A Day in the Garden!

I thought the poor little snow drops would be crushed under the weight of eight inches of heavy, wet snow. but they have rebounded!

 Tom's collection of cyclamen are also beginning to bloom in the little winter garden outside the family room windows. 

 The air here is perfumed by the winter blooming sacacocca, with it's lovely vanilla scent. 

The snow is all gone except for the remnants of the mound shoveled off the driveway. 

Since our snow last Sunday and Monday, we have had lots of rain, a day of temps in the 50's, and today, Sun!

So we made this a gardening day, a day to get out and do the clean up that is needed after wind and rain and snow storms, when you have lots of big trees overhead. 

Branches have been picked up and the lawn raked, collecting lots of twigs and fir cones 

 The patio is clean again. 

 We even got down on hands and knees and began cleaning out some of the flower beds. 

You have to watch out where you step because the bulbs are coming up, daffodils here

 and tulips there.

 The buds on the magnolia stellata are getting plump and fuzzy. 

We spent almost five hours working outside. It felt great, although we are a bit stiff and sore now. 

But we had a very satisfying day in the garden, and bins full of yard waste to show for it. These were all empty when we started.

Politics are still very much on our minds. Our week three activism included more phone calls and emails and donations to organizations fighting for our progressive principles. We are very proud of the work of our governor and state attorney general and solicitor general in taking on the President and winning the first round in the immigration/travel ban. Yay, Washington State!