Pleasing Petunias by A.M. Westerling

 

Petunias are some of the most popular bedding out plants and are considered an annual in most areas. I buy them every year as they’re easy to grow, bloom all summer and come in a variety of colours. Mind you, the first year I planted them I had no idea what to do with them so I didn’t pinch them. I ended up with 2 foot long stems with a single bloom at the end! One of my favourite varieties is Wave (pictured below) but pretty much any variety you buy will do nicely. On our front steps we have two barrels, it's a hot and sunny spot, just perfect for petunias. In the past I've leaned towards shades of purple but this year I've gone with red and white.

  

Petunias are South American in origin and the Mayans and Incans believed that the odor of these flowers had the power to chase away underworld spirits and monsters. According to folklore, these flowering plants thrive where there is positive energy and will not grow where there is negativity. If given as a gift, they have two meanings: either the giver is comfortable with someone or conversely, they also represent anger and resentment. I couldn’t find any medicinal purposes for petunias so I suppose their beauty could be considered food for the soul. My local Home Depot had these gems one year but I haven't seen this unusual colour since.   

                        

You can plant petunias anywhere ie in borders, hanging baskets, pots or even as a seasonal groundcover. They like full sun and will become spindly and won’t bloom if the spot is too shady. They can spread anywhere from 18 inches to 4 feet, with a height from 6 to 18 inches. If putting them in a pot, make sure the pot drains well and use a good potting soil. If planting in the ground, add compost to poor soil to promote growth. I fertilize mine every 2 weeks with 20 20 20.  They are fairly heat tolerant and don’t need water every day but keep an eye out for frost! They do well in mixed planter pots. 

 

However, keep the soil moist and when you do water, water thoroughly as shallow watering encourages shallow roots. Also, dead head regularly to encourage new blooms. When they start to get too leggy, I pinch them about halfway down the stem and just above a leaf node. They’ll look a little sad at first but a good dose of water and fertilizer will encourage growth and they’ll rebound nicely. These popular plants have few insect or disease pests although aphids and slugs can be a problem. I live in a dry climate so that’s never been an issue for me. 

If you're looking for an easy to grow annual, try petunias, you can't go wrong!

*****

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A Writing Challenge by Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

 

https://www.bookswelove.com/donaldson-yarmey-joan/

A Writing Challenge.

It was Wednesday evening, the night of my writing group meeting. As writers do when they gather, we were talking about writing. One of them gave us a writing challenge. We had to write five beginning sentences for five stories. We had ten minutes to do it.
After much thought, I came up with these five:
If you didn’t know your actual age, how old do you think you would be?
The day that my brother blew his hand off is the day that I lost my father to booze.
Whatever the past, the future is spotless.
I don't give a dang, for I have seen the elephant.
The only time I like water is when it is cold and the day is hot.
As each one read hers, we discussed them trying to figure out how the story would go. At the end of the meeting we decided that we should take one of our sentences and build it into a short story, or the beginning of a novel for our next meeting.
I took my second sentence and here is the beginning of the novel I wrote around it.

     The day that my younger brother, Ralph, blew his left hand off, was the day that I lost my father to booze. Not that he hadn’t drank before. He'd have a beer on Saturdays with the neighbours or a drink at family gatherings but it was that day that he began drinking every day as soon as he got home from work.
     And the change was immediate. When he and mom came home from the hospital after leaving Ralph, Dad went to the cupboard and pulled out a half empty bottle of whiskey. He got a glass and poured it almost full. He drank it down. I was watching him as mom told me and my younger brother, Jimmy, that Ralph had lost his hand and would be in the hospital for a few days. Dad took time off work and he and Mom went to see Ralph every day. But every evening Dad drank himself into a stupor.
     When they brought Ralph home from the hospital the only change in Dad's routine was that in the morning instead of going to the hospital he went to work. He got up sober, left the house at his usual time and was sober up until the moment he entered our door after work. It was once that door was closed on the outside world that he'd sit in his chair in the living room and pour his first glass of whiskey or vodka or rum whichever he had on hand at the time. Mom would serve him his supper there while the rest of us ate at the table in the dining room. His evenings varied little. Sometimes he'd stare at the television set, sometimes he'd stare into the corner of the living room. And he continued drinking all evening until he passed out, usually in his chair, sometimes on the couch, occasionally he made it to bed.
     He became, and remained for the rest of his life, a functioning alcoholic

     So far the story is not finished but I still have hope that one day it will be.

A Blast From the Past by Victoria Chatham

 

AVAILABLE HERE

I'm often asked if I read outside my genre of historical romance. The answer is an unequivocal and resounding yes. Books are a feast and I devour them. I enjoy and follow my fellow Books We Love authors, but beyond that, I have a penchant for Lee Child, Jane Austen (still) and many, many more both old and new. A recent search for a much-loved book, The Old House at Railes by Mary E Pearce turned up something totally unexpected, an autobiography Good Morning.... Good Night by Tim Langley.

The only Tim Langley I had ever known was huntsman at the Berkeley Hunt where I had worked in my teens as a groom during the 1962-63 season. Could it be the same Tim Langley? Yes, it could and now I have my copy with the cover embellished with the same illustration as a birthday card I have kept for many years of Tim with the Berekeley Hounds. Tim was a real gentleman, always well turned out and polite, but definitely a character.

I never hunted, and today fox hunting is viewed through a very different lens, but I loved the hunt horses. I had three in my string: chestnut Duet who was a real sweetheart, grey Thor who had the longest back of any horse I've ever known, and Tangerine, another chestnut who never learnt to walk but jiggled and jogged along working himself into a sweat and always took forever to cool down.

Duet

This was my first home away from home and it's no wonder I now write historical fiction. Berekeley Castle was our backdrop. It has been the ancestral home of the Berkeley family since the first motte and bailey was erected at the time of the Norman Conquest. The stables were built during the time of Queen Anne (1702 - 1707) and had barely changed at all. The last window on the second floor was our bathroom, the next window along was the kitchen, and the flat apartment was shared by us four girl grooms. 

The routine was all about the horses, from getting up at 4 am for first feeds and skipping out the stables, then exercising them at 7 am for two hours. After checking their hay nets and water buckets we would have our breakfast. Then it was back to the stables for proper mucking out and grooming. Lunchtime the horses were fed again with the hay net and water bucket checks and in the afternoons we cleaned tack, swept the yard, and did whatever odd jobs needed doing. Anyone who has ever had the care of stabled horses will understand the routine of feeding little and often, taking away the waste product and generally keeping everything in order. We all took turns at the early morning starts and the ten o'clock last stables. 

After a month, when my parents came to visit me for the first time, they were so shocked they threatened to haul me home. I'd lost weight with all the extra physical work, they were appalled at our flat, and I was as happy as a cricket. I stayed. Each horse had its own character. Duet was such an obliging gentleman, Thor had a weird sense of humour as if you bent over anywhere near him he was likely to nip your backside. He also had a way of moving without you noticing 

Thor

until he had you pinned against the stable wall and would then look over his shoulder at you as much as to say "What are you going to do now?" 

After all this time I don't remember all of the horses. There was Trio, a full brother to Duet. Zulaika, who loved to watch the birds, Wexford, a big grey who was so fat when he came in after being at grass all summer that we didn't have a saddle that fit him, Doctor who had navicular disease and had to be euthanized, Big Ears (if I remember correctly her real name was Lady Jane) and a black thoroughbred called Judes Hill. 

After a day's hunting, he was always the one we had the most trouble settling down. I won't go into all the reasons this can happen, only that no one went to bed until any of the horses had calmed down, cooled down, and could be safely left. I'm not a poet, but I did write this after one particularly late night.

JUDES HILL 

Ten o’clock.
Last rounds.
Sweet smell of hay
Drifts from warm stables
Where horses shuffle, sigh,
And soft whiskery muzzles
Nuzzle goodnight.
 
But not Judes Hill.
He has been hunting today
And his thoroughbred body
Is hunting still.
Sheen of sweat on neck,
White striped face stark
Above the stable door,
He peers into the night.
 
His ears twitch this way, that.
Has he missed the plaintive
Wail of Master’s horn
Sounding ‘Gone Away’?
Was that the full cry of
Hounds in flight?
Steel strikes stone under his
Restless feet.
 
I unbuckle surcingles,
Loosen steaming rugs.
Islands of foam float
On the sea of neck,
Shoulder, flank.
On with his cooling sheet
And out into the night
We go.

We walk and walk,
This horse and I.
He stamps his feet and tosses his head,
His mane flutters like
Tattered rags against his neck.

I talk about everything
and nothing into his willing ears
until his head drops,
and the thrill of the chase
drains from his body.
Now we can rest.

From beach ponies to the hunters, from friends' horses to our much loved Arab, the books about horses that I have read and still like to read, I think you've gathered by now that I have a passion for this marvellous creature that is unlikely to ever go away. Horses appear, in one way or another, in all of my books. In historical novels how can they not? And even in my contemporary western romances, cowboys need horses. Look out for my next contemporary western, available for preorder now and releasing on June 1st.

AVAILABLE HERE

Victoria Chatham

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