It has seemed like a long winter this year - even though we have had very few days that were below -25* or even got past -20*. We have had Covid and culture cancellations, as well as some business and school closures and cancellations that have been stressful and exhausting as well.
Among it all though, there has been beauty! This is Angelica.
Angelica is an natural medicinal plant used for a variety of ailments, including insomnia. There are also folks who use it in the culinary arts, including making "candied Angelica", and it is delicious, but I am not an Angelica expert and so far I just enjoy its beauty as it grows up among some of my other plants. Maybe this next year I will start to make use of this beautiful and useful plant. Angelica is a bit of a parasite plant - not according to science really, but its seed blows a bit like the Dandelion and lodges in among the leaves of other plants or even the roots of trees, or Rhubarb, or Peony, or.... the list goes on! Then it grows tall and beautuful, and umbrellas out over the other plants, they effectively holding it up like beans on a fence.
This is that same Angelica plant and its beautiful flower head covered with frost in the very early fall here at the farm. It makes the yard look a little eerie and mysterious even. We had a few months of fall that we worried that we would get no snow and have nothing to protect the plants for the winter.
But then the snow began. Here is our lovely Angelica in its spot right below the "love" sign that Reed made for me out of a piece of steel. It is one of my most treasured items. Sturdy as all get out, in the wind it swings to and fro and the wind whistles through the chain and the letter holes. Literally whisthing in the wind. It makes a beautiful sound.
The it snowed some more and the Love and the Angelica stood sturdy and resilient.
Then again with the snow - covering the bench, the wind drifting it all around the little shed and covering every track in the yard. Even the moose don't go out there now.
And more snow on top of that snow. Love and the Angelica still standing under the weight. Some of the snow you see here is from the plow - not just the wind.
This is from this past week. We got another 6-8" of snow, but we cant really tell how much because the wind blew so hard that we arent able to tell where the old was and the new begins! We have at least 3 feet here on the farm and I had to shovel the top of the greenhouse the other day - just before the new snow came - lest I risk a cave in of the greenhouse!
Love and Angelica stand. Still. Proudly. Waiting......
For the promise of Spring.
This is the Angelica plant right below the Love sign. It has grown up aong the Caesar's Brother Iris that you can see blooming here. It makes a beautiful addition to the Oasis I have here beneath the sign, next to the shaded bench and so I let it stay. Angelica is a biennial and only will live here two years. Then it will move along to another plant, in another area of the farm, and wait to cause brilliant beauty there....Winter and Spring. Summer and Fall.
Blessed Spring, Blessed Be.