With Easter past and all the guests gone and the feasting finished, the world settled into a steady pattern last week. We had wonderful weather. Warm sunny days brought me renewed energy and ambition to accomplish projects that had waited, some of them since last fall. First thing on Monday, I drew up a list of what I wanted to achieve during the week – redoing the kiwi trellis, planting strawberries, clearing winter debris from the woodland garden, cleaning the upper section of the barn, fixing the dilapidated pepper box, and the continual task of weeding and tending flowerbeds. I took a brisk morning walk around the property surveying and assessing, making note of tasks to do. It was 17° at dawn (the coldest it would be all week), but it felt so good to be out in the sunshine with frost lingering in the shadows and the dawn chorus of the birds filling the air. And all the while I was walking, plans and images ran through my mind of what I hoped awaited us as the season advanced.
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| Sunset last night. |
Spring is a season of hope. With winter’s long sleep behind us and summer’s abundance ahead, spring is a sweet transition decorated with flowers. It doesn’t last long and that makes it more precious. I find myself wishing sometimes, when I’m in the midst of it, that spring would go on forever, but that would weaken its magic. The brevity of the early spring flowers is part of what makes them beautiful. If we had them with us all the way through spring and into summer and fall, their loveliness would somehow be diminished.
Monday morning, after taking my walk and making my projects list, I waited for the world to warm up a little before going out to begin work. The sun is growing stronger now as the days lengthen and by 9:00 it had warmed to 50°, so I set out. I met Kurt out in the big garden and we prepared the new strawberry bed. A little later, Kailie and Ian and Miriam came out to help. Then Kailie and Ian left for home and Miriam stayed and helped me plant 100 new strawberry plants. By the time we finished it was 68°, perfect weather for working outdoors, so I kept on working.
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| Kurt watering out in the big garden. |
My next project was cleaning up my small garden where I have my raised beds and pepper box. First I weeded the raised beds and turned the soil in them. Half of my pepper box, which is made out of salvaged windows, was badly rotted, so next I dismantled that half and Miriam helped me cart the broken and rotten panes away. When Hannah got home later, she helped me reassemble the box with the remaining good windows.
Later in the afternoon, a rose bush I’d ordered arrived and Miriam helped me plant it. It is a climbing rose called Gertrude Jekyll, named after the famous British gardener. I always pronounce her last name with a short “e”, Jeck-ul like heckle, but the Brits pronounce it with a long “e”, Jee-kul, like treacle. I guess they would know. [I found out they also say Dr. Jee-kul and Mr. Hyde.] Here is the blurb from Gertrude’s official website:
“Gertrude Jekyll (1843-1932), created some 400 gardens in the UK, Europe and America; her influence on garden design has been pervasive to this day. She spent most of her life in Surrey, England, latterly at Munstead Wood, Godalming. She ran a garden centre there and bred many new plants. Some of her gardens have been faithfully restored, wholly or partly, and can be visited.”
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| Gertrude Jekyll. |
I’d like to visit some of her gardens some day. Her namesake rose is gorgeous. Here is the blurb from its official website at David Austin Roses:
“Always one of the first English Roses to start flowering, its perfect scrolled buds open to large, rosette-shaped flowers of bright glowing pink. The beautiful, perfectly balanced Old Rose scent is often described as being the quintessential Old Rose fragrance. A vigorous rose; it will form a medium-sized, upright shrub. Named for the famous garden designer and author.”
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| Gertrude Jekyll. |
Planting it in my chilly Zone 5/4 garden is a bit of a risk, but one that I’m willing to take. I need roses.
When I’m working in the garden, I often feel a sense of profound serenity. Garden work is a form of meditation for me where my inner thoughts flow quietly along while at the same time I’m keenly aware of the world around me. As I work, I get into a rhythm. I become very aware of my breathing, how my hands are moving, what the soil feels like, what the air smells like. I hear the world around me – birds singing, the far off sound of the sheep in the neighbor’s pasture, the occasional peeper in the distant beaver pond. At times I reach a level of transcendence, a feeling of peaceful harmony when it seems like the earth is strong and vigorous and its Creator is wise and I am His child and completely enfolded in all of it. And then, suddenly that mood will break. I’ll realize that I’ve been kneeling too long and my back aches and my knees are sore and I’m sunburnt and thirsty. Then it’s time to stop and retreat to softer and less lofty comforts for a while.
As the week progressed, each day grew warmer. On Tuesday we hit 70°, Wednesday 75°, Thursday 78°, and Friday we hit 87°, which is like high summer here. It was wonderful. Every day I spent every moment I could working outdoors. I accomplished a lot. With Miriam’s help, I finished redoing the kiwi trellis, and just in time, the vines were starting to break bud. Each day I took a section of the long border and made my way down it weeding, digging up and relocating plants. [I might have stopped for a little rest in the greenhouse one afternoon and dozed off for a minute.] I set up new bluebird houses in various parts of the yard. I took all my overwintered potted plants out, gave them a thorough dousing of neem oil, and set them on the back porch to acclimate before setting them outdoors.
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| My new kiwi trellises. |
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| Weeding in progress in the long border. |
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| Miriam caught me taking a brief siesta. |
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| Potted plants on the back porch. |
With this long spell of warm weather, spring has accelerated quickly. The maple trees have burst into bloom. Their blossoming is subtle. Their flowers are small and not flamboyant, but en mass, they make the trees glow with a red or chartreuse haze. The lilacs have budded. And out in the orchard, the plum tree is about to blossom and the apples and pears are breaking bud. This is when I get extra anxious for the sake of my fruit trees. Having been coaxed by the warm days to bud out, they are vulnerable to a hard freeze. From now until June, I will anxiously watch the weather forecast. There is nothing I can do to protect my trees but pray over them, and I do that every time I pray.
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| Maple blossoms. |
Out in the long border, the hyacinths and daffodils are blooming. While weeding near a patch of hyacinths on a warm and calm afternoon last week, their scent was intoxicating. I didn’t plant any tulip bulbs last fall and I’m regretting it now. I didn’t plant any because they frustrate me. They are a favorite food of the deer and rabbits that browse in my garden. I’ve tried different things in the past to dissuade them, with only a little success. But I love tulips and any that survive being eaten are my delight. This fall I will plant a hundred of them and do my best to get them to bloom. I miss them this spring.
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| Hellebores. |
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| Hyacinths. |
Miriam and Hannah left on Friday afternoon to spend the weekend at the Foster’s house in Toledo. From the reports we’ve received, it sounds like they are having a great time. They will be home later tonight.
Yesterday I took a break after a week of hard work in the yard. Stacey and I went to the temple. We picked up our friend Esafe on our way to Palmyra and he visited some of the Church History sites while we were in the temple. He went to the Smith Farm and the Sacred Grove and then to the Hill Cumorah. When Stacey and I were done at the temple, we went with him into Palmyra and toured the Grandin Press where the Book of Mormon was first printed. Then we drove over to Pittsford and had lunch at the huge Wegman’s flagship store. The drive through Western New York to and from Palmyra was beautiful. With this warm weather, the trees and fields are rushing into pure spring loveliness. We saw hundreds of forsythia bushes, magnolia trees, and ornamental cherry trees in full bloom, maples on the hillsides with their subtle flower colors, and vivid bright green willows in first leaf. At the temple, the flower beds were full of daffodils and hyacinths. We saw so much beauty.
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| Daffodils at the temple. |
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| Daffodils at the temple. |
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| The Palmyra Temple. |
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| Lunch at Wegman's with Esafe. |
Late last night, just before midnight, we got a call from Daniel. He told us that Raven is having problems with her pregnancy. They ended up in Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane where Raven will be on bed rest for the next four weeks. She is in Labor and Delivery room 2029. She is thirty weeks along at this point. Prayers for them would be appreciated.
We are home from church now, sitting in a very quiet house, just the two of us, wondering what to make for lunch. Sitting here and looking back over the last week, I see that, although I got a lot done, I didn’t accomplish all of things on the list I devised on Monday. It is warm again today, but it doesn’t look like the week ahead will be as warm. It will be more like normal April. It looks like we’ll get some rain midweek, which will be nice. I’ll keep working on my list and no doubt will add more to it. Tending this little piece of earth is an ever ongoing job and I love doing it.
Good Sabbath.
