Dee Blair

The drive to Montreal seemed too long; anticipation made time drag. I finally rolled up into a ball on the front seat and went to sleep, something I rarely do. It helped enormously to hurry time along. Joe drove well,…

Joe and I packed our two bikes, left Bryn with family and drove to Toronto to stay for three nights to explore the Royal Ontario Museum’s many treasures. Our B and B, only a few blocks away from posh Bloor…

Joe and I had a fine adventure the last two weeks of September, exploring Toronto and Montreal. Here’s how it all happened. 

Our fiftieth wedding anniversary, celebrated in June, represented a Giant milestone. And to honor it our families…

Some years ago, when visiting my family in England, I took a long, solitary afternoon walk down the rustic, unpaved Callow Lane, which led to the little village of Much Dewchurch, and its Black Swan pub. The sun, partnered with a…

Just days before Christmas about six years ago an SUV ran off Sixth Street in the steady rain, smashed through our front garden’s antique iron fence, ripped over the grass and through the front flower bed to charge up the…

On April 9th, 2009, my husband rumbled into Hereford on the noon train. Hereford, a city of about 60,000 in the West Midlands of England, is seven miles from my late mother’s cottage.  (The plane ticket was super-cheap: he’d gotten the…

Well, on September 9, in the Fairy Garden, I finally tucked in the huge, collapsed Dicentra spectabalis.  What a perennial star! 

She emerges emerald green in mid-spring, from partly shaded, moist, fertile earth, and grows feverishly to 3 feet high.…

One lovely early morning in mid-summer some years ago four middle-aged ladies showed up, smartly clad in attractive Bermuda shorts, crisp short-sleeved shirts and spotless deck tennis shoes. They wore expensive, very attractive haircuts and large wedding rings, which glittered…

I’ve been doing this column for over 13 years without a break: I need to take some time off. But I offer some reader favorites that I’ve especially noted over the years, and will submit them every Sunday, as usual.…

Never mind the Cherry Festival, Film Festival, Beer Festival- Bryn has attracted quite an audience with her very own 15 minutes of fame- a Shriek Fest!  
Here’s how things went down. 

Happy families sat or lay on the sunny…

I, a dedicated gardener, do declare there are three constants: death, taxes, and bad brooms. 
  
I find myself pondering what would happen if I vanished today. Who’d understand my garden’s intricate needs, its subtle tweaks, and why and how…

Standing at our ancient Hoosier cabinet I folded freshly dried clothes. The cabinet is perfect for this task, as it has a porcelain pull-out front, as well as lots of cupboards for housing various laundry room essentials. (It had also…