Insanely hot and humid yesterday, with storms popping up all over the northeast last night. Interestingly, we didn’t get any rain, but we sure as heck got a lot of wind. Scary wind. I had to run out to the porch with my flashlight a couple of times to batten down the hatches.

What a bizarre 3 days! I told Don I would just like some spring, please. For more than three days at a time.

Today, it is much, much cooler and sunny. I’ll take it.

I bought a long handled lopper the other day, and yesterday found me lopping away at brambles that were climbing up other plants or blocking my way or just plain annoying me. Today, I have to face the music and transport all the cut branches to the woods.

Flowering quince. Note the teeny tiny bug on the leaf.

I love the splash of orange/red.

They’re just about to pop. The heat moved everything along at hyper-speed. The trees have actual green leaves now! What a change in just a few days. It’s almost like Mother Nature was making up for all the spring days that were more like winter days.

This was part of the reason I was hacking at brambles. I had to break through them in order to take a picture of this – my favorite crabapple. I have a question: there are about three or four of these little trees that I would call crabapples. But they’re not all the same. This is the only one that has the pink buds and the flowers are slightly different. Is there more than one kind of crabapple?

Mowing the back forty is on the docket for today, plus cleanup of the aforementioned bramble branches. And some more topsoil. It’s going to rain tomorrow.

Happy Saturday.

I decided to power through my lack of sleep yesterday. I added top soil to some of the garden beds and I mowed the front lawn (both sides). Goodness, I always forget that the first time is always the hardest! I’m not in my best lawn-mowing-shape yet, but I’ll get there.

The lawn slopes downhill and the land behind the house is on a higher elevation. That means that rainwater flows down hill and the grass gets really long – really quickly. I knew I had to mow soon or I would be dealing with constantly clearing a clogged lawnmower.

I took a break halfway through. I do love seeing a freshly mowed lawn and the spring greens that are popping up all over the property are so lush!

I came in, took a shower and laid low for the rest of the day. Today it will be in the eighties and I’m going to do some plant, topsoil, and mulch shopping.

I slept well last night, so I’m feeling much less ragged this morning.

I found the hyacinth bulbs a few years ago when I was digging a new garden bed on the side of the house. I had no idea what kind of bulb they were. They had been buried deep within the soil. So I took a chance and planted them in the big garden bed. Imagine my delight the first time they came out of the ground and I discovered they were hyacinths! They’re awfully pretty this year.

This is one of the Italian pots we purchased a few weeks ago. I’ve filled it with lavender, which should do well on the very sunny funky patio.

And here are the other two. I’m not sure what I will plant in them, but I’ll figure it out.

The pansies are keeping me going as I wait for my garden plants to grow and flower. They’re so darn cheery!

I hope your weather has changed for the better and that you are able to get outside and do some therapeutic gardening! Speaking for myself, it makes an enormous difference in the quality of my life. After many years without a garden, I started gardening in earnest at our rental in San Diego and then when we first moved out east, I asked my landlord if I could put in a little garden on the side of our rental cottage. Seriously, I now wonder what the heck I did all those years without a garden! Tended my houseplants, I guess. I still do that.

Happy Wednesday.