December brings with it many joys and celebrations, but also the challenges of hectic rounds of social activities and preparations for feasts and festivities. While this frantic activity is in full swing, this month reflects a quieting down period in the garden. It is a time when much of the work of the past three seasons is done and now it is time to pause, ponder, peruse and perhaps dream.

Pause to look over your garden or lack of one and then ponder – what to change, what to move, what to add, what to try out, what to dare. Browse seed catalogues or books at local libraries to stimulate your sense of garden design possibilities. Use the internet or the local libraries for resources, but also take a few minutes to glance over gardening magazines or books at a bookstore as a break in the midst of holiday preparations and endless errands. In those quiet moments let yourself return to the sanity of nature and its natural rhythms – fortunately so present here in Point Roberts. Perusing also encourages you to dream – to make small changes to your garden or to dare to plan something bigger.

Gardening is a creation process. When I worked in Toronto real estate, we used to call this going from ‘concept to completion,’ visualizing goals and then taking steps to realize them. Visualizing goals is not an easy process for some, but it is a skill one can develop and improve upon with a little practice. Visualizing or re-visualizing a garden involves practicing the art of dreaming of the perfect garden even if there is no such thing as a perfect garden. “Is it not so much more enjoyable to travel than to arrive?” the sage, Liu Tun-Chen of Suchou Gardens, China, once asked. So, now in these dormant days of December, how to put into practice the dreaming skill, applied to gardening?

Last year I was inspired to begin a new experiment I called the “Dare to Dream Project.” The experiment involves writing out goals and dreams, no matter how small or large - preferably on 5 x 7 index cards or in a notebook and then keeping these goals and dreams to yourself. Do not broadcast them. This seems to be a key part in the process. The magic is in writing out your heart’s desires and then setting them aside and letting the natural flow of life move them along to fulfillment. Try doing this with pictures of plants, trees and shrubs you come across in your perusing. Collect or create picture collages of border ideas and plant groupings that strike you.

Daring to dream may lead you to some much-wanted spiritual reflection during the holiday season. The results of this effort may be a deeper spiritual satisfaction with the processes of life and its seasons. Gardens can be the reference point that link us to our past and yet bridge us to a desired future, while anchoring us in the present moment, the point from which we can shift or adjust right now.

Holiday gift-giving of garden-related items is a sure way to connect with the gifts of Mother Nature. Here are a few thoughts, some inspired by “The New Twelve Month Gardener, A West Coast Guide” by Hungerford Et Al Stevens:

Give the most precious gift of your time to the elderly, sick or handicapped or someone stressed-out by their garden; for example an hour of weeding, pruning or shoveling topsoil.

You could make up some gift certificates for different gardening services and include a couple of special seasonal gifts such as an offer to chauffeur someone to a bulb field in the spring or to take a walk among some of the beautiful gardens in our area.

Give friends gift vouchers ($15 each) for the Point Roberts Garden Tour in mid-July 2010 and plan on coming as a group to see the fascinating gardens.

Order a selection of gardening catalogues and present them in a bag with a good bottle of wine, virgin olive oil, sweet-smelling lavender and catnip sachets or some homemade goodies, perhaps found at the Point Roberts Craft Fair being held at the community center on December 5 and 6.

Make a donation to Lifeforce in a friend’s name to help protect the whale pods in Georgia Strait or to PAWS to help rescue cats and dogs in Point Roberts.

Or perhaps just say Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah and Peace on Earth with some fresh cut greens and pinecones tied up with a lovely ribbon to hang on a friend’s door or fencepost.

One last item to stimulate your dreaming and your gardening plans in 2010: consider visiting the website of Conscious Media Network and their interview of Leonid Sharashkin discussing the popular book series “The Ringing Cedars of Russia” and the mystical Anastasia. Perhaps afterwards you might consider conditioning your gardening seeds in the special way described that is said to make the produce taste better and be uniquely healing. Website link: http://www.consciousmedianetwork.com/members/lsharashkin.htm

Wishing you Peace on Earth and Peace in Earth throughout the coming year. 

Bev Mar is an Interfaith Minister who marries couples of different faiths in heart-centered weddings around the world and studies various forms of hands-on and vibrational healing. New to Point Roberts, she is herself daring to dream of a new garden here along with her husband Andy, and cats.