Happy Mother's Day

For all the mothers out there and especially my own! Happy Mother's Day!

For me it was another day of gardening and trying to catch up with a very late winter. Two weeks ago we had snow. Tomorrow this is what we expect:

Yep. Already into the nineties, which means the gardening will have to happen in the mornings, because it's just too scorching hot after lunch.

Here's a bit of our newest project - a butterfly garden, which means tearing up 1/3 of the front yard. I'm using Barbara Damrosch's Theme Gardens book as a guide for the many flower and flowering bush plantings.

There'll be a white curved picket fence in front of the wishing well that will help define the actual flower plantings around the bird bath, stretching to the walk on the left, and road to the right. More photos when things start to grow, and I'll include a list of the plants as well. Wait until I paint the wishing well with a full palette of colors! I can't believe it's mid-May and the cottonwood tree behind the bench has barely begun to leaf out.

The flower boxes have been planted, but I still have to paint all the white trim. This is part of the springtime ritual  for me, sort of a "right of passage" into summer most people would just as soon avoid.

After a nice chicken dinner that hubbo cooked, we had homemade vanilla custard ice cream with raspberries soaked in St. Germaine elderflower liqueur. Very nice indeed!

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his. - Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest

G is for Gardening

I'm a bit late this morning after returning from a very long day trip to Denver. One of the highlights of Sunday was a trip to the Denver Botanic Gardens where things are still looking pretty brown, with just a few hardy bulb flowers peeking their heads through the cold ground. Still it was a lovely day and there were loads of people out walking the paths. I came away with numerous ideas for my own gardens. Also a real appreciation for water features, hard-scaping, and architectural features like pergolas. Here are some photos of images that inspired me and might translate to my own efforts here at home:

Water feature with simple sculpture

A smaller pool that would work in my yard

A flagstone rock garden with native plants

Brick hard-scaping with a covered path to the right

An evergreen mound adds a mass of green

I don't think I would have noticed these features during the summer when the gardens are a riot of color. I got a lot more ideas from the barren gardens than I thought I would. It's all about getting the "bones" down right. That's true with anything, I guess,  whether building a house or writing a novel. Get a solid foundation first, and all the embellishments tend to enhance the picture.

Speaking of novels, maybe I'll make some headway in the next few days. It doesn't look like I'll be gardening much.

By "damaging thunderstorms" they mean high winds, hail, rain turning to snow, and a possible tornado. Nope. Definitely won't be gardening. How's the weather where you live?