The Four Elemants-Are they in your Garden?

The four elements – you hear about them often;

Earth, Wind, Water and Fire.

Those four elements you’ll find in the garden as well. Earth, of course, is your garden’s anchor. Whether it be in a container, in the ground or in a hanging basket; the earth element supports your plants. The second element is water. Of course water comes from the rain and gives life to your plants. It’s often an added element in the forms of the bird bath, a fountain or small pond.

Then there is something that you really can’t add and have to rely on nature to provide; wind. You can enjoy the benefits of cooling breeze, the sounds of your wind chimes as the wind pushes through them, or the results of pollination from the wind pushing pollen out of one flower to the next.

The fourth element is fire and it is little bit harder to add. It’s making a big splash on today’s landscape garden, and there are many forms that you can bring it into your garden. Artificially, you can add fire by adding lighting landscape, or hanging lanterns or using Tiki-Torches. But now the biggest trend is fire pits.

Fire Pits seems to bring with them a feeling of closeness and community. They become a gathering spot for friends and family to share, and catch up on the day’s activities with each other. They can be a place of laughter and good times or maybe a solitude spot for a bit of romance.

You can go to the web and find all kinds of sources for fire pits; do-it-yourself or premade- your imagination is all that holds you back from creating a special location in your landscape than everyone will want to enjoy. Not all fire pits are equal. Some actually use traditional wood that you burn, or some of the new trends that I really like are propane gas pits. You have no mess and all you have to do is turn the switch on and off. Some bit think it’s a bit lazy, not quite the traditional approach, but it works.

And a new item that I’ve recently seen is Fire Glass. This is added to your container and produces no smoke, order or ash. It comes in a range of colors and sizes, which makes it pretty even when not lit.

So your garden is an extension of your world; a small little microclimate, a place where you can use the four elements of Earth, Wind, Water and Fire to create a beautiful atmosphere just for you.

Do you have all these elements in your garden?

The Gift of Rain

The Gift of Rain.

The gift of rain can do so many things for us; water the crops so that we can eat, fill the lakes and ponds so that we can drink. The rain does so much more than that and it truly is a gift.

Have you ever noticed how some  much-needed rain can change your whole attitude? It can wash off the dust, clear the cobwebs to refresh and renew you. Not only can the rain renew you, the rain can change your whole outlook. On a gloomy, dismal day the sun breaks out in amongst the rain and it can create a rainbow. But, remember, that rainbow wouldn’t be possible without the rain. The gentle rainfall can be relaxing and peaceful versus the thunder and lightning and pounding rain of a good storm can be frightening. Yet, without that change of rain types we would never be able to experience all that rain has to offer.

Rain has many benefits, as you well know. It opens up the flowers, which produces seeds, which produces food. The results of a good rain will green-up your lawn and open the leaves on the trees giving this world the oxygen that it needs. And that oxygen wouldn’t be there without the green plants and the green plants wouldn’t be able to survive without the rain; are you seeing the circle we live within? Sometimes that gift of rain comes in abundance and it’s almost too much for us to handle. Other times we find ourselves praying for rain to save our farms and livestock. Whatever amounts of rain that we get we should always be grateful, because it means that our world, our precious earth, is producing and growing and surviving.

So the next time you find yourself caught in a rain storm, will you moan and groan about the inconvenience –

Or, will you be grateful for the gift of rain?