February 29th

 

I hope you're having a hoppin' good day. :-)

Winter Sun

 

It snowed a little bit yesterday. It didn't freeze though so this morning when I went out to the street to get the newspaper it was not slippery. The winter sun was struggling to warm us up.

It's a good thing early blooming flowers know how to survive unexpected snow.

The primroses on the porch were not happy.

Tete a tete daffodils are blooming now.

These are not mine. I took this photo on Whidbey Island last week. My mini daffs are a bit bedraggled today.

We started today with our regular Zoom meet up. We began this during the pandemic, and since one of our friends now lives in Maine, we have kept it up. Today we talked about quilts. You never know where the conversation will go. 

After that Tom and I went for a walk over at our little neighborhood park. I got my mile in again. As much as it is hard work, I make myself move, and I really enjoyed the cold, fresh air. 

Now Tom has returned home from running some errands, I've read your blogs and posted mine, so it is time for lunch. 

 Outside the sun is losing to winter. 

Sun And Rain

 "Rainful rain, sun and rain, find my way in nature's chain." - Garden Song, John Denver

Sun when we arrived on Whidbey Island on Tuesday afternoon.

Clouds and rain while we gardened on Wednesday.

Sun again on Thursday when we finished up a bit of garderning and took time to play and relax before packing up to come home.

There were ducks and herons in the lagoon. 

There was coffee and strolling in Langley. We found flowers. 

There was a short walk on the lagoon dike while Tom collected some wild rose starts, hopefully to eventually grow on in our cabin garden. We are trying to go more native. 

Pussy willows already blooming out. 

With the garden tidy and weeded, hopefully the tulips will stay ahead of the weeds until we return, 

Gardening never stays done.

We had a great little getaway, one much needed by me. 

Time Doesn't Stand Still, So I Won't Either

 Sunday we went for a walk in the park again. There are signs of spring there too.

Red Flowering Current buds are swelling, getting ready to burst open.

Indian Plum is fully open. These are both native plants.

This little park is very close to our house and a great place to walk away from traffic.

Monday we both expended a lot of energy cleaning house and doing laundry. Then we were ready for  little vacation.

Today I am posting from the family cabin on Whidbey Island. After Tom hosted our Tuesday Zoom meet up, and I packed, we were on our way, stopping for Starbucks coffee and a ferry ride.

When we arrived at the cabin about 12:30 we were greeted by sunshine.

Blue in the sky and cool ducks on the lagoon. I spotted Green-winged Teal, Northern Shovelers, and Northern Pintails.

This afternoon I went for a walk on the beach road, stopping at the beach to see the bay view. I got my mile again. Tom worked tidying up the cabin garden. Tomorrow we'll both spend a little time weeding in the garden, but not too much.

I am on vacation. We'll have dinner out tonight, I'll cook and work tomorrow, and then Thursday we'll play before heading home.

I had a message from my surgeon's office this afternoon. It looks like my knee surgery won't happen any time soon, maybe not even until after July. So...I'll keep on moving.  

Fun or Interesting.

 Yesterday at breakfast one of our friends started us off by asking, "Did anyone do anything fun or interesting?"

There was a silent pause, so I spoke up, "We got a new dishwasher this week." Everyone laughed. I guess a dishwasher is neither fun nor interesting, but when you are old, it just might have to do. It did generate some conversation before it sparked something else and we moved on.

That dishwasher was delivered on Monday, in a box, uninstalled. 

Tom and Jake were going to do that. Apparently the directions were less than clear and much discussion ensued, along with considerable frustration. I opted to go upstairs and check in later. It took several hours, but apparently all was well as I reemerged for lunch.

Three days later, when we ran it for the first time, it was so quiet Tom wasn't sure it was working. But it did, no leaks, and clean dishes.

Otherwise it was just an ordinary week. Tom worked outside when he could. I'm not sure what I did but I was always busy. I did decide it was time to have  surgery again, a knee replacement on my right knee. After exhausting all other possible causes, I have decided, with previous hints from my Docs, that my poorly functioning knee is partly a cause for my poor mobility. I emailed my sugreon, heard back from his office, and I guess I will have to wait longer than I want. I have a preliminary appointment for April 3rd. 

The rain held off again today and we were both outside doing clean up. I raked up debris from the last wind storm, and Tom spent a lot of time in the garden trimming and grooming and cleaning up, a lot of the work I used to do when I was more able.

He does get to rest now and then.

Opps. Looks like he left his coffee cup out in the garden.  I do tease him about working with his coffee cup in his hand. Never was my style.

There was just enough sun to open up the first ranunculus today.

Daffodils won't be far behhind. 

Spring emerging in the garden is both fun and interesting. 

Valentines Day

 

Tom is out working in the garden, potting up plants he dug out of the bed we were renewing.

I helped transplant new stuff. Tom still has to straighten out the edge. 

While he got all of the prunings loaded and hauled away, I planted the primroses in pots on the front porch and did some cleaning up there.

I made a quick trip to the grocery store this morning to get a few things for dinner. We'll be dining in, I'm cooking, Tom will assist. Dessert is from the store. 

When Tom comes in from the garden, we will go for a short walk. At least I will attempt to walk. I seem to be getting worse all the time. But my dear partner will go with me and we'll do what we can do. That's how it is now as we grow old together. 

Wishing you much love on this Valentin's Day.

Winter Gardens

 Sometimes we need to get away from our own gardening and go see other gardens. The Northwest Perennial Alliance Open Gardens Program doesn't officially start until May, but occasionally there is a garden that needs to be seen earlier. 

Barbara Flynn has such a garden. She collects snowdrops. She has 90 varieties of them! Of course we have to see them in February.

There are other early little lovlies that pop up out of cold winter ground, like these Winter Aconites. 

And of course, hellebores.

Everywhere there are the beautiful, varied leaves of hardy cyclamen.

I don't know how there can be 90 varieties of snow drops, but I can see that some are pointy and some are round. 

Thanks to Tom for getting down on the ground for closeups. 

Leaving Barbara's garden we drove around to the west side of Lake Samammish to Bellevue, to the Bellevue Botanical Garden, where Witch Hazel was putting on a show in the parking lot.

As you can see, the day was gorgeous, and stepping out of the car we were hit by the delicious fragrance of the Witch Hazel.

Then we entered the garden looking for winter color. 

Iris reticulata

Early camelia

Hellebores, of course.

Fragrant daphne odora

Edgeworthia, not open enough yet to waft its heady fragrance. 

Hellebores that shly look at you are fun to photograph. 

It was lovely to spend the morning strolling through gardens, but then I was tired and we were hungry. Time to find a Starbucks for lunch.