This week the garden has had plants covered with sheets (because of the severe frosts and winds) so that things look like Halloween around the farm. There is sun and sometimes even heat in between the bitter cold nights and you can see new spring plants emerging by the hour!

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Last evening I planted some seeds: corydalis, hollyhocks, lupines, geraniums, everlasting sweet peas. A friend has offered to care for them while I am away in April. Hurray! My artichokes and foxgloves are up and growing.

Today I expect the new lady helpers, so Drema, we'll see how that goes!

Lots going on. A man is supposed to come check out some ancient metal scaffolding in our barn. I hope he agrees to take it all AWAY!

To quote Drema, "Must run, have little time and many chores.... "
'bug

5cm of snow expected tomorrow.... Not a surprise, but definitely a disappointment!

Are you kidding me??!! I think that storm is passing south of. Sunny and bright here, but not warm. Good Luck!

BTW, referring to your GB post, have you thought (of course you have) of letting a bit of your ten acres naturalize (read: no weeding, only native plants etc). This might make maintenance easier and you could maybe just let a little go each year. I know I know....that would drive you nuts! Just sayin'

I think any 10 acre property should have a native plant/ naturalized component. Mine certainly does. But still... there's tons of work/play to be done out there.

Today they're now saying "Risk of freezing rain late this evening and after midnight. Snow and ice pellet amount 5 cm. Wind northeast 30 km/h. Low minus 1." Blarrrgh!

I planted seeds the other day and some are UP already. (zinnias and lupins) That's just nuts when the directions say 2 weeks! Yesterday a friend dropped off a bulb for a Vodoo Lily. I wonder if I'll kill it? I'm so bad with indoor plants.

I'm off to town to pick up more laminated lesson plans...and computer paper. At least the sun is shining now but it sure is cold.

GB - have you ever tried the recipe on Epicurious in the link below? I made that for supper last night and it was great! Sort of a cross between tortiere and apple pie!:-)

The cooks' comments all said it made a large quantity so to either halve the recipe or make two - I made two. They also said to double the spices and I did that too - I put one batch of the spices in with the meat (minus the brown sugar) and tossed the softened apples in the other batch. I used Granny Smith and Northern Spy for the apple mix. For two pies, next time I'd increase the apple quantity. No one ran the cooked meat through the Cusinart and neither did I. I think the next time I make it, I'll use phyllo pastry for the crust and put the cheese, sage, and some finely chopped walnuts between the layers of phyllo. I think that will make it faster to prepare and still make it very tasty. A recipe well worth trying....

Here is a link that might be useful: pork apple pie

Hmmmm. Maybe on the evening we bring Phoebe? :)

I almost finished reading Homonids, so I'm off to visit parallel universes.
'bug

GB - we could certainly do that.... Did you get 'into' Hominids as it progressed at all?

Finished! It got better...but not my thing really. We'll see what book club thinks on Monday night!

Woody, D just discovered he must work in Brampton on an organ...so won't be here with the cats. Oh bother... I'll figure it out, but there's lots going on and I didn't need that...

DD has strep throat, ear infection, sinus infection and more, but finally took antibiotics and hopes to finally get some sleep tonight.

DS on his way to Boston and full of drama as well concerning his efforts and friends in Haiti. We will be on the same flight when he returns.

Too bad I have allergies to cats! We used to have cats and I miss not having one. However Misty would not get along well with a cat - since she's a dedicated rabbit-killer, I fear for the life of any cat that comes too close!

Poor Sarah!! I hope the antibiotics work quickly!

Woody, I wouldn't wish 4 cats on anyone!!!

GB....love you Haiti pics :-) Actually being in the military and having spent time deployed there, we've had people get on that boat also.

There is a still a lot of work to be done in that country, but it seems to be falling off the media radar.

"Lots of work" doesn't begin to describe things there. Of course it's off the radar. When there's little agreement by anyone, no skills, no governing, no water, no food, no housing, greed, no voice, rape, lies, theft and violence...what is anyone supposed to do?
And yet there are some amazing individuals and lots of talent too! And the kids... So I must hope.

We had a bit of rain this morning (4mm) so we just got back from walking the dogs (Dexter - Randys brother's Airedale is here for a few days). We were surprised to notice that all the early saucer magnolias in the neighbourhood now have icky-looking brown buds! It hasn't been very cold at nights here so there doesn't appear to be a reason for the damage. I checked ours - which are a little later-blooming than most - and they look fine. The tough outer casing on the buds is just starting to split and reveal some of the petal color. The neighbour to the north's star magnolia, which started blooming a few days ago, is also fine. So hopefully the damage we saw this morning is just to the outer casing and the trees will still bloom. All the perennials, shrubs and vines look fine too. Very odd...

Here the magnolias are brown, but we have had frost.(I don't have any myself, but there are 2-3 fabulous specimens nearby)

It is rainy and yucky out now, so I won't go check!

Earlier I took hellebore photos.

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The bloodroot has been stalled by the weather. I thought they'd be gone by now, but thankfully not!

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A beautiful sunny/cool day to be gardening! (But I only managed about an hour outside)

The stars must have been aligned well for me. I had Debbie Day as well as Gardeners Day- as well as pay day! Then DH returns this evening.

I'm awaiting the arrival of a bin to cart away the metal staging from our barn. Then Book Club follows.

Canada has some new currency. It certainly is different and odd feeling the first time you see & touch it. It has Braille, see through patches, and is partially plastic. Supposed to be more durable. Anyway, that's the $50 and $100 bills only I think. They plan on getting rid of pennies. I'd be in favor of getting rid of nickles too.

Definitely a good day. Hope yours is too!
'bug

It looks like the magnolias around here weren't hit as hard as I thought the other day. Today we were seeing color starting to show on the buds that look so brown and ugly. So it looks like maybe only the outer protective covering of the buds got hit. Hopefully everything will survive the next week or so of cold overnight temperatures. The magnolias are so pretty in spring; it would be a lot duller without them in bloom!

Got some weeding done today, said "good riddance" to the bin of metal pieces from our barn, posted on our Haiti blog, picked up our malaria meds in town and saw Deanne's latest article in Fine Gardening. (Hurray to you Deanne!) Then I made cookies. Soon my friend comes over and we translate a 12 minute film into French. I hope to garden more this week before turning to finalizing our packing (and weighing) of materials for our trip.

The plants are growing every day, but the nights are still bitter cold. Phoebe was so cute when DH returned from his travels. Was she ever excited!

What kind of cookies gb...? I'm having a sweet craving at the moment:-) and have been thinking about making something sweet tonight.

We cleaned up the backyard yesterday and started on the front this morning - it'll take another day or two to finish the front. We need to get the peas planted in the driveway pots this weekend.

Poodles seem to have a lock on the job of Hearing Ear Dogs - we groomed 10 poodles this afternoon! We've really come to like poodles - I suspect our next dog may be a poodle! Randy will be participating in the Dog Guides fund-raiser walk in late May. Misty would go nuts with all those strange dogs, so he'll likely either borrow Dexter (his brother's Airedale) or Liam (friends' Border Collie) as a walking companion. Dexter is here at the moment and is fairly rowdy still. Other dogs like him a lot - they recognize him as an amiable goof! But Liam is smaller and better behaved so I think he's now leaning towards taking Liam on the walk.

I need to check out Fine Gardening...

I haven't baked at all in ages. So cookies were a complete surprise to DH! They were chocolate chip, from package directions. Fewer chips and a few added walnuts. Not sensational, but OK.

I've found poodles (standards) very smart. It's the haircut that bothers me though. If left alone, they actually look like dogs! The smaller ones act like their owners...and that can sometimes be bad. ;) In Toronto I found that people wanted small dogs and that they didn't really have enough time for them so they were poorly trained, though loved.

I want to support Randy on his walk. I'll get back to him soon. Liam sounds like a good choice. Certainly Phoebe doesn't have the stamina she used to and sort of drags along these days...unless she sees a squirrel or two!

I hope to be gardening tomorrow, but may have to continue with translating a video instead. Oh well....It's cold in the mornings anyway, so I can do video work first and then maybe go outside at lunchtime to work in the garden. We still use our wood stove in the evenings!
'bug

Ay yi-yi, way behind schedule here ! Enjoying photos and updates here and on FB. I had a box today from Digging Dog with my Axminster Gold comfrey..pined for and now in my possesion-two of them no less. I have opening night baseball on in the background, and though the sun is still up it's chilly.My phone says it's 53; chilliness is relative !

I have been crazy busy at the awfice, but have finally scheduled some time off. I'm going to head on down to Carmel/Big Sur the last week of the month for a few days. I've already scoped out the local garden centers, and there is a really big one just outside of Carmel..can't wait . I'll visit the mission there too , and of course the foo-foo art galleries in the village.

Your Hellebores are splendid 'bug..mine are overwith at this point (except for the Corsican) but I have seedling issues that I need to address soon.

All for now, will try to catch up better on the weekend..

Kathy in Napa

For Kathy: a puzzle!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/UPLANDICUM-VARIEGATED-Garden-World-Images/dp/B004DGBAKG

Also a short read below.
Happy today! Good to see you here!

Here is a link that might be useful: borage family comments

An amusing dog story from this afternoon/evening... We were visiting our friends who have the young Australian Terrier and a big older Golden. Both Callie and Pendle know there are cookies in the walker basket and expect some when we arrive, depart - and anytime I pass through the front hall where they hang out... While we were playing Bridge in the living room, Callie clearly felt cookie-deprived :-) So she raided the walker basket! She removed the bag, opened it and emptied it - without damaging the bag or the copies of the recipe I keep in the bag. She's adorable, very intelligent - but a bit wicked! I'm not sure if she shared the booty with Pendle or not - he looked very morose that there were no cookies for him when we left :-)

This has got to be a record! Randy is out mowing the grass already!!

I was out working in the vegetable garden until (minimal) rain began. I'd love to mow...but the mower is in for spring cleaning and repairs.

Guests have just arrived for an Easter WALAT experience..

Well Geez! I never get here anymore do I?

So good to catch up with Woody,Bug and Jak.

Our month of March had record high temps and felt like summer most of the time. Just unreal. So between an over abundance of weeds and spending time with my horse I have enjoyed the spring garden. I'm still working on the weeds. I finally resorted to the weed eater which I dislike doing because it just scatters more seed for next year, but My arthritis in my fingers and hip just won't let me do what I used to. So if no one looks real close the beds don't look to bad. I just have to accept my limatations.
Tonight we may have a light freeze. Frost is pretty definite. I put a pot of lillies in the barn everything else is on it's own. Hopefully the trees have leafed out enough to protect a few things, but I will be disapointed if the Japanese Maples get damaged.
The roses and Clems are all budding and if they hurry I might get to see some flowers before the Japanese beatles start, or maybe they will come early too because of the warmer than normal weather.
Every year, every month every day is different here. I just try to go with the flow.
I would like to get here more often but am usually crashing when I come in, so am just skiming the computer.

It's good to know you gals are still here.
Fond greetings to all. Norma

Well hi there Norma! Glad you have your priorities right (unlike me) and enjoy your pets and minimize the work part of gardening. Stick to the joys of it! I don't (yet) have the hip problems, but I sure notice my hands seize up after 4-5 hours of weeding, especially in the mornings. I look at the ads for flame wands and wonder if they would do the trick for me....or if they're yet another gimmick to waste money on.

Was it sleet, hail or rain? Anyway...it was something nasty, but not much of it at all. We could sure use some moisture. I can't stand the thought of hose dragging even before I mow for the first time of the season. But the whole countryside is heavy with dust. Can't read any license plates here anymore.

The latest:
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Giving big brother a ride. Cute!

I'm off for a couple of weeks. Perhaps Phoebe and Woody will report for me instead?

Happy Spring to all!
'bug

Sorry for my absence my friends....last week my computer had three virus's - and I had one too! Feeling better, and so far no junk being transmitted through my e-mail to my contacts. Stuff even went to my bank. Why do people hack anyway? Just nasty.

And speaking of nasty, our weather forecast has a snowfall warning in it for tonight and tomorrow! My poor gardens! At least at this time of year snow does not tend to last very long, but it is a cruel trick of Mother Nature all the same.

I planted a Chinese Wisteria next to the fence in my back garden this week. It is supposed to be a little hardier than the Japanese Wisteria, and they are sold here in nurseries. There is a little house on the other side of Perth that is covered in Wisteria in the spring - just beautiful! I alsways take a hike or bike ride over there in the spring just to see it. I hope mine catches on all right. I also scored a Red Abysinian Banana last week. My Musa Ensete that I have had for three years is looking pretty sad in the house, as it always does by now, and has put out a deformed leaf. The general advice is to just chop it off and when it goes outside it will resprout. I hadn't the heart for that without a replacement of some kind if it didn't work, so now I might do that if it doesn't seem to perk up. Usually these plants flower after three or four years and then die, so I was kind of looking for a new one anyway. I grew the Musa from seed. I have five more seeds planted, but they are very difficult to germinate and nothing has shown up as yet. We'll see.

Although it has been very dry here all Spring, we have had cold rain the last few days and the lawn looks like a field! I will have stuff to do for sure when the weather improves. My new front garden has been edged with brick - this time I took Woody's advice and installed a grass barrier first - the stepping stones are in place and I am
chafing at the bit to get stuff in there. I don't quite have a plan yet *LOL* but it will come I am sure.

So I am off to check out my seedlings downstairs under the lights, and will be holing up beside the fireplace today instead of gardening.

Cheers,

Julie

Hi Julie! It's looking like Facebook has killed the Idylls...

The snow is in the forecast here for Mon./Tues. here. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the lake is warm enough to deflect any nasty stuff - the wisteria buds are enlarging; the Clematis montana is growing like mad; the peas in the pots (7 pots this year) are up and growing.

Phoebe has settled in well as usual. She's quite shy with other dogs (Misty and Dawn excepted!) so she's a bit spooked by the sassy/friendly German shepherd mix that is temporarily living next door, and the two little terriers across the back fence :-) On walkies the other day we ran into a strange-looking dog. When we asked the owner what it was, he said it was a fawn Bouvier! I had never heard of one that color (he says it's only been recently recognized as acceptable for Kennel Club shows), plus it didn't look at all like Phoebe - mainly because she (Gracie) had a bad haircut; the groomer had cut off her beard and she doesn't have Phoebe's fuzzy feet and legs! This is what she looked like:
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Pictures of your beds with the brick edging...? What did you use for edging - the Curve-rite that I used or something else?

I have thought of adding a banana to my big-leafed pot collection but I'm not sure if I want to take on the work for one!

Hello Woody and Julie.... :-)

I am so surprised to see an Idyll thread started in February, only at 84 posts at the end of April. So everyone is meeting up on Facebook instead? I don't have a Facebook account and don't plan on getting one, so maybe I can post a few times to help get to the end of this thread at least. (g)

Sorry you have been feeling under the weather, Julie. The weather has been so crazy this year, it surprises me that more people aren't sick. We're having rain tonight, finally, after an 8 inch deficit of rain since January. I like the sound of your new front garden, Julie. A new project is always fun. Is it full sun and what are you planning on adding?

Woody, nice to hear that you are still enjoying your dog visitors and your dog neighbors. We have been helping our son out with his Lab mix while he is working and that is very enjoyable.

No tropical wonders in our garden. Well...except for Hibiscus, that winters over in my Dining Room West window with very little effort.

Still working on our garden here. But not paying much attention to the vegetable garden this year. Our property has become more shaded over the years, and I don't get the performance that I would like. We're also having to pay attention to house repair and maintenance this spring, so I didn't want to be pulled in too many directions. We've joined a CSA for the summer instead. And although I usually do at least a little 'winter sowing' over the winter, this winter I didn't start one seed. I am doing more dividing of established plants though. Nice to finally have some 'little dividends'.

So, would be happy to help put up a portion of 16 more posts before the end of April to finish out this thread. :-)

Hi PM2! What's a CSA?

Hi Woody!

A CSA is Community Supported Agriculture. You buy shares of the vegetable harvest for that year. We found a new organic farm about an hour away that delivers the shares to a nursery that is less than a mile from our house. They set up a weekly pick up time from the middle of June until the end of October. We hope we like it.

I still planted peas which are up already. And I bought pepper and tomato plants, which I will plant and ignore. Some of my beds still have leftover plants from last year, that I never pulled. It was so warm over the winter, that they are still growing. Brussel Sprouts and Scallions that I am allowing to go to seed to collect it. And Bok Choy and Lettuce reseeded in one bed and once we use those, I'm going to sow a cover crop in the beds for the season.

Maybe you have some CSAs in your neck of the woods. They seem to be getting more popular.

Yes, I have heard of those CSAs around here - I just didn't recognize the initials....(CSA most commonly means Canadian Standards Association - i.e. the body that approves all electrical appliances and things like that!) We probably wouldn't join a CSA because there's a good farmer's market every Saturday at a mall about 5 minutes away so we can get all we need there.

Randy has been harvesting carrots and leeks all winter from the pots that are stored in the garage for winter!

You're lucky to have a good Farmer's Market. There is one nearby that has no organic growers, so that doesn't help me. There is another one that is an hour away that has only one organic grower in the whole Farmer's Market and I'm hoping this new arrangement will work out better than that.

Harvesting carrots and leeks all winter? Well that sounds like you and Randy. So self sufficient!

PM2 - the winter harvest was an unexpected bonus :-) We didn't expect things to survive and thrive in the garage during the winter - but were happy to take advantage once we realized they hadn't turned to mush!

We had frost here this morning even though the low was only +4C! The forecast for the next four days is for lows in to -2C range. I fear for the wisteria buds!

A picture for gb when she returns...

Phoebe made a new friend the other day. Chester is a Goldipoo (Golden x standard poodle). He's about 2 years old and is in his rowdy stage. He was all over Phoebe, which disconcerted her at first but she quickly got the idea that it was play-time! We had to keep them far apart in order to get a picture!
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Hello Remaining Idylls (RI's).

Do dogs actually outgrow the "rowdy stage"? Not my boys, at approximately 5 years old they are little bundles of muscle who think they are great big dogs. They come on like gangbusters and if the other dog gets excited, well, let's just says things get difficult. If the dog gives them the "what's with you, goofus" look, then my guys do the sniff thing and then get on with their day. Most of the people around here have little fluffy dogs and really don't want to see if my guys are really fierce or just pretending!

I don't find the bananas much care, Woody. I buy them small or start from seed, and grow them on in the great big pot where they will remain for their lifetime! I water often, and grow them on my patio in the sun. I bring mine in for the winter where they are a huge nuisance, but many people just cut them right off and store them in the basement, bringing them out again to restart in the Spring. Or just get new ones - at 2 for $12.00 it is hardly worth the effort of keeping them, unless you want them to grow huge; at three years mine is about ten feet tall. If you want large tropical look, have you tried Castor Beans? There are several varieties, some bigger than other. I have good success with these too, and I never winter them over.

PM2 and Woody, we here are blessed with an excellent Farmer's Market all summer on Saturdays and Wednesdays, and also a couple of organic CSA's available locally. They deliver to within a few blocks of your home at central places for their members. We also have organic meats this way. Perth itself, although a small town, has two major traditional supermarkets, a Health food type place that also sells all kinds of excellent produce, and a wonderful butcher shop. A great place for "Foodies".

We too had heavy frost here this morning, but better than yesterday when everything was snow covered. I am getting very tired of cold dark days though - I am making list of sun-loving low-growing perennials for my new garden. Woody, I just used that black flexible edging beside the bricks. The biggest problem with that stuff is that people don't bury it deep enough and the frost heaves it out, or they can't run over it with the lawn mower without tearing it up, or it just sticks up and looks ugly. I take great pains to bury mine pretty deep and I find it works well for me. You are right, the brick edging looks a lot better with some sort of a bariier between it and the lawn. If the spirit every moves me, I will remove my zillion bricks and replace with the edging and then the brick. We got our bricks from the local college which has a heritage masonry program. As we use half-bricks because our gardens are curved, their broken cast offs are perfect!

I hope we get to see some more of out Errant Idylers (ER's) again. I find Facebook pretty shallow, not many long conversations there.

Cheers,

Julie

Julie - the bigger dog breeds seem to hit 3 years old and finally become sensible! The smaller dog breeds seem to either get sensible early - or never! :-)

I'm having to do some remedial work this spring on some of my brick edging. I didn't get the base of limestone screenings compacted enough in places and some bricks have sunk below the edging. So I'm having to lift the bricks, add more screenings, and reset the bricks. Fortunately, that's pretty easy to do - now I just need some warmer, more pleasant weather to work out there! I was hoping to work outside today but it's darn chilly outside. There are also a few places along the grass path through the front beds and at the top of the front ditch where the ground has sunk/become very uneven. Randy is going to have to deal with those areas I think.

Where do you get your bananas? I've not seen any for sale around here but maybe I'm not looking in the right places. If you can store them in the basement dormant like elephant ears that would work for me. We potted up the elephant ears and got them started growing again about a month ago.

Yes, I hope the Idylls eventually find their way back here... I find it somewhat ironic that Facebook has drawn most of them away. A few years ago this was the preferred site as it was less 'public' than other options. There is not many places more public than Facebook! And the conversational style here is much better.

Good afternoon...

Woody, I'm wondering if you have a window in your garage or were the carrots and leeks fully grown and the garage just acted as a root cellar? We're expecting overnights this weekend of 32 degrees, too. We're having a cool week. Spring like really. It's cold in the house though. Still using hot socks.

I never heard of a Goldipoo. How cute! Standard poodles are supposed to be more hypoallergenic I believe? And of course Golden's are supposed to have the best disposition.
And I don't think the poodles shed?
My DH is allergic, so I would think about that if we were going to get one.

I'm watching our son's Lab mix during the work week and I like that arrangement. Our son has been changing her over from commercial food to real food, after problems with itchy skin, ear infections, etc. We are encouraged that she seems to be improving already and it hasn't even been 2 weeks.

I do well with indoor plants in the winter but they always suffer in that month or longer, when the gardening season starts outdoors and I spend so much time focused on that, that the indoor plants start getting neglected. My tropical Hibiscus standard has looked good all winter and now I just started noticing yellowing leaves dropping. I need to get it outside, but it will probably be another three weeks at least. It's too heavy to drag it outside during the day, so it has to wait for overnights in the 50s.

Julie, I have a few rolls of that plastic edging hanging around. I never had an easy time installing it. I use brick edging and no edging and resign myself to re-edging the lawn in the spring.

I have a front garden, full sun. It changes all the time. Right now I have roses, agastache, perovskia, sedums, echinaceas, grass, I've added Verbascum and Euphorbias recently and edged it with creeping Veronica and thymes. I had California poppies and alyssum along the street last year and that has reseeded well.

I only have one small section of brick edging that often disappears under encroaching grass. Along my largest perennial bed, I have a raised rock edging fronted with mulch that would be really easy care if not for nearby quack grass. We have a small patch of grass that has quack grass in it, which is horrid. Traveled under a 2ft area of mulch and invaded my raised bed last year when I wasn't looking. I just spent an hour yesterday pulling the rocks out to pull out the quack grass and then I couldn't get them back in place the same way. It was too late in the day to deal with it, so tomorrow morning that is the first job on the list. We did get the quack grass out of there, but I plan on getting rid of that entire patch of grass where the last of the quack grass is, hopefully this summer.

We were doing some work out front this afternoon and I noticed the Japanese wisteria has a whole lot of HUGE buds this year, so it looks like it will flower this year for the first time. BUT it's supposed to get down to -6C tonight! I've got my fingers crossed that we get lucky and don't get a hard freeze...

PM2 - I think the carrots and leeks in the garage situation is the root-cellar one for the most part, although the leeks definitely started growing again in February. The garage has fairly large windows on one side so there is light there.

I have one area of the driveway border where couch grass (a.k.a. quack grass) snuck in a few years ago. We dug the whole area out once but that didn't help for long. I'm now engaged in a battle of attrition - i.e. I check the area at least once a week and pull what I can of anything I see. The link below is to an article from the Ontario agriculture ministry so it's written from a farm perspective. But it was interesting to note that it is not found in continuous shade - which made me wonder if one solution if things get really bad would be to convert that area to a dense evergreen shrub planting which might kill it off in a few years and then one could perhaps replant with other stuff - as long as there wasn't a lot of seeds in the soil!

Poodles don't shed like most dogs - although they do shed a bit (when we groom the Dog Guide ones, there is a bit of hair that comes out but not too much.) Goldens can be heavy shedders - when we had Chelsea, there were always lots of golden dust bunnies about :-) So I'm not sure how much a Goldipoo sheds. Is your son's dog a Labradoodle? How much does it shed? Labs are big shedders in my experience!

Here is a link that might be useful: quack/couch grass

Woody, we had some earlier cold nights that surprised me how well most of the plants in the garden did. I'm sure if there is a way you can cover it with a sheet or something you would. Although if I remember right, your Wisterias are large.... I feel for you, you wait all year for bloom. Fingers crossed!

I hope this is a fluke of a year and that we aren't going to get this kind of inconsistency every year.

You are lucky to have a garage that will act like a root cellar! And with windows. Ours is a stand alone unheated garage with one small north window and nothing has ever wintered over in there for me. Just as well, keeps me from branching out into 'wintering over'. (g)

The quack grass is the worst problem in the garden for us. It took over my first vegetable garden, and I was pretty inexperienced and I tried to use a rototiller on the bed. What a mistake that was. It just quadrupled the grass in a 25 x 25 ft area. It was so bad, I abandoned that part of the yard for a few years. When I was ready to try to deal with it again, I did some research and came up with an idea of smothering it, instead of trying to dig it out. So I had a large roll of plastic left over from an ice rink we had for the kids when they were younger and I laid that down and anchored it with rocks over the whole 25ft area and beyond. I left it there for a whole year. It killed just about all the quack grass and I was able to reclaim that whole area. Part of it was under the dripline of a large Maple and that area did come back a little and now I have to get it out of there again, but it's about a 6ft area which is manageable. I think it died better in the full sun areas. It was a dry hot summer that year and I didn't put holes in the plastic, so it really baked it. I was SO happy to get that part of the garden back! Thanks for the link, it was very interesting.

No, our son's dog is just a plain old mutt of a Lab mix. She was a rescue. She is a black lab with some white socks and some white on her chest. So she is pretty short haired and her shedding is not too bad. She rarely barks, even when other dogs are barking at our fence line, she goes over and wags her tail but then ignores them. Doesn't seem to mind the loud chain saw in the yard next door today. Doesn't dig. Follows me around. Doesn't mind baths or hair dryers. I guess that is the Lab personality, but we've had some that were a lot more 'hyper' than she is, so I wonder what her other mix is. We've never had a Golden, and the shedding was the only reason. I've always loved them.

PM2 - The Japanese wisteria is still relatively small so Randy is out there at the moment covering the top. I expect I'll lose some buds one way or the other - the covering and removing of the cover in the morning is likely to break off some of the buds, but hopefully a few will survive. The Chinese wisteria is too big so is on its own... But that one is quite dense so I'm guessing that I might lose the buds on the top but the ones lower down might survive.

Oh good....you'll have to post a photo after the weekend. I assume you are due for low overnights for a few nights like we are? You might get lucky even with just a thin covering over it. We had about a 10 day spell of just under freezing at night and one night it went down to 28 degrees F and the only thing that seems to have been damaged were a few leaf tips on the roses and some of the foliage on a butterfly bush. The smaller things went under a turned over pot and the roses had the sheets and rocks anchoring them. Good luck! Maybe it won't get as cold as they predict!

Hello friends , and great to see you PM ! I have been on vacation this week, my 1st time off this year ..boy did I need it. I went down to Carmel for a couple days and now I'm finishing out the week with an all-gardening-weekend. I went down to Annies Annuals today and spent too much money, but have cool plants to show for it.
I do fear that FB has dipped into our group here, but I do enjoy seeing everyone there several times a day.Maybe we need to go ever to the discussions side and do some recruiting, lol.

I was jazzed before my trip to Carmel; I researched the garden centers in the area and there were two huge ones, so I visited them. What a disappointment ! I've never seen so many mundane plants in such large garden centers. When I looked at the gardens in the area I could see that they were pretty conservative, heavy on Impatiens and Pelargoniums.I guess that's the gig out there.

OK, here are a few photos from Big Sur to help close out the thread.

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Kathy in Napa

Kathy - wow - nice coast shots!

We got lucky last night - no frost! But there are below-feezing temperatures in the forecast for the next two nights too so Randy wants to leave the cover in place. I'm inclined to take the risk since they survived the frost a couple of days ago, but we'll probably keep the protection in place.

You can see the covered Japanese wisteria here if you look closely - it's the thing draped in white near where you can see the neighbour's culvert:
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Flowerbuds on the Japanese wisteria:
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The flowerbuds on the Chinese wisteria are starting to expand now. There's no way to protect it - it's too big, but so far it's been surviving fine.
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Hi Kathy! That is some great location for vacation! Thanks for the photos. Love looking at ocean and that is some blue, blue water. Nice shots! I wish I lived near Annie's. Looks like my kind of nursery too.

Glad you didn't get a frost last night, Woody. It was pretty cold here last night, but it was windy. I think I heard that improves the chance of no damage? Anyway, no damage here either. I'm hoping after the next two days, that will be the end of frosts. I wanted to get my tomato plants in a little early with some Wall of Waters.

Those are some big flower buds on the Japanese Wisteria, Woody. You did say this will be the first time it's bloomed...are they fragrant? It will be interesting to see the difference in bloom between the two types. The buds look different.

Back from Haiti a few hours ago...with DS & friend. Very busy and sticking close to the toilet... Glad I wasn't sick there though!

Later!
'bug

We are entertaining guests tomorrow with photos of Haiti by DS and by his friend from Madagascar. Food should be easy BBQ stuff.

The garden is still exciting with spring things popping up. I hope to be able to plant things in about 3 weeks, but we'll have to wait and see. Still plenty of weeds to be pulled and then vegetables to start. My plant sitters did an excellent job...so nothing was lost.

We have Phoebe back home and she seems sleepy after her ride home. She also ate grass and threw up! (Joy!) She loves being outdoors and watching us prepare things for tomorrow.

Our DD's brother-in-law found a tiny foal on his property. The vet hopes it will survive, but that is not yet certain. The good news is that he seems stronger each day and is starting to drink milk. Ivy has enjoyed him as part of her birthday present. She's officially 3 now. The foal is probably from a wild horse and therefore the vet says BIL can legally keep it as he has the space and the desire to do so. I'm not able to post photos right now but will try to share them tomorrow.

I'll leave you with the following link showing some photos of the Haitian school where we spent much of our 2 week stay.

Here is a link that might be useful: Buildingaschool, May5-2012

Ivy's birthday with foal!
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Success so far - DD feeding foal
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Ivy's birthday...
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with cake.
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Gardening tools
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Ivy as mountain goat...Such a steady climber!
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Big brother is 13 now. Dad teaches him dancing!
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All three "camping" indoors:
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