photos in a later post. It was just time to say a bientôt to the place, though not adieu. There was mostly just harvesting in the vegetable garden and on the bee-side of business some markets and transhumances left. But I figured Jorris and Philippe could hold down the fort without me, and they are doing just fine. I suppose I'm slowly giving in to the fact that California will always be home and I will always miss it, wherever I go, no matter how old I get, so maybe I should just make it my physical home, too, deepen the roots I already have here. I've had the privilege of traveling afar and living abroad since my college days, and even before as a kid during family vacations. Each time I come home, I realize how much I miss it. And it's not just my family, though, they are the main reason; but it's also just the way the landscape feels, the vastness, the independent freedom, the Pacific Ocean, the Sierra Madre and San Gabriel Mountains, the forests of central and northern California.

Of course, I also have another home, and that's where Jorris is. His mind is as vast and open as the California landscape, and he is willing to seek a new life here with me, for us. While we can plan our future, we can never anticipate everything that will come. Of course we should plan, hope, dream, though I’ve learned that not everything in life will go as planned. We can’t always rely on our hopes and dreams to come true. In fact, in doing so, we limit ourselves, closing the door to the possible magnificence our human minds could never have dreamed or imagined and only something greater, like the Universe, can create. Why not trust that this Universe could have something even greater than what we could ever have imagined, hoped for, or dreamed of? One thing, however, I’ve learned I can always trust is my gut. Our guts know the truth, but it’s whether or not we choose to listen. The mental, physical, and spiritual aspects of our bodies are inter-dependent, inter-twined, and together work in ways to communicate messages to us. Learning how to hear, decipher, and understand these messages can be a life long journey. It's complicated. It can get a little woo woo, as my beloved yoga teacher Alma says. But we can start by following our guts, our heart. 

The herb bed has seen better days.

I will plant wild flowers here! But first, poop scooping, amending & weeding.

Quick! Duck before the neighbor sees! Lining the wall with coffee & pepper.

For instance, I trusted my gut to save the coffee grounds left over from my, may I say, amazing pour-over coffees I make every morning. My Dad will attest to their amazingness, and I’d bet both my gardening thumbs on that! Even without a composting system, yet, it felt wrong to throw out all this great nitrogen. So I saved them, just in case. And then during the week, I made a uniquely delicious mac ’n cheese for my dad and I, which called for smoked paprika. I hesitated to buy the whole glass bottle of organic smoked paprika for just the teaspoon that I needed, but my gut said go for it. It’s good to experiment with new spices. A few days later, Mom informs me of the cat visitor, so I find myself researching ways to keep cats out of the garden and what do you know? You can sprinkle coffee grounds and chili powder along your garden’s edges to keep them out. And I had both those ingredients! Did I know they would go together like that? Never would I have imagined. 

I suppose you may be calling me a fancy/crazy gardener, and I am, so go ahead call me fancy, call me crazy. I am that gardener who sprinkles organic coffee grounds and organic smoked paprika powder along her garden borders and above the walls, ducking a little so the neighbors won’t see. And while I’m at it, I’ll sprinkle some coffee grounds into the soil itself to add some nitrogen; and since I’m also a chef, I can’t help but shake a few dashes of organic paprika powder into the soil too. A little chili powder in the soil doesn't hurt, right? At least that’s what my gut told me. 



*photos by Tiffanie Ma