just add water

~

this is the first year in a long time

the thick, yellow tree pollen

has coated my throat

and red-rimmed my eyes.

spring and summer arrived together

thankfully, rain fell yesterday,

and the wet, green smell it brought

was sublime.

~

our yard is really just a rabbit's den

the tentative growing in our yard over the past month 

has tumbled, head-first, 

into rampant and exuberant GREEN.

there is very little that we planted intentionally.  we've moved a few things around (like the two dogwood volunteers above, which are now surrounded by wildflowers), but most plants pre-date our arrival, are 'weeds' i am encouraging (like the little white wildflowers, now in two separate stands in the backyard), or spread more every year (lily of the valley, irises, peonies, & so forth).  one of the 'weeds' i discovered, to my delight, in our yard last year was goldenrod - which i've allowed to spread this year and is now (perhaps unwisely) surrounding some of the purple irises along the back of the house.  the goldenrod will grow as tall as me and have bright yellow flower tassels in the late summer.  i love it!

we do plant some each year.  at the end of the summer, i make pesto from the recipe in my old Moosewood Cookbook.  so, i need lots and lots of basil.  usually, Mike plants the basil (and i harvest it & make the pesto).  he is a much more patient farmer than i am.  this year, i planted the basil.  the top soil i wanted to use was quite wet, coming out of the bag in slimy, clay-like clumps.  did that stop me?  nooooo.  i dropped those slimy clumps into the pots, tossed in the basil seeds, covered them with more slimy clumps, and called it a day.  (i put the pots near my other gardening attempt this year - Joseph and i flung about, and at times actually pushed into the soil, lots of flower seeds in the old vegetable plot.  all sorts of things are coming up, so it will be interesting to see what it looks like as the summer progresses.)

thank goodness they sprouted!

i've done a better job watering the basil, which are close to the house, than the two little blue spruce we stuck in the ground this spring.  but they seem to be surviving (a prime requirement in my garden).  we were fairly ambivalent about planting them, as they can get take up a lot of ground when full-grown.  but we'll see how they look over the next few years and move them accordingly.

i have my eye on this one.  would love to hear from you, if you have any idea what it is.  it looks a little like the wild cherry tree in the yard, but i'm not yet convinced.  i'd keep it (and move it) if it is one of those!  but the branching is suspect, to me.  not very tree-like - or is it?  hmmmmm.

i definitely know what this is.

& its life is not long under my watch.

ever since a nasty case of poison ivy back in high school,

i have been hyper-vigilant about this plant.

sadly, the late freeze may have hurt our fig tree.

we trimmed it in the fall, hoping to bring the figs

within reach this year

(rather than high above my head).

but there are only three branches with any leaves right now.

our butterfly bush was also frozen,

but it has rebounded nicely.

fingers crossed that the fig does, too!

this next series really warrants a separate post,

but i will just make the pictures humongous

so you can bathe yourself

in Peony Power.

it's like the ants are circumnavigating the earth.

i just am fascinated by the work the ants do to open these peonies.

it rained overnight.

i could not have asked

for a more perfect

photographic

opportunity.

not only are peonies visually stunning,

with all their ruffles, crumples, and blushes - 

they are olfactory bliss,

 lemony roses

worthy of eye-widening inhalations.

please excuse me while i go sniff my peonies.