Holly Rossi's Profile

Peach blossoms, hyacinths, and daffs. Yep, the sun is shining. Continue reading

Posted Apr 4, 2012 at Sparks in the Soil

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What a swing - it was in the low '80s late last week, and now they're predicting a hard frost tonight with lows in the '20s! Growers across New England is worried about their crops, especially on fruit trees that... Continue reading

Posted Mar 26, 2012 at Sparks in the Soil

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Wordless Wednesday: My Favorite Farmers

Re-mulching the fruit trees, and workin' the land.... Continue reading

Posted Mar 21, 2012 at Sparks in the Soil

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Last Year's Twilight Zone Crops

Oh, and I never did post these other-worldly bizzare beauties that came out of last year's garden! Better late than never.... Continue reading

Posted Mar 16, 2012 at Sparks in the Soil

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The Garden: Year 3

With this mild winter almost over, it's a great year to get an early start on the garden! New this year: A grow house for a modest seed-starting experiment. And some arrugula seeds that are cooperating (a single kale, spinach,... Continue reading

Posted Mar 16, 2012 at Sparks in the Soil

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In Other News

My garden never ceases to blow me away. Almost the hot second that I pushed "publish" on my post lamenting my tall, healthy, but flower-less sugar snap pea plants, what should I see sprinkled all over the top foot or... Continue reading

Posted Jun 8, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Tent City

This morning my neighbors sprayed their trees for winter moth. The spray is "non-toxic," so says the company and some mild Internet research. It's water-soluble as well. But...it's bug spray, and the tree hovers right over my vegetable patch (which... Continue reading

Posted Jun 8, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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The Bald and the Beautiful

By "bald" I mean that my sugar snap pea plants are almost 3 feet tall, healthy and strong, yet are sporting not one single flower. Some initial research suggests this might be due to a potassium deficiency in the soil,... Continue reading

Posted Jun 5, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Strawberry Fields Forever

Have you signed up for my feed yet? It's easy - just click here! Continue reading

Posted May 12, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Second Chances in the Garden

Two bits of "second chance" inspiration in the garden - First, the cloned New Dawn roses that we started in our condo before we moved here almost 2 (!) years ago are springing to life beautifully....all 4 of them! We... Continue reading

Posted May 11, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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You're the Best!

Ok, so I'm officially terrified that the 3-foot chicken wire that surrounds our raised beds is woefully inadequate.... Continue reading

Posted May 7, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Parsnips: Carrots from Outer Space

Growing parsnips is a one-year project - sow the seeds in early spring, heavily straw-mulch the green shoots when they emerge, leave them alone over the winter, and dig them out the next spring. Exposing the plants to winter cold... Continue reading

Posted Apr 25, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Welcome Back, Green

Hello, my verdant old friend. My rods and cones have been starved for you! But now you're finally roaring back, in the cover crop that's fixing nitrogen in my soil, the rosemary that hopefully will green back to life... ...the... Continue reading

Posted Apr 11, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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The Garden...Year 2

So here's where things stand in our garden. Spring is, slowly, springing... Despite an impossibly snowy winter... With snow drifts so high, the neighborhood bunnies were empowered to, um, "prune" our fruit trees for us... But the snow also gave... Continue reading

Posted Apr 5, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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Not Much, How 'Bout You?

Friends, I can't tell you how happy I am to be writing again in this space. Happy, but overwhelmed, both with all that's happened since my last post back in August, and with the complete transformation my life has taken... Continue reading

Posted Apr 3, 2011 at Sparks in the Soil

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You Spin Me Round

I just love how a trip out to the garden brought out three different foods that are so uniformly shaped, I could juggle them! (If I could juggle....) Have you signed up for my feed yet? It's easy - just... Continue reading

Posted Aug 10, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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An Unfolding Hydrangea

Last spring, we excitedly broke our "never order plants from catalogs" rule and got this "Vanilla-Strawberry Hydrangea" from the Jung seed company. We put it in the ground in its stick state: We watched as it leafed out: And could... Continue reading

Posted Aug 2, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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Happy Early Harvest

There's something so clean and magical about the first summer fruits of a vegetable garden. The plants haven't yet gone all beautifully wild and woolly, they're still roughly in the spots where we dug them in. And the yield isn't... Continue reading

Posted Jul 27, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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New Project: Tips for a Dairy-Free Diet

Friends, I'm excited to share with you that I've recently launched a new writing gig--I'm the Dairy-Free Food writer for Boston's Examiner.com! I'll be writing 2-3 times a week with tips, advice, products, recipes, and information for those of you... Continue reading

Posted Jul 14, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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The Very Picture of Summer

I've been away from this blog for awhile, for reasons both good and bad (yes, the list is really this dramatic: a job change, major health news, and a bona fide natural disaster). But though there is much to discuss... Continue reading

Posted Jul 13, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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Faith in the Compost Pile

"Where did you come from? From a putrid drop. Where you are going--to a place of dust, maggots and worms....." An uplifting piece of scripture, no? Um...no. This is a quote from the Pirkei Avot, the classical ethics text of... Continue reading

Posted Jun 4, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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Interview: Craig Goodwin, Pursuer of 'Plenty'

Craig Goodwin's story has so many layers of inspiration, I hardly know where to begin. He's a family man who worked with his wife and two daughters to create a year of completely local food and product consumption (rewarded with... Continue reading

Posted May 25, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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Walk with Me

I just shared my new practice of circumambulating (taking a meditative, mindful walk around) my house each day as a way of enjoying the big picture of my garden's first year of growth. Now, a photo journey through what today's... Continue reading

Posted May 24, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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Take It All in: Circumambulate Your Garden

We gardeners are generally a contemplative bunch--patient enough to experiment with different groupings of plants, different locations, different varieties. We're prepared for failure and pretty well versed in how to learn from it. We can get blissfully lost in yanking... Continue reading

Posted May 24, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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What's Eating My Fruit Trees?

Our dwarf fruit tree orchard is cooking along, I'm happy to say, and now that we've settled the trees into their new homes and tucked them in with a chunky mulch blanket, they seem to be putting down roots (final... Continue reading

Posted May 5, 2010 at Sparks in the Soil

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