And It Was a Good, Good Friday

What a week! First there was the joyous descent of the robins into our neighbourhood on Monday. I went for a walk at sunset, rabbits scampered, birds sang and darted from tree to tree visiting each other, the great owl hooted, the deer ran across the field, coyote howls rose up from the ravine, the rabbits nibbled the newly exposed grass. (Re-reading this paragraph, it sounds a little 'Snow White'. Can spring make one giddy? It must.)

This entire week was glorious leading up to Easter weekend. Yesterday we shoveled a foot or so of snow off the patio. Then we came back at noon and scraped and chipped the last few inches of ice off.

We even dug out the baby spruce my dad grew and gave to us to commemorate the birth of our son. After a long winter completely buried under the snow I'm sure the photosynthesis was like a jolt of pure joy.

I didn't tackle the north facing side where my bird bath peeked out as well for the first time in months (And I won't even mention the Christmas decorations that re-emerged in the front!)

Then I had my brilliant idea - yeah, it happens - to have an impromptu picnic. It's amazing how festive sandwiches can be when eaten outside for the first time in many months. I suspect I could have served dryer lint for lunch and we would still have eaten it and grinned at each other.

After our meal my little son went up to nap and I curled up on a lounger in the sun with a carafe of tea to read my new book, Grayling Cross, while the birds and squirrels chirped and chattered in the trees. Really, does anything beat the first day in the garden? I fink nottle.

I even bared my 'sole' to the sun (couldn't resist doing it - or this bad pun :) )

Of course, I had to poke around a little where the snow was melted and look for signs of life. This blurry photo is the columbine (Aquilegia "Biedermeirer") I planted last year showing new growth. Yay!

Today was a family visit to the country to my sister's where the kids all played outside in the sun and ran around in their new rubber boots while the dogs barked and tried to join in. Have I mentioned how I love Spring?

I hope you are all enjoying a wonderful Easter weekend with lots of sunshine, family fun and garden dreams!

when you sing in your whisky voice

Ladies and Gentlemen, it's getting kinda slushy around these parts. When I'm wandering the trails I try to stay on the trodden path because the snow there is packed down and there is less possibility I will sink through to my knees. I can see the deer tracks really well in this damp snow and I know I am not that far behind them.

[These narcissus taken May 2010 in neighbour's front garden. Aren't they the cutest!]

The days lately have been brilliant sunshine and one section of my trail is closed off due to flooding. Greenish yellow water followed me down another trail today in gushes staining the snow in front of it. I bet that section of trail will be closed off by tomorrow. Crows are wheeling through the neighbourhood and the magpies are affronted.

Given all this extravagance of wakening earth after a hard, snowpacked winter, I can only think of one poem that really captures it. Here is my old university sweetheart...

...when you sing in your whisky voice
the grass rises on the head of the earth
and all the trees are put on edge...

Welcome back, Miss Spring. Like a gin-soaked favourite auntie with the best stories, hugging us all and smearing lipstick on the kids, you are bit late for the party, but we are still tickled pink that you are here.

Mad as a March Hare

“With rushing winds and gloomy skies The dark and stubborn Winter dies: Far-off, unseen, Spring faintly cries, Bidding her earliest child arise; March!”
~ Bayard Taylor

Spring's voice is still faint here, but the rise in birdsong in the neighbourhood acts as an advance party.

I slipped away a couple weeks ago to an inspiration garden at a local garden centre. It was just the tonic I needed.

Dancing water, the freshest greens, white impossibly delicate blooms

Sweet displays that smiled winsomely, asking to come home with me (and did)

Oranges and lemons growing in profusion, heavy and fragrant

And a table set just for me. If there had been a teapot on it, I would have thought a March Hare had been expecting me - but that would just be mad. :)

Happy Spring! For you GWN gardeners, it's closer that it seems. :)

How a Frozen Ground Gardener Stays Sane - or Mostly So

What do you do when January seems like it has lasted five months already and your garden is under several feet of snow and the city keeps promising the plows will come and the wind chill is straight out of Mordor? You get creative. You play. You get goofy even. (Goofy not being a stretch for me, say some).

I am dancing to salsa music. Actually I should say working out to it because, really, I haven't mastered enough of the steps yet to say I am cha-cha-chaing. No matter. The music makes me want to move my butt and moving my butt I am, even if it hurts. I guess that's why they call the class Salsa Burn. Oh, my favourite move? It's called Washing the Windows. Soooo much better than really washing windows. Trust me.

I am drumming. Yes, I wanna bang on me drum all day! I took a workshop in Japanese drumming in the fall and loved it. So for January I decided to try hand drumming. What fun! It is a rather intimate experience, actually, with a little more 'touchy-feely' focus than I was expecting, but nobody in our little circle has gotten to the point of oversharing yet so I'm good. There is something quite joyful about playing in sync with others and just having hella fun. This week we actually did a little dancing with the drums. My science-minded husband raises his eyebrows and nods with that poker face he has perfected when I tell him what we have been up to. Then he raises the newspaper up over his face again. I think I've heard snorts from behind that paper, but it must be the dry air making his sinuses act up. Right?

For moments of real cabin fever, I have emergency seed catalogue stations around the house. Quick, page 12, the hellebores....ah....that's better...sigh. Breathe.

And I am bringing flowers in for mainline therapy. These blue hyacinth's are my latest fix. They make the house smell heavenly and give me something to stare at besides the white outside. Of course, I have taken a million photographs of them. But that's okay. It does seem to help.

Otherwise, you might hear a bellow across the frozen prairies of "Heeeeeere's Johnny!" And we don't want that now, do we?

Hope all the GWN (Great White North) gardeners out there are finding ways to keep the winter blahs at bay. Just remember, February is shorter. Better be, is all I can say. Where is that axe, anyway?

Dreamer, Nothing but a Dreamer...

Snow day! We are having what the weather personalities call a "weather system". All scheduled activities cancelled today. Nothing to do but bake little baby cinnamon rolls for all, and, of course, to dream.

Now, what does one dream of when the temperature is plummeting and one's garden looks like this?

This.

Dear Summer, I have the fondest memories of our time together last year. Thinking of you often.

xoxo
Ms. S