I don't really miss the roses; when my garden finally shuts down (happened this week), after running all spring and summer, am ready for the break while they (and I) rest! Everything starts back up in March with a vengeance but this gives a few months to catch up on house things, reading, all sorts of "winter" stuff. Then in March I'm ready to go again!

My garden is just getting cranking.

Strawberry

You are welcome to come to California and enjoy some roses :D

If you want, I have several fruit trees roots to dig up, some fencing that needs updating, tons of weeding (grr those mallows)

And there is the matter of 2/3's of the veggie garden that needs prepping for spring and....

Like floridarosez, summer is our big down time. The winter, though it brings its share of snow, fog, rain, and cold, has enough suitable weather for garden work that I stay engaged. Between now and the beginning of spring in late March I'm going to be busy pruning the roses and doing cleanup. Normally I would have done more of this in the fall, but we had so much planting and digging to do that I had little time for it.
Still, this time of year we only have eight hours of daylight. I read a good deal, fiction and not; cook--I need to get started on a couple of baking projects--spend time on the computer, watch movies. I always talk a good deal with my daughter, that's year round. Oh, yes, and this is when I update my rose list on HMF. In periods of bad weather I walk a good deal for exercise. And most winters I take off by myself once or twice for a few days and go visit a nearby city. Neither my husband nor my daughter is a fan of cultural tourism, and the dark days of winter are definitely the time to visit museums and cathedrals. This year I have in mind to see Padua.

Melissa, I love that idea of getting away for a few days! With my DH so ill, just don't get anywhere anymore, but that's okay, having worked for 50 years am absolutely loving being at home for a change. We're having our old house remodeled, they're planning on doing the kitchen around the middle of January and I can hardly wait - plus I won't be able to cook while it's torn up, oh yeah!

My garden is pretty well cleaned up and mulched for winter, (in much better shape than my poor old house), still have to plant bulbs and more seeds in my wildflower area, plus about 8 roses coming in February...

cakes

Pie.
I've been working on perfecting a
Meyer Lemon Pie recipe with candied zest and violets to garnish the merengue. I was making it Shaker style with a layer of candied slices of Meyer Lemon blanketing the bottom crust but it was a heck of a lot of work. I was tickled pink when I took it to a party and it was the only thing photographed. Meyer Lemons are a cross between a regular lemon and a mandarin type citrus, found in China by a Mr. Meyer. I think Meyer lemons might be as popular in California as Key Limes are in Florida as a gourmet citrus item.
When I was looking for a property to buy I paced off the likely "rose real estate"here and then found a mature Meyer Lemon tree in the back yard, it was a done deal after that. Oh and there was a house on the property too; quite convenient after a days' work in the garden.

My China and Tea roses stop blooming for c. 6 weeks in Jan-Feb, and often if it rains all the blooms are spoiled, but I count myself lucky for it is such a short time.

Luxrosa

Like Ogrose I don't miss the roses at all in the winter. I enjoy the seasons as they come. Winter is the time when we can travel. We can't get away in the summer with all the watering chores.

Luxora's lemon pie makes my mouth water. Thanks for the info. on Meyer lemons. I hate watering roses in the summer, but I like digging holes, it firms up my flabby arms. It's so cold here that walking is outside is sheer torture.... It's still safer than our Chicagoland summer of 104 degrees, when one cannot fart near a cigarette lighter or else an explosion would occur.

I should accept Kippy's offer to slave under her CA sun so I don't have to buy these mega-doses of vitamin D.

As others have stated I dont miss gardening in winter. Though I do miss the bouquets. We've just finished mulching the gardens. After Christmas we will create a raised bed to permanently house the strawberries, raspberries and blueberries. My original plan to interplant them with the rose did not pan out a they all crowded each other. Never expected that problem so soon. When that's done,,,,rest time. And catalog perusing for next Spring's dreams.
Jeannie

Lux, I would love to see your Meyer pie and the recipe. I planted 2 new Meyers this year, I did not realize I had picked up a semi dwarf and wanted a standard, so it had to move. They are both already happy and putting out some fruit. (My January/February plant buy list is Citrus and fruit trees)

Strawberry-rained overnight but the sun is out today. I got a banana tree grove to split up and a persimmon tree to dig out. Plenty of spare gloves and shovels here for ya.

I let the roses bloom through the holidays and after New Years day I start pruning which makes me sad to know that the roses will not bloom for a while, but each year the Camellias are getting bigger so that now they are the size of small trees and the flowers are similar to roses except none of the beautiful fragrance. The most tedious part is cutting the leaves off all the bourbons and HPs but if I skip it then the old leaves seem to get sick before the spring flowers can come on.
I like putting on the new mulch and moving roses to better locations and planting new ones or the ones that began as bands and have been growing in pots all year. I have great big bouquets from all the cut roses at pruning time.

I used to do it all at once but since I went over 100 roses, I stagger it now and do different sections different weeks. Then if the weather is bad the whole spring bloom isn't spoiled. They seem to start growing right after they get trimmed.

The weather is cool but it's good for transplanting and repotting. There are no bothersome bugs and I don't have to water as much. I don't have a frost so my only concern is not letting the rain get in the biggest camellias or they turn brown and drop. The angle of the sun changes and comes in through the lace curtain then all the african violets on the windowsill bloom together.
I have two mature tangerines that I have to pick the fruit from and thankfully the roses are trimmed back then or else I couldn't get in there. The DA roses Charlotte and Jude the Obscure look wonderful both with the orange tangerines and with the white tangerine blossoms in spring.

In these cooler days, I like to knit and crochet blankets. Any other time of year, the large amount of wool feels hot on my lap and I make sweaters or socks, or lace crochet from cotton threads. Winter is the time to make a blanket or a thick aran style sweater. Then one of the cats will jump up and lay in my lap so I can't move the blanket or bats at the yarn as I work. I love to wear my sweaters when it gets cool outside as well as scarves and knitted hats.

I like to make soup and bake bread and sometimes pie and cookies if someone is coming to visit.

This is my seed sowing time of year. I've been direct seeding them and starting them in flats since September. For the first time, I direct seeded lupines, and they appear to be all popping, so no babying them in flats next year. I think the horse manure helped. If we have a good spring--meaning we don't go straight into 90-plus temps in April--I'll have blooms until May, maybe June. One year, I actually had foxgloves in July, but that was highly unusual. This might be my last year of annual gardening since it's backbreaking work getting them all in the ground.

I love the ones that reseed themselves year after year, like the larkspur, Queen Anne's lace, alyssum, gallardia, cosmos, and nasturtiums. They don't always come up where you want them, though.

And I'm afraid like Suzy, cake--and pie--and apple fritters and--

Well - I don't miss hand watering at all!!! So that's my happy point of winter. But now as all my roses have about shut down - many with little buds that now won't come to fruition, I really really miss the rose blooms. I'm starting to pine away... until around March/April when the mad explosions will start - THATS an excitement worth waiting for!

I'm taking this time to finish off the last of my digging up and recaging - 90 down, 20 more to go. I wasn't going to tackle my climbers, but now that I see the end of the tunnel in sight, I think I probably will. Nice to see them recover so quickly in the cool, wet weather.

Horse pens take more work now - extra bedding inside, and loading outside areas that are filling with water, with sand. More hoof picking needed from the wetness, and I'm behind in my trimming. Just started putting blankets on yesterday as we're finally getting our first feel of seasonal cold.

Everyone here is making me hungry.

I have a tropical greenhouse full of Nepenthes from Borneo, Sulawesi and the Phillipines. So I have plenty to keep me entertained through the winter as the roses sleep. ;-)

This post was edited by trospero on Fri, Dec 14, 12 at 11:31

I miss ALL my roses in the winter. And most all the rest of the garden too. From about mid-March until mid-November I spend nearly all of my time outside in the yard so being house bound in the winter is really hard for me. I do go out and feed the birds and I still walk the roses whenever I can, even though they're asleep, but I can't spend all day playing in the yard like I'm prone to doing. I miss it a lot!!! That's why I started doing rose breeding. So I'd have green living plants to play with in the worst of the winter months. It does help!

In truth, I don't actually miss any of them having moved right along and am now ensconced in couch-lock mode. I hate the cold and wet - a miserable state of affairs for a UK gardener - and have to keep the bitter envy out of responses to posts from Cali and Florida and so on. The bare roots are mostly in the ground, seeds are slowly doing their seedy thing while I vegetate (although I normally read Melissa's posts from Italy but skipped right over her Serbian roses one cos I knew I was going to get a massive guilt complex). Weirdly, the whole of the UK has gone into a kind of nostalgia fest for baking (economic recession)so TV schedules, magazines and such are crammed with various bake-offs and wholesome presenters extolling the virtues of bread - not like I need any encouragement but given the choice between hacking over frozen earth, trying to clear up last years rotting tomatoes - or baking (and eating) date and walnut cake, blueberry muffins or pear frangipane.....well, what would any greedy sane person go for?

You guys make me really hungry for lemon pie, walnut cake, blueberry muffin. I used to make this killer-cinnamon-rolls in the winter. I grinded grain from scatch, not like pioneer women, but with NutriMill. It took 5 minutes to grind whole wheat kernels. Then I used KitchenAid mixer to make the dough... then sprinkled with Trader's Joe cinnamon, plenty of plump raisin, walnut, butter. Plus a frosting on top. Guess what? I still prefer sniffing roses over the above... no guilt & no calories with roses.

Since it's Christmas, my 10-years is divinely inspired to read the Bible beginning with the Old Testament. I didn't know that it would turn into sex-education for me with her questions, "what's concubines? What's harlot? What's spilling his seeds?" Then she asked me, "what's an ennuch?" I told her, "it's either he's born without, or his part got chopped off". I googled and I was right.

I was shocked for the entire day over the Connecticut shooting of 20 children and few adults. I feel so sad for the parents of those school-kids. Thinking about the funny things my kid does help me to cheer up. Earth is a place to accomplish one's mission, then we move on to a better place. That's the best I can think of.

OT - you're right, strawberryhill, such a sad day. What do you say to your 5 year old on Monday morning when he/she just does NOT want to go to school because they're traumatized and scared by this senseless act?

Our world has turned upside down and I don't want to sound depressed, but in a lot of ways I'm glad I'm old.

Oh, God, I am sorry to hear about that.
Melissa

I was tearing up off and on all day. Just little tiny kids starting out. I could not watch the sad people on the news even to see the weather report to check for rain.

I don't have time to miss my roses until after Christmas, and by then I have a pile of garden catalogs that I mark, re-mark, peruse again, turn down pages, then make lists, scratch out lists, reconsider, then look at my bank account, and start all over, lol.

My big indulgence...I think I must have been a confectioner in my past life. At Christmas I make enough candy to last until March: chocolate covered cherries being the most trouble, but the biggest reward for the work. If it weren't for hacking down invasive privet all winter (I live on 110 acres), I'd be too fat to walk, much less garden!

John

Strawberry, your daughter cracks me up! Bet you didn't expect to get blindsided by her reading the Bible, now did you?! That is too funny. A nice little sweet to try to balance yesterdays bitter.

I too was teary most of the day. I LIKE that the President was too. What a horrible day that was.

I was heart-broken for the parents of the dead children in Connecticut and prayed for the survivors. Today I saw the names of deceased, and I broke out crying. I saw the name of my friend's 6-years old child, and the birthdate. They lived across the street from us, until they moved to the east coast. My friend is a petite, attractive, blond/blue, smart & charismatic person. She lighted up any party. Her husband is tall, handsome, and English. Such a perfect family with a son who was my kid's playmate, and a 6-years old girl daughter, who was murdered. Hopefully I can find the best words to comfort my friend, and ex-neighbor.

OT: Hi gang. I didn't realize the topic had changed when I posted my last comment. I had only read the first few posts and was getting a kick out of everyone's experiences. I certainly didn't mean to be insensitive to the tragedy in Connecticut. Like everyone else, I'm horrified, and wonder WHAT COULD POSSIBLY drive someone to commit such a senseless act. Words escape me...

But remember to give out extra hugs and "I love yous", today, and every day.

Fig Insanity, I certainly did not feel you were being insensitive, the topic just sort of went there, and now we're back on track.

I think the whole world is in mourning for those children and their families.

Today I was standing in a typical Christmas store lineup. A lady was there with 4 little ones, the two middle were twin girls about 6 years old. They were singing caroles to each other. It was so wonderful to hear the children laughing and playing but my mind immediately went to those families who lost their children, knowing they would want nothing more in this life than to hear their children sing.

God bless them one and all.

Valerie

Talking is the best therapy, John, I enjoy reading about your candy-making. The Chicago Sun-Times called me to ask about my ex-neighbor, now in Sandy Hook with a dead child. I feel better talking and crying ... instead of holding it inside. Why a child is taken away from such a loving family with great Mom and Dad? The answer? Because it's not a safe world anymore ... they are much safer in heaven. Ogrose is right.

My indulgence now is my kid ... I enjoy them while they are young, Christmas is not the same without the children. When she was 3 years old she kept asking me how did the fallen angels lost their wings? I was pushing my cart through the grocery and thinking of what cut of steak for dinner, so I answered, "God chopped their wings off with a steak knife." That stopped her nagging question.

The other time she kept asking me tons of questions. I threatened, "If you keep asking me questions like that, I'm going to die young." She retorted, "how are you going to do that, are you going to assassinate yourself?"

LOL, Strawberryhill, she sounds like a character!

lol...it's too bad Art Linkletter isn't around to say, "Kids say the DARNDEST things!". I used to love his show.
One thing is for sure, kids will keep you honest by repeating everything you say, in the least appropriate settings.

I wonder if anyone has thought of planting a memorial garden for the ones who died? I'm sure it's too soon to be "officially" talking about it, but wouldn't a meditation garden full of roses be a nice tribute? It might even be a cause we could "indulge" in.

John

I think about how many times in that 20 year old's life he probably acted out in school and with others and somehow no one was able to help him deal with his anger and hate issues. The Old Testament says not to murder, but Christ expands that when He says that whenever you have hate in your heart, you are murdering, both yourself and others, I think.

I didn't respond on the "what roses symbolize" thread, but roses are for me a reminder that there is a God who is creator. There didn't have to be any such thing as a rose with its beauty, fragrance, color. They have comforted me in hard times, encouraged me with their beauty, given me a way to share something valuable and beautiful with others, and taught me about patience. In the same way, in our souls, there doesn't have to be such a thing as kindness or love, but God has given us the ability to be that way.

I feel terrible for that broken family the 20 year old came from, the families that lost their children, and the resulting fear and terror that will plague us because of it. Politically I hate what has happened to us as a nation because there is so much hate and anger between the two groups. That's the kind of thing that develops in hearts of people so that they want to shoot each other.

I think about all the other kids and people that have those same hate and fear issues and think that for myself, I want always to forgive anyone who hurts me because it can grow into something ugly in myself if I don't. It makes me want to try harder to love those kids and people I'm not crazy about that are all around me so maybe they don't develop into people with those same hate issues.

The rose I miss most in winter ? Funny, I miss a climate where the season is longer, but I don't so much miss them in winter because I think and plan a lot during the wintertimes, and anticipation is more than half the fun, anyway.

Indulgences? I love to make Christmas table arrangements out of the evergreens all around me and give them to friends. And music ... it's not Christmas without John Rutter's carols and Handel's "Messiah."

{{gwi:330732}}

Thank you, Gean (Harborrose), for the so-true thoughts you shared, and posting your wonderful creation, so cheerful & cozy for the Christmas season.

I agree with John that kids say the darnest thing. I have a similar idea of a memorial in terms of naming a rose after my friend's deceased 6-years old. Her Mom loves roses and got into roses before I did ... I already asked if she wants a rose named in honor of her little girl. Channel 7 will come here today to film the Bacon's house across the street, before they moved to the east coast.

This whole mess wouldn't happened if Nancy Lanza got into roses rather than guns. Play with fire and something will burn, play with guns, and everyone get hurt. My friend is the strongest and best Mom I know, she doesn't deserve to have her 6-years old killed. It happened to her because she's most capable of bearing the burden, I would crumble if such happened to my child. It's like Jesus Christ doesn't deserve to be nailed, he was chosen because He's the strongest spiritually to bear that burden of the cross, and to save the world.

My friend JoAnn was happy, outgoing, smart, and turned everything into gold. The killer took her child away, but I hope she won't let him destroy WHO she is before this happened. People can say and do nasty things, but we can't let them destroy WHO we are, and the mission that we are ordained on earth.