Wildflower Festival 2013

This Saturday, March 2 will be my 4th show at the Coachella Valley Wildflower Festival presented by Friends of the Desert Mountains, located at the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument Visitor Center.

I always look forward to this show because it celebrates the natural beauty of the Coachella Valley, steps aways from where I grew up.

I will have a few new items for children and women, including new  desert plant prints on dresses, tops and accessories.

Smoketree dress

Paper Moon dress

As well as my new jewelry line made entirely out of upcycled and organic materials.  As always a portion of all sales go towards protecting the native habitat of the Coachella Valley. 

Book of the Garden necklace

 Vintage Book & Wine earrings

My sister, Meghan Kelly will also be joining me this year with her incredible photography from her expeditions around the world.  

I look forward to seeing everyone on Saturday!

Please share with your friends my FACEBOOK event page...
Join Tea With Iris at Wildflower Festival 2013

Here are some of my favorite shots from previous years...

Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument Visitor Center***

51-500 Hwy 74Palm Desert, CA 92260
***shuttles run from St. Margaret's Church: 47-535 Hwy. 74, Palm Desert
FREE admission and parkingTelephone: (760) 862-9084

Spend the day with your family and friends in support of the National Monument and Friends of the Desert Mountains. Join us in search of wildflowers with guided hikes and nature walks, and enjoy kids’ activities, plein-air painting, various workshops, raffles, and vendors. Free entry to event. Food and merchandise will be available for purchase.

Festival attendees browsed and shopped at over 40 vendor and exhibitor booths, attended one or more of the seven specialty workshops involving photography, wildflower identification and landscaping, got messy in the Kids’ Zone with face painting, arts & crafts and live entertainment, enjoyed a selection of beer and wine while listening to The Bill Saitta Group provide great jazz music, and participated in an interpretive hike or walk in search of wildflowers. Overall, more than 1300 guests enjoyed a picture-perfect day at the National Monument Visitor Center on Saturday, March 3, 2012 while attending the Annual Coachella Valley Wildflower Festival in Palm Desert.

Kohlrabi in the school garden

I've been helping out in my daughter's school garden.  I love discovering new vegetables to grow and cook with....

KOHLRABI

I had to look this vegetable up last month because I had never seen such a thing.

The name comes from the German Kohl ("cabbage") plus Rübe ~ Rabi (Swiss German variant) ("turnip"), because the swollen stem resembles the latter, hence its Austrian name Kohlrübe.

Not only do the stems have an unusually beautiful appearance, they are surprisingly flavorful and have a very unique taste, like a mix between brocolli, cabbage and mildly sweet like an apple.  The leaves can be prepared like kale and are high in nutrients.

I peeled and sliced the stems for the kindergarten classes to try during snack time.  I made a dressing for them to dip them into and the teacher said most kids loved them.

Raspberry Vinaigrette recipe:

• organic raspberries
• meyer lemon juice
• honey
• olive oil
• white balsamic vinegar
• oregano, thyme, marjoram

BLEND.

LINKS:

prota.org- scienitific information

NY Times- some great recipes

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/kohlrabi/

Mr. Coffee in the garden

I'm trying to drink less coffee and more water and tea.  But sometimes I justify drinking more coffee because I don't want to waste any coffee leftover in the pot.  

But there is no need to throw it out because you can use it to fertilize your garden...

Here is how...

• dilute leftover coffee- add 3 parts water to 1 part coffee
• pour over the soil at the base of your plants that need an extra energy boost
• coffee has calcium and magnesium- both beneficial to plant health
• till coffee grounds into the top 6 inches of soil when preparing new plant beds to fertilize and improve organic soil texture
• throw coffee grounds on surface of garden to discourage slugs and other pests

Not a coffee drinker...ask your local diner or coffee shop for their grounds...

http://www.garden.com/garden-articles/plants-love-coffee-and-tea--who-knew/58/

First show of 2013- Chinese New Year Festival

Join me for my first show of the year in downtown Los Angeles...

Here's the details...
Join LA Craft Experience as we partner up with LA Chinatown to bring you another exciting event. The Chinese Year Festival - Year of the Snake, Feb. 16 & 17, 2013 is one of the largest festivals of its kind in the country. This year we're expecting a large turn out with even more activities to experience and explore:

 

• Live music stage with music curated by Kevin Bronson of Buzzbands LA

• Exciting cultural performances by Chinese acts

• Craft beer garden curated by Eagle Rock Brewery

• Hands-on cultural workshops for all ages

• Gourmet food trucks

• And of course LA Craft Experience featuring a juried market of LA's best designers and crafters

Festival address: 943-951 N Broadway, Los Angeles 90012
Hours: Feb. 16 from 12 - 8 p.m. & Feb. 17 from 12 - 5 p.m.

http://us1.campaign-archive1.com/?u=20d2f6cb24abef095e3cef6fc&id=039e048b83

A Cactus with a Purpose

When we first bought our home in 2004, my husband and I were eager to start to turn our front yard into a private,drought tolerant and native animal-friendly garden for the birds, lizards and most importanly our tortoise Iris of course.  I found a photo of Diego Riviera and Frida Kahlo's home studio in Mexico City in one of our magazines and loved how the border was landscaped with a minimal looking hedge of cacti...

Here is how ours turned out...

Yesterday, I trimmed the cacti to grow more columnar and to make it easier to rake the mesquite leaves and harder for black widows to hide. The cuttings will dry for a couple of weeks...

then I will plant them around the wall in our backyard.  Not only is this cactus beautiful and drought tolerant but it produces the most attractive flowers at night and also the sweetest fruit that tastes like a mix between dragon fruit and kiwi to me.  I plan to grow these all around our property since you can never have enough of these fruit since we compete for them with the birds and Iris...

Here is some information on the cacti with the linked website at the bottom:
Scientific: Cereus repandus [also known as Lophocereus schottii or Cereus peruvianus (though not from Peru) and often confused with Cereus hildmannianus]Common: hedge cactus, Peruvian apple, queen of the night, night blooming cereus (the common names for plants in the genus Cereus are all mixed up!)Family: CactaceaeOrigin: Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina (uncertain)
Pronounciation: Ser-E-us re-PAN-dus
Hardiness zones: Sunset 13, 16-17, 21-24USDA 9 (marginal, protect from cold) - 11
Landscape Use: Strong focal point for xeric landscape themes, container plant, rock garden, large patios, and even as a natural screen for garbage containers.
Form & Character: A majestic columnar cactus, upright, tree-like, branched and contorted, convoluted, dominant.
Growth Habit: Slowly upright and branched to 20' (specific variants can grow to 50').
Foliage/texture: Stems sometimes segmented, dull to light green, ribs mostly 12, mostly spineless to very short spines; coarse texture.
Flowers & fruits: Flowers large and white to 6" across, borne on a elongated tube, somewhat fragrant, tube short often ridged, stigma often exerted before flower opens, flowers at night; Fruits, globose, red when ripe and rounded like a small apple with a white pulp to 2 1/2" diameter.
Seasonal color: Spectacular flower display in late spring, sometimes will flower during early fall.
Temperature: Tolerant to 20^oF.
Light: Full sun and NO shade.
Soil: A well-drained mineral soil is best.
Watering: Water only occasionally if at all during summers.
Pruning: None, except to control size by occasionally thinning out awkward or crossing stem branches.
Propagation: Easily propagated from softwood stem cuttings of most any length. Will develop roots after directly planting stem cuttings into the soil (right side up!). Make sure to first allow the cut surfaces of the stems to harden for several weeks (callous over) before planting directly into soil.
Disease and pests: Susceptible to root rot in damp poorly drained soils.

http://www.public.asu.edu/~camartin/plants/Plant%20html%20files/cereusrepandus.html

Book of the Garden necklace

Book of the Garden Necklace
- wood, paper, metal, non-toxic sealant
- each necklace one of a kind

Inspired by the very old mesquite tree that our tortoise Iris lives under in our garden. Branches of the mesquite tree used after trimming with pages from a vintage gardening book called, "Reader's Digest Complete Book of the Garden", by Thomas Everett, circa 1966.

Next stop...Unique LA Holiday Show

I had a great time at the Green Festival in San Francisco last weekend. 

My products will now be available in northern California at Ricochet in San Mateo.    

I'm travelling home today and will start getting ready for...

The 5th Annual Unique LA Holiday Show in Downtown Los Angeles!

Buy tickets here.

Click here to join Facebook event and SPREAD THE WORD!

Green Festival 2012

I'm thrilled to announce that I will be showing my product line at the San Francisco Green Festival...

Tea With Iris will be showing with...
Ricochet
Booth 265 and 266

Here's a little info on Jill Pillot of Ricochet...
San Francisco Green Festival Features Richochet Vintage – Wearable Art Made from Recycled Materials

Organic Blend scarf

I'm excited about my latest design, the Organic Blend scarf.  

Each scarf is one of a kind, handmade from an organic cotton/hemp jersey blend, organic cotton corduroy, and the finest repurposed sweaters and shirts.  And they are unisex! 

Now available online.

Green Wish - Coachella Valley

 Last weekend I hosted a gathering at my home to introduce Green Wish to the Coachella Valley. Green Wish is a grassroots, non-profit charitable organization that is focused on helping local green organizations fund projects for their communities through small donations at local retailers. I met the founder, Raphael Sbarge, at the Unique L.A. show in Santa Monica this past summer and I really was impressed by the goals of the organization and hoped that I could get more involved. So I partnered with my mom, Gloria Kelly, who has years of experience in community service, to organize a Green Wish introductory meeting in the Coachella Valley.

 Raphael along with his children and fellow Green Wish board member Jenna De Angeles took time out of their weekend to meet with us.  We had a great group at the house and we all are inspired to move forward with a new chapter of Green Wish in the Coachella Valley.

 Future Green Wish board members...