Orange Love

The tangerines are happy in our garden this morning. We're juicing a lot of Valencia oranges too. Everything is thriving, now that the rains have moved through and the sun is back to give them life.

And the excellent little "Juic It" workhorse carries on...

When I was living in the Pacific Northwest, working full time in Telecommunications, leading sustainability discussion groups, and beginning the life of a creative freelancer... I wanted to find a business name that would fit whatever direction I might stretch into. I like to write. I enjoy working with my voice. I'm thoroughly fascinated by the art of letterpress and hand-bound books. I like to work with beads and wire. At the time, I was into arranging flowers from the garden and even did a semi-commercial Mother's Day floral operation one year.

I took my inspiration from a pottery business called Butter Bean. Something with a wonderful scent and great graphic possibilities would be a nice naming direction, I thought to myself. I considered Vanilla Bean, Pomegranate, Persimmon... all lovely and calling up rich images from the natural world. I settled on Sweet Orange Productions back in 1998, with not an orange tree in sight!

Maybe it was a premonition, maybe it was an intention forming, maybe it was California calling me home, but I could not have fully imagined that I would now be living in Southern California, blissfully married and growing citrus in my own garden at the edge of a canyon, behind our 1915 Craftsman Bungalow. Home Sweet Orange.