Blooms and Buds

It turned out to be a pretty nice day yesterday...mostly cloudy, but no rain. We set free the cats, and then I needed to water things in the greenhouse. It's a new item on my daily checklist, and it takes me a while to get into the swing of it. While I was out, I took a walk around to see what's new. Mainly, I was checking on blooms already in progress to see how far they'd come.

Of course, the azaleas are delighting me right now.

The apple tree is covered in buds, and they are starting to open.

Since yesterday's image of the purple poppy bud was blurred, I took another. I'm so excited about this!

The echinacea is coming on strong. One of these is a very tall plant. I need to put a tomato cage around it before it gets too big, but I'm not sure which is which.

The second rhododendron is starting to open.

The first one is turning into a mass of blooms.

While I was standing there, this guy flew up. This is a cabbage white butterfly. The males have just one spot on their wings (like this one), while the females have two spots.

I think I'll have enough lilac blossoms to make jelly if I want to...which I do...but I'd have to clip the lilac blossoms at just about this stage. Not sure I want to sacrifice them.

I'm feeling more optimistic about the dogwood. It looks as if flowers are forming.

The golden chain tree continues on its way, seemingly unaware that it fell over this past winter. I think it's going to survive.

The clematis is covered in blossoms now. So pretty.

The andromeda is at its very best right now.

Here's a man mending fences. He doubles as my hairdresser for the time being.

So here's what he's doing. This kind of fencing is made from fiberglass. We chose it because the black color kind of disappears from view, unlike a chain link fence...as an example. It "hangs" from "cables" that are strung from pole to pole. Originally, there were plastic ties that held it in place. This fence was erected some 15 years ago, and in the intervening time, the plastic has disintegrated and some of the fencing fell down. So now, he's going around and replacing (and repairing) with these stainless steel clips. It won't fall down again. It's a job, but I think he's enjoying his retirement, now that he's feeling better. He has a whole list of projects he's been wanting to get at for years. This is only the first of many.

Here are cats on separate missions. Smitty was being stealth under the tree.

Sadie was more interested in the squirrels.

Later, she stretched out to her full length and napped on Mike's lap.

And I caught up on my housework, but I didn't make it all the way across the poppy quilt. Still, I'm close to getting it to the 80% mark. I'm mostly finished with the blue now. When this row is finished, there are just a few more blue patches. The rest will be all greens.

So it's off to the grocery store for us today. Our list is shorter than last week, but I'm still dreading it. We're lucky to have a McDonald's just across the street from the grocery store, and so we'll fortify ourselves with our favorite Egg McMuffins before we go. Wish us luck...better yet, wish our fellow shoppers luck. Someone could get murdered today.