Preparing the Ground Work and Breakthrough on Canvas

We finally had some rain. The earth is taking a nice long drink before she swallows the last drop of rain. Everything is greener. Everything has swelled. Even the air is drenched and blurred with moisture in the air.

The big long swirls, instead of rows, dug in the garden were pooled with rainwater. Good. That's what I thought would happen. But I'll need to mound areas in these rows if the seedlings are going to be able to thrive. The water will pull them upward when it rains hard enough.

The idea of making these wave move with the earth in the yard by creating these waves in her rich soil too will is also good. It'll slow the water from running off the surface of the ground and keep it from moving lickity-split into the road and down the sewer. And that is such a waste.


The idea of having the waves always point, with the earth, in a downward slope and to wrap smaller connected bands around the trees is also good. But too much pooling of water in these ruts, where I was planning to put the seeds, will wash the young seedlings away or pull their roots up and expose them to dry air, which is never good.

So I'm not going to plant the seeds in wavy rows of tilled earth and I'm going to raise the mounds in these wavy rows so that water will move around them. Even if there are several plants in one of these mounds, creating a place for the water to go and also provide a way to slow how quickly it moves downhill, will give the ground more time to absorb the rain. The earthen mounds will protect the seedlings but the ruts just a little below and around the plants will help to water them. Yes, this is good. I'm just going to make wavy lines in the lanes where the seeds will be planted. Even in the rows that are wavy, the seeds will be mounded in beds laid out in wavy lanes.

Does anybody care about this? Oh man, I'm rambling. I'm just excited to see what's happening in the garden and being able to figure out how best to till and sow this year. Now, back to painting. The light is perfect.

I'll add pictures later. I'm just going to focus on the painting today. In a week or so I'll reveal the painting here. But for now, it is in that magical stage when I'm working with more glazes and in different lights and the trees are coming alive and I am so happy. Gotta go. Wanna go.