Springtime Shifts

Its been a good winter....again, and I am loping on into a New Year, February already a new notch in my belt. There are big fat buds on the apple tree that leans over our fence, the snails are out doing war  with the cole crops in my garden every night and the acacia trees are flouncing along with their yellow blossoms all down the freeways. Its the first of the really solidly spring blooms...before the poppies are spilling down the hills like orange sprinkles or the bottle brush trees are a standing in fierce crimson array on every street corner. So wonderful to live in a place where winter means green, and lush and damp fog laden moss. I have to get my tail down to the redwoods again, haven't been for a couple of shameful months...the trees call in this kind of weather.

I have noticed that in the waste space along the freeways there are some old forgotten orchard trees...I saw them for the first time last year and assumed they were cherries but missed a chance to go see them close up because we were so busy with baseball. They are just opening to peak bloom right now and I managed to park and run over to check some out on a side street near an overpass. They are not cherries, but maybe some kind of plum or peach. I am curious to see what/ if any fruit develops as the summer goes on. Lovely to feel homey enough where I live to be able to start picking out little curiosities like that to keep tabs on.

I am starting to feel pretty settled. I have places for most everything in the house, I am starting to feel like our possessions are trimmed down to an amount that more closely match this space. I have people to call in case we are trouble, know the neighbors, have the mailman's name down and even occasionally run into folks we know at the grocery store. Its such a good feeling to nest in more firmly and feel the amazing mix of wonder at the novelties but comfort over the known.

Spring is coming and I am working on tuning up my life and schedule...working out all the little ways things can be tweaked and adjusted and let go and removed. Isn't it wonderful to remember that we are the stewards of our own lives?

Here's What's New Right Now:

• I have been making meals for families with new babies or sick members at our church and homeschool group as a little way to contribute to the community. 
• I am cutting back on fruit and coffee and going back to a more strict interpretation of paleo eating.
• I am trying a new sleep schedule (to bed before my husband) to try to get 8 hours and still have morning quiet time alone.
• Minimization has come back into my life in a firm manner.
• Watching the boys play piano is inspiring and I have been planning to get my fiddle back out for tune up and learning.
• I am painting weekly now thanks to standing babysitter dates.
• We are not doing baseball this spring.
• Taking Zumba in addition to yoga.
• I am signing up for another year with Classical Conversations.
• We are planning a big trip to Italy this spring!
• I cut a bunch of length off my hair after it kept breaking and breaking. 

What are you shifting and changing in your life this season?

A Garden Plot

Photo credit to: http://www.thegardenlady.org/

This morning started out so chill and bland and then as the day tumbled on it got brighter and clearer until there was warm golden sunlight pouring in on the potted fig, leaving cozy puddles of light on the floor. If only we had a cat. But we don't, instead we have me. So, I sat in the sun pools and read books to the boys and vacuumed the rug and then flipped through another sheaf of garden catalogs that came up the steps in the arm of the postman.

Nib, big book lover

Ru, my biggest book hound. Consuming Mr. Popper's Penguins as fast as I will read.

Here are five garden problems I have at the moment

1.  I need to figure out proper up-keep for a gravel drive. Our gets all weedy every two minutes, and short of weeding it by hand meticulously (which I did do once or twice last year), how do folks really pull it off?
2. I need a reminder to put in fall veggie crops. I always, always forget. Maybe one of those, send-yourself-an-email-in-the-future things would solve this. Hmmmm.....
3. I need more chives. They are great for eating, they're completely fuss-free and they're a beautiful landscaping plant and rabbits don't eat them. That said, I can't bear to buy them. Everyone has chives, right? I'll have to get some divisions from someone.
4. I am looking for some big shallow circular planters to nab. Preferably free! Am keeping an eye out on curbs. I want to stack them up in graduated sizes inside the giant cement planter on the lawn to make a towering kind of fountain effect. Then...I'm going to fill the whole thing with a cascade of strawberry plants.
5. I have to figure out what can live under yew plants. Last year they looked like they had been plopped down into the sea of wood chips overnight. Very barren. Maybe I just need a few impatiens?

And here are five plants I'm most excited to be planting this year:

1. A bridalwreath bush. This is a beautiful shrub that has everything but fragrance. It looks like a big frothy white fountain in May or so and is so covered with little white blossoms that you can scarcely see the plant itself at all. When I was a little girl I sighed over this bush and promised myself I'd buy one when I saw it blooming, every spring in forgotten doorways of abandoned homesteads in Northern Michigan. It is one of those steadfast shrubs that outlives occupants with ease. And you have to admit the name is high romance.
2. Strawberry plants! Hooray! Am so excited to start putting in the small fruits.
3. A climbing rose. I'm thinking to buy a deeply ruffled, scented yellow variety...the kind that blooms from June till frost. Still not sure if it should live in the back and climb up over the basement door in the stone foundation or in the front to camouflage the electrical wires and box on the the face of the house.
4. A double mock-orange. This is another old fashioned charmer. A big frothy shrub that blooms all multi-petaled white during the garden's peak. Just trying to figure out where to put this one too. Too many options. I kind of fancy the idea of putting it by the back door where I'll smell it every time we walk in and out. It has a wonderful, sweet smell. I plan to be quite bowled over by it. 
5. High bush blueberries. I just dug holes and put all five of them in the ground. I know it seems early but the shrubs I ordered came in the mail and they were still dormant so I gave it a go. The ground isn't frozen and so I am hoping for success. Some are going to fill holes in our hedge and some will mix into the perennial border along the front of the house.

And the top five changes I'm making since last season:

1. I will put something in the giant cement planter in the backyard. It won't be a naked, slightly weedy odd spot in the yard. My plan is: strawberries!
2. I will mulch thoroughly and often with grass clippings to keep plants from getting weedy or wilty. Have to locate a safe source for bags of discarded, non-treated bits though. Can't just go picking them curbside if you wanna be clean and green. Hmm....still thinking on that.
3. I will get my garden in early! I was too lax last year and didn't realize that the hawks nesting above our house keep the rabbit population at bay until after midsummer when they're young fledge and suddenly whatever is in the ground and thriving is all there will be. Plants not established or tall will be munched. Not to mention I'm having a baby in June. I have no fall-back plan. I must plant early.
4. I will keep the decorative planters full of pretty things. I did this once or twice last year but there were some real odd, patchy arrangements at certain times. No reason to let little contained, manageable bits get lost. I can do it!
5. I'm carving a path through the lawn from the front door to the driveway. Everyone walks that way anyhow so you might as well go with the flow. I'm excited about putting in little stepping stones and dividing my thyme to go in between. Can't have too many pretty winding paths around!

What is on your green little hearts today? Have any solutions to my five conundrums or some exciting planting plans or changes of your own? I'd love to hear the deep, dark dish on all of it. My thumb needs a little fodder this time of year, we can't simply go mad while we wait you know!