Once upon a gourd......

I was thinking about something today as I was moving a bunch of gourds from the "dirty" pile to the "working" pile. At my place, the life cycle of a gourd does not end with the dying of the vine. My gourds live on to become a myriad of other things. There are multiple uses of the same gourd in its lifetime from the woody seed until it moves from my possession. I buy a lot of my gourds from a lovely lady in Collinsville, Ms. She and her husband have a farm and grows such a wide variety of gourds that range in size from humongous things to tiny things no bigger than fig! They sell their gourds not only on their farm but also on their website .. http://gourdgracious.homestead.com/gourds.html . Like I said, I buy most of my gourds from them and have always been extremely happy with each order from Mr. and Mrs. Davis! Still occasionally, a gourd will pop up in one of the gardens here. This is not a rare occurrence when you think of just how many gourds that I cut each year...a seed is bound to find its way into the yard. It is always a happy find when I see a tiny vine sprouting in the roses or veggie garden. I nurture it just as I would something that I planted and the vine never ceases to provide me with a free art piece in the making! This is the story of one such gourd.

I usually work on my art projects in the living room and somehow I must have dropped a gourd seed. This seed was then sucked up in the vacuum cleaner during one of my daily chores. I have a tendency to empty my vacuum cleaner canister into the garden..more oft than not, the rose garden. The strange little seed somehow escaped notice of the birds, squirrels and raccoons and soon sprouted. It quickly grew into a healthy vine that nigh took over the rose bushes. Several weeks later, there were little ecru-colored blooms dotted around on the vine. So began the life of a little gourd. Out of a dozen or so baby gourds that were on the vine, this was the only one that was not eaten by some critter. The little gourd grew quickly and soon was about nine inches in diameter! It was a beauty! The bright, lime-green skin darkened with age to a deep olive color and then the vine started to turn brown.

By this time, it was getting late into Fall. The gourd vine was not to last much longer so the gourd itself had to toughen up if it was going to override the winter. The green skin soon turned to a golden brown and the top layer started rotting away. This caused some really ugly black and brown blotches to cover the gourd. Well, at least this made it a bit unappetizing for any potential diners! The gourd was still quite heavy and not ready to pick. I watched the changes in the gourd. I knew that it would soon be time to pull it from the now dead vine. I would tote it inside and let it continue its drying out stage. About mid-December, I picked up the gourd and stuck in in the entryway on a high, out of the way shelf. There the gourd sat for almost a year! To be honest, I forgot about it! By the time, I "refound" my gourd, it was light and woody-feeling. I pulled it from the shelf and scrubbed off all of the dried outer layer! What a beautiful under layer! Now the gourd was ready to be used in Fall decorations! Some brightly colored leaves and a variety of seed pods were combined with several gourds to make an interesting decoration! The gourd sat on the shelf for the duration of Fall.

By early December, I was ready to pull this gourd down again! Not just because it was time to change out the decorations but I was ready to find a new use for this gourd! I cut, cleaned out the seeds (and probably dropped a few!) and the painted the gourd. This one received a beautiful poinsettia and holly motif! The gourd was now a Christmas box! The life of this gourd will continue now for many years. It has become a trinket box or Christmas decoration to be enjoyed for years to come! Such is the long, long life of a gourd!