My love for flowers started in my mid 20s when I was living in Seattle, WA.
For 8 years I lived with a lovely lady who had one of the most beautiful front yard gardens in Wallingford. I used to go outside the house and be enchanted with the variety of colors and shapes of the flowers. Living in a condo through my entire life, I never heard or seen a bi-color rose until then though.
I can still smell the perfume that each released—even 6 years later. Their shapes were always unique and intriguing. I would wonder how a flower that comes from the same branch be so different from the others? So much variety. I never grew tired of admiring her yard, or of discovering new things or different blossoms.
Since a garden is a living thing, it evolves every single minute. For better or for worse. Therefore every day was an adventure for me. Sometimes my friend would invite me to help with the yard work, which I always gladly accepted. Always enjoyed being outdoors. Feeling the breeze, drinking a glass of iced lemonade, and working in something of my interest was always pleasant. At the end of the day, it was always a great workout as well. I always thought gardening was a better activity than staying being inside a gym. I could work out longer, be happier, be more productive, and tan—all at the same time.
A mere 15 minutes’ walk from there was the Woodland Park Rose! My goodness! To this day I cannot forget about those beautiful, manicured, professionally done rose beds. Every single bed had roses trimmed at the same height. The yard design was impeccable. It was and incredible Tsunami of colors that assaulted my soul. It was an overdose of beauty that blew me away. Right there I knew the meaning of paradise and heaven. Bees, birds, insects, people, smiles, colors and sweet floral aromas.
I remember praying to God and dreaming that one day I could be blessed with a beautiful garden of my own.
Years later, when I moved in to Chateau Pinacho, I spent hours looking at several nurseries and selecting plants. My first two rose bushes were Joseph Coat and Zephirine Drouhin.
Since then, it has become my obsession, and now I have over 180 different kinds of rose bushes. A lovely sight, but extraneous job to water this amount of plants in the summer season. In the first years I had to spend 5 hours every other day watering the roses by hand just using a hose. When my daughter started taking less and less naps, watering the plants become a almost impossible task.
In 2017 I almost lost all my roses due a severe drough in July. I didn’t have choice, but to put an irrigation system through all the flowers bed.
Well, if someone told me 6 years ago that I would have a small rose garden in my back/ front yard, I would not believe back then. Every morning I look through my kitchen window and smile.
For me, it’s a combination of prayers, blessings, miracles, achievement, gratification and hard work. The beauty and the peace those flowers give to me, floods my heart with joy. It’s a pleasure that I can’t get enough of. It’s always developing and getting better and better.
Even though I consider myself a rose collector, I have recently started to open my mind to different kinds of plants and flowers.
