The May Garden

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Today I had as my goals for the outside to water my newly planted annuals.  The idea that I need to be watering at the beginning of May almost fries my brain.  Ordinarily we're begging for an end to the rain at this time of year.  Nevertheless, the pots are looking and feeling dry, and so it seemed like a good reason to get out and enjoy the sunshine.  Also, I was hoping to get little Smitty down into the woods for a walk.  I tried to coax Gracie outside too, but she refused.  (And she absolutely hates the woods.)  

First, I filled the bird feeders.  I tried sitting for a while trying to get a picture of the blue jays stealing peanuts from the peanut feeder, but they seemed too shy to come around while I was sitting there.  They were all around in the tree tops, and I could see them.  Still, they would not approach the feeder.  Only this little brown bird was brave enough.  He wasn't very cooperative with having this picture taken.

Still it was nice sitting in the shade of the fir trees, and I could see a nice view of Mt. St. Helens.

Smitty was following me around, and I decided that was as good a time as any to try taking him for a walk in the woods.  I tried the other day, but I couldn't find him.  Today, he was very enthusiastic and went hard charging down the hill with the hair on his back standing on end.  I can never decide if that's fear or excitement.

When one ventures into the woods, one must first find a good spider stick.  My arm wasn't long enough to hold this any farther away from my body and still snap my picture.  (Go Gadget Arms!  Tell me you know who Inspector Gadget is.)  Anyway, this stick is about three feet long, which is the perfect length for a spider stick.  The spider stick is to hold in front of oneself so as to avoid being spider webbed.  Obviously, being spider webbed is deadly.  (Consider this a safety tip.)

The spider stick also works well to clear the winter's droppings from the chairs that are placed at various spots down in the woods.  When I used to walk in the woods with George, I was always wanting to sit down and enjoy the sound of the wind and the quiet.  Rather than sit on the ground, we put two chairs at three different locations along the path.  They collect a lot of dead stuff during the winter.

Putting my trusty spider stick to good use, I cleared off the mess.  It's still dirty.  The woods are not a good place to wear white.

Despite Smitty's initial enthusiasm for venturing into the woods, his first move was to climb part way up a tree.  I warned him not to go too high, and then he vanished.  Not up the tree...but somewhere.  I decided not to go any farther, and instead walked back toward the house.  After a few minutes, he came crashing out of the brush making his "distress meow".  He has a distinct sound that he makes when he's lonely, frustrated, seemingly sad, or fearful.  At least those are the times I've noticed he does it.  Clearly, he is nervous about venturing into the woods.  He was happy to go back to the house and kept glancing nervously back in the direction of the trees.

Toward the end of his life, George refused to go walking in the woods with me, and I always thought it was because he'd become less able to run without pain.  Now that I think about it, he stopped going with me around the time that the bobcat starting showing up.  The bobcat comes up from the woods, and we've also seen him going in that direction.  It could be that he's marked the territory down there, and the cats are nervous about it.  (On the other hand, it doesn't seem to bother Uno.)  Still, when it comes to this sort of thing, I always trust kitty instincts.  Smitty seemed very glad to be walking in the opposite direction.

We decided to walk around the garden instead.  The rhodies are starting to open now.  We have them in all colors.  Apricot:

Pinky:

Lavender.  This one is just starting to open.  When they are completely open, they look almost like orchids.

There are some others, but their buds are still closed up tight.

Also, the lilac is starting to bloom.  This one came home with us one Mother's Day.  We met up with the kids for breakfast on Mother's Day and some women were selling these in the parking lot of the restaurant.  Ours was dead, and so we replaced it with this one.  This is the first year it's had some size to it, and I think I might get a good number of flowers for the first time.

Also our sad little dogwood is finally starting to give us a bit of a show.  It's still a small tree, and these apparently are very slow growing.  It's taken this one forever to get any size at all.

It has a surprisingly dark pink flower.

This azalea is in full bloom now.  It is the deepest shade of fuchsia.

The previous one is in full sun most of the day.  The next one is in the shade about half of the day.  It is a little slower to bloom, but it is beginning to open.

Here it is close up.

And this pinkley-purp one (that is a Stanbroism) is in the shade most of the day.  It's flowers are just now starting to open.

The iris are heading up.  This is when I start rooting for them to bloom while it's dry.  They are gorgeous if they can bloom between rainy periods.  If not, the buds fill up with rain water and rot.  (Sad face.)

Oh and here's one more lonely tulip that the squirrels forgot to eat last year.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrr.

The wisteria above the front door is in full bloom now.  So pretty.

When we planted this, we didn't realize that wisteria can grow into veritable trees.  Hopefully, we won't have to chop this one down to keep it from moving the house off its foundation.

So far, so good.

I moved my "Garden of Weeden" sign over to the herb garden.  Usually it lives in the vegetable garden.  I'm thumbing my nose at the vegetable garden this year in repayment for its past two seasons of failure.  I got this sign at a recycled garden art show quite a few years ago.  Last year, I repainted the lettering.  The garden decided to take on the label as its personal code of conduct.

Speaking of the herb garden, look at my chive blossoms.  They are days away from bursting into bloom.

I'm seeing chive blossom vinegar in my future.

So that's our walk for today.  After moving the sign, I came back inside to write this post.  Now I'm going to sew.