Happy Spring Equinox!

Go smell a flower!

ADDENDUM the First:
I should not, apparently, have pre-posted this.

No flowers here. Just 36 degree temperatures and wool coats. And temperatures in the 40s for the foreseeable future!

Oh yeah! How could I forget? It’s spring break in Morgantown! Maybe we’ll get lucky and won’t have a snow emergency this year.

Until the three day weekend.

I can’t wait. I am going to sleep in as much as I can (which I can’t really do that much, since my grandmother refuses to leave her room until we’re up.) and take naps, and relax.

Considering the projected high for the weekend is 51, and that’s on Friday when it’s supposed to be raining (snow projected on Saturday) I don’t think I’ll be doing any gardening.

But I’m still waiting on flower pr0n from S.

Well, most of today was super. Except for the bit with the chimney fire. But OTHER than that, today was super.

Slept in (well, slept in as much as I can, knowing that Grandmom won’t leave her bedroom until we’re up, because she “doesn’t want to disturb” us.)

But more importantly spent several hours getting the garden ready for spring, which involved raking up all the leaves we’d covered the beds with, which showed that a lot of bulbs are starting to come up, and even the day lilies are starting to sprout. Also uncovered my herb garden, and was very pleased to discover that the rosemary seems to have survived the winter. So it looks like being close to the house and covered with leaves allowed it to survive in a zone colder than it normal can take.

I also see that several plants I put in last year seem to have survived the winter, but I’ll have to wait a bit more to see if others survived (including the foxglove). All in all, I’ve got a fair amount of variety right now, so the only planting I really need to do any more is fill in spaces where the occasional plant didn’t survive the winter.

Least pleasant was cleaning out the flower beds on the side of the house with the bearded irises. The greenery never quite dies back (especially when bedded down with leaves) so the beds are a nasty mess to clean up. And I can’t do a whole sale cutting back, because I’ve got spring bulbs coming up. But really, if that’s the worse I have to deal with, I’ve got nothing to complain about.

And I trimmed back most of what I’d left for “winter interest” including the dead heads and stems of the black eyed susans and purple cone flowers. So Although things look extremely bare right now, I see the bones of my garden starting to come back, and that always makes me feel good. And I thinned out the lavender. I felt like I should be doing something with all the stems I was cutting back, but into the compost they went.

We also went to Lowes, where I picked up some seeds. I’m going to try–for the umpteenth year in a row–to grow sunflowers. We’ll see how it works this year. The problem is we don’t have much full sun space (that’s an understatement) so plants like sunflowers and tea roses don’t tend to thrive. Which is too bad, because sun flowers provide food for birds (food other than what we supply in our multiple bird feeders) and because I love the smell of roses. Of course tea roses are no the most environmentally friendly flowers out there. So I should be happy that my rose bushes are thriving. But they just don’t smell the same.

So even though right now my garden looks bare and sad, I can start to picture how things are going to look, and in a month I can start bringing plants outside, and deciding what I want to put in planters on the deck.

It’s always nice to have something to look forward to.

Came home today and saw that the first bulbs are blooming!

So I’ve got new crocus flower pr0n!

Yippee! It might not be spring yet, but my garden is starting to wake up!

As threatened, the first of the flower pr0n!

My grandmother noticed this morning that the pussywillow bush is starting to flower. So I took some pictures then cut 7 stems to bring in to enjoy.

Assuming the cats don’t eat them.

I’m having a crappy day. So here’s some old flower pr0n.

Unfortunately, that rose bush died last summer, but I did plant a nice rhododendron to take it’s place.

I just have to remind myself that in a few weeks the first of my flowers will start blooming, and this year I’m going to start taking pictures again. I bought a small tripod last year, but was too depressed to try it out. This year, I’m going to take LOTS of flower pr0n. Why? Because it’s fun.

Whether we wanted it or not, Michael and I get a new dishwasher for Christmas.

Take home lesson:

Don’t by a GE dishwasher unless you think that replacing the pump after three years, and then having the replacement pump go bad in three months do to a previously unnoticed leak is okay.

We’re going with a Kitchen Aid this time.

I was thinking about the progression of our dishwasher purchases over the years. First, I was thrilled to have something that washed the dishes. The next purchase I had a couple features in mind and wanted better energy efficiency. This time I had a whole slew of features in mind that I wanted the new dishwasher to have, plus I wanted it to be quiet, plus I wanted it to be reliable. At this rate, by the next time I buy a dishwasher, I’ll want one that loads and empties itself.

Probably be denied on that one though.

So today is stock making day. I bought all the veggies last week, but, what with Michael being busy all weekend, never got around to making it. So that was part of today’s plan (after going to the Mountaineer Week Craft Fair). As I was chopping things up and dumping them into the stock pot, I realized that this is about it for my herb garden. The basil is dead, and the oregano is down to the ground, where it will wait out the winter.

But there are some herbs that are still good.

So, if anyone is in town and interested, feel free to come decimate my herb garden. I’ve got multi-color sage, which will die back to the ground over the winter, and insane amount of parsley that won’t last much longer, a gorgeous rosemary plant (that almost certainly won’t last the winter) some thyme, chives (which will probably last the winter, but I do have plenty), and some marjoram, which was okay for stock, but I’m not sure how great it would be for anything else.

In a week or two I’m going to cover it with leaves (maybe that will let the rosemary survive, but I’m not counting on it) and that’ll be it for the year.

Let me know if you’d like to take some of these off my hands. I certainly can’t use them, and it’s a shame to waste them. So I’m begging you: if you’re in Morgantown, please get in touch with me and help clear out my herb garden before everything dies for the year.

Happy autumnal equinox!

Every time I check the weather (I love the animated radar), it looks as if the called for rain is not going to happen.

So I did my part to make it rain.

I just spent an hour watering my flowers.

I am now, officially, freaking the hell out.

We just got the official date that Grandmom will be here, and I am completely worried that we won’t be done in time.

Plus, I’m tired of living in a house that’s completely torn up.

But mostly I’m just completely tired. Maybe I should just go to bed. As they say, the morning is always wiser than the evening.

Thing I really don’t like: Cutting drywall with a utility knife. If I never have to do this again it will be too soon.

Too bad we still have two more sheets to put up.

Cutting drywall with a jig saw? Much easier.

Thing that I really love: Leather gardening gloves. These are the single most useful object I’ve used throughout this project. The leather is thin enough that I can hold screws when wiring sockets and switches, but thick enough to provide protection from general cuts and scrapes and blisters.

I won’t fuss at all when I have to buy a new pair in the spring because these were definitely money well spent.

Where did all this STUFF come from? Does junk have a spawning season or something? Because I don’t know where some of this crap came from.

My basement is an unmitigated disaster area. We’ve torn down a closet, and moved stuff to empty part of the basement, and that meant piling up stuff elsewhere, to the point that the rest of the basement is nearly impassable.

Despite the bags of stuff that are going in the trash or to Christian Help or to anyone that will take it off my hands, I AM going to more thoroughly go through the basement at some point in the NEAR future, and cull even more junk.

Because this is just ridiculous.

I’m sure that if I had the patience to sell things on e-bay I’d make some money off it, but I just don’t care that much. I want space, and I want it NOW.

This is the best thing I’ve seen in my yard this year!
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