How’d I miss this? 

And, really, isn’t every day National Chocolate Cake Day?

Anyway, if you need a recipe to observe this holiday properly in your home, then allow me to help you out a little bit with recipes from my stash:

• Chocolate Whiskey Cake  (Just spike and tinker with a mix!)
• Chocolate Peppermint Mayo Cake (For the from-scratch crowd)
• Best-Ever Chocolate Frosting

This month holding the start of the Chinese New Year, it occurs to me that I missed a great opportunity to introduce Tater to a Chinese “fortune fish.”  In fact, the topic of fortune fish can be a great way to introduce kids to chemistry. Yup. Read here how the fortune fish “works.”

On another tangent, my friend Jami is doing the voice over work on this new Kiwi Crate video. It, too, has a fish-meets-chemistry theme! Be sure to check out Jami’s blog, NogginMama.com, as well as her “Science Kids” Pinterest board!

Explore More
• Chinese New Year Unit Study (Squidoo)

From Obamafoodorama.com:

First Lady Michelle Obama will kick off a national media campaign to promote her forthcoming book about the White House Kitchen Garden with a visit to NBC’sTonight Show With Jay Leno on Jan. 31. “American Grown,” Mrs. Obama’s first outing as an author, will be published in April. NBC said when announcing Mrs. Obama’s appearance that she will discuss the book and the Let’s Move! campaign; Mrs. Obama will embark on a three-day national tour to celebrate the second anniversary of her childhood obesity initiative starting on Feb. 9, with a visit to Des Moines, Iowa.

Other details: the 256-page book will cost $30. The book’s coauthor is Lyric Winik.

As excited as I am to see it come out, I think that price is out of reach for many Americans–presumably the very ones that need to hear information about gardens and healthy eating.

So I’m going to go ahead and predict that someone is going to harp on that fact.

Welcome to Election Year 2012.

Explore More:

• Victory Gardens

A personal favorite of mine, a Belinda's Dream Rose from Antique Rose Emporium

As part of this month’s giveaway, we asked author Greg Grant to recommend a few of his favorite nurseries. Naturally, his list emphasizes Texas retailers, but there’s really something here for everyone.

Texas

Antique Rose Emporium (Independence and San Antonio)
Arbor Gate Nursery (Houston/Tomball)
Fanick’s Nursery (San Antonio)
King’s Nursery & Florist (Hwy 84E, Tenaha)

National

Baker Creek Heirloom Seed (Missouri)
Old House Gardens (Michigan)
Plant Delights Nursery (North Carolina)

Do you have a favorite nursery or seed source? Do tell here or on Facebook!

Related Content:

• About this Series

Today, as part of this week’s giveaway, we have a virtual interview with Greg Grant, coauthor of Heirloom Gardening in the South. On Thursday, I’ll share with you some of his favorite Texas garden resources.

A prolific gardener and  writer–in addition to being a horticulturist and lecturer, Greg blogs at ArborGate.com. His garden, farm, and plant introductions have been featured in a number of magazines and newspapers. His email signature file contains this quotation from Abraham Lincoln: “We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”

• My maternal grandparents were Rebel Eloy and Georgia Marquette Emanis. They were the loves of my life and I spent every holiday, vacation, and summer that I could with them at their old farm house in the rural Arcadia community of Deep East Texas. When my grandmother first told me that her old house used to belong to her grandmother and wondered what would become of it when she was gone, I promised her then and there, as a young boy, that I’d look after it. A promise is a promise. My granny passed away several years back and I kept my promise by having the old dog trot house restored to the way it was when my great-great grandparents lived in it and continue to live in it myself. It’s been (and will continue to be) a lifelong project, a true labor of love.

For Greg Grant, this family property and garden are labors of love.

• Whether one notices it or not, it’s very easy to be tied to a place, by your culture, roots, view, regional plants, friends, memories, fragrances, plant collection, yard art, favorite colors, etc. My favorite way of all to establish a connection to a landscape is by surrounding it with “pass-a-long” plants that a person has collected through their lives. Then every trip through the landscape is like a trip down memory lane, watching home videos, or flipping through a photo album. I’m particularly fond of capitalizing on early life or early career deep visual impressions and bringing them to life in some form in a current garden. To be honest, the minute one sets foot in their garden, they’ve established a sense of place. Even if it’s brand new, you start building it from that very moment. I bond very quickly.

• I LOVE my granny’s old Celeste or “sugar fig”. Though I prefer them fresh, she always made fig preserves. I also love my papaw’s black crowder peas that I save seed of every year. I could eat them every day. I also save my own seed of purple hull peas, cream peas, and burgundy okra. I grow an old asparagus that I dug at the old Darnell Place where my parents now live and it of course thrives. I grow some pears from nearby old homesteads as well as pomegranates and muscadines. I do like my purple podded poles beans and heck what Southerner can exist without speckled butterbeans? Yum. I also grow and save heirloom strains of sugar cane, multiplying onions, and perennial leeks. Every time I see one, I take a leek!

• My co-author William C. Welch has been a long time friend and mentor. I first met him after he came and spoke to one of my freshman horticulture classes at Texas A&M on the history of roses. I was so interested I went to his office immediately afterward and we have been fast friends and partners in crime ever since. I soon joined the Texas Rose Rustlers that he helped found and went to work at the Antique Rose Emporium which he also helped establish. I later went to work for the Texas Agricultural Extension Service multiple times, the same organization he still works for. I have a strong interest in regional plants and history so he asked me to help write The Southern Heirloom Garden when I worked for the Extension Service in San Antonio. Heirloom Gardening in the South is a major revision and update of that earlier work. Dr. Welch literally altered my life and garden.

Don’t forget to register for the book giveaway!

It’s January, and that means that most gardeners have visions of seeds and seedlings dancing in their heads.

Naturally, this makes for an ideal time to host a garden book giveaway, right?

I’m going with a personal favorite this month, a new-ish book by William C. Welch and Greg Grant called Heirloom Gardening in the South: Yesterday’s Plants for Today’s Gardens published by Texas A&M University Consortium Press. I say “new-ish” because it’s actually an expanded version of an older text by Welch.

According to the press website, here’s what’s included in the revised edition:

• New essays on naturalizing daffodils, slips and starts, and growing fruit;
• A completely updated and expanded heirloom plant encyclopedia;
• Revised plant lists (bulbs, cemetery plants, etc.);
• New material on the creation of two of the authors’ personal gardens.

Building on the popularity of the original edition, this lively, entertaining, and informative new book from two proven experts will be enthusiastically welcomed by gardeners and horticulturists throughout Texas and the South.

The TAMU folks were gracious enough to send me a review copy.

And let me tell you that I wish that I’d had this book years ago, in its current form. It would have saved a lot of trial and error. With the rising interest in heirloom varieties that are suitable to our region, this revision couldn’t have come along at a better time. If you’re seeking to create an environmentally conscious garden filled with plants evoking Southern homes of old, this is really the book for you.

Note that I found the sections on the author’s creations of their personal gardens especially interesting. In fact, if you come back tomorrow, Greg Grant will fill you in on his special “homestead” project in an exclusive interview.

The details:

• The contest deadline is 5:00 PM on Friday, January 27, 2012.

• To enter, FIRST leave a brief note in the comments section of this post. THEN you can also:

• Tweet a link to this post (just copy me @redwhiteandgrew so I *see* your tweet!)
• Leave a comment on my Facebook page.

Each of the above actions by you counts as a separate entry. That’s right, you can register up to THREE times for this contest.

• The winner must be a resident of the continental U.S. (Sorry, Canadian and Australian friends!) Yes, you can live north of the Mason-Dixon line and still be eligible.

• I’ll announce the winner in an update to this post and on my Facebook page during the week of January 30. The winner will be selected by a random drawing.

Best of luck!

Image source

Related Content:

• About this Series
• My Leap Year Pinterest board

Emergency! was my favorite show as a kid. (Yeah, weird.)

Over the last year, I’ve been inside or near quite a few ambulances. This story is, by far, the most unusual experience that Mom and I have encountered with one to date. I shared it with friends privately last March, but it seems to be a story that deserves a wider audience.

Last Monday, after an appointment with my mom’s new surgeon, Mom and I were waiting down near the River Walk to pick up another patient bound for Fredericksburg. (Yes, we were in an actual “van down by the river” like the old Saturday Night Live skit.)

Of course, it wasn’t exactly fun stuff for us as Mom’s pain meds were wearing off, so we admittedly and briefly considered stealing the van. (To be fair, the driver HAD left the keys in it.)

Anyway, the other lady finally showed up and was loaded into the rear of the van, behind Mom.

The lady waved and nodded at me and I said “Hello” and, at long last, we take off.

We’d gone only a few blocks when, while we were at a red light, Mom called my name and gestured toward a couple about to head into the crosswalk. They had a big dog with them, too–a beautiful fellow.

“That’s a Great Dane,” said the other passenger. “I used to raise those.”

“Oh?” Mom said, trying to be pleasant even though she’s feeling awful.

“Yes,” came the reply. “We had two bitches give birth once at the same time. I was nursing myself at the time, so I put one of the puppies on my breast.”

Slowly it dawned on me what the woman has just said.

To my left, the driver stifled a snicker.

And then suddenly I really wanted to understand the logistics of that.

I turned to look at the rear of the van–only to meet the same glare that my son must see when I admonish him to steer clear of the Cheetos at the grocery store.

“Turn around and don’t say another word,” said Mom.

Like a good girl, of course, I did just as I was told.

(I still call Mom my “story source block.” She laughs.)

Image source #1

Image source #2

Funny, but it was just three years ago that I was saying the exact same thing about Twitter and twitterers. Yes, what works on one social media site seems to translate to others. Go figure.

Here are a few of my favorite garden-friendly folks on Pinterest. Of course, like most people, they drift into other topic areas–and that’s part of the fun of Pinterest, right?

Helen Weis

An Oklahoma designer, Helen is hands-down my favorite pinner. Period. She finds all kinds of cool images for her 104 (!) pin boards. Among my faves is this board featuring her own garden design work, but she’s got all sorts of awesome stuff picked out. Like the simple one called Mercantile. Helen’s pins always make me smile.

Nancy Wallace 

A Georgia garden designer, Nancy’s Pinterest feed is a reliable resource. I’m especially fond right now of her garden decor board.

Andrew Keys

Mr. Keys, a Southern transplant to New England, is well-known for his popular garden podcast, Garden Confidential. He’s not a prolific pinner, but his pins are consistently appealing–especially if you like grasses. (I do!) I just love his Wish List for which each pin is marked with the Latin name. Truly a “curated” pin board.

If you’re on Pinterest, to whom do you look for garden-themed pins?

Oh, and if you are looking for me on Pinterest, I’m here. But if you read this blog regularly, then you likely know that already.

Explore More: 

• If you are a Pinterest newbie–or you just haven’t gotten the hang of it yet, check out this Mashable article. (Also, if you want an invite, let me know.)

• If you are a blogger or own a web site and haven’t started a Pinterest account, here’s why you might want to get going.

• A fun post: Seven Cool Ways to Use Pinterest

• Pinterest-o-Rama, Part 1