Saturday

Again, a beautiful day before us! There is sunshine already by 6 and the hens are anxious to get out and test the lands to the back of the barn (they get much more adventurous on sunny days and that may or may not be a good thing!).











Breakfast on the porch again. Right after Ed conducts a successful catch and release of a huge bumble bee. If ever there is a mark of an approaching summer, wouldn't it be the sound of a bumble bee?





I completely appreciate this morning of utter loveliness. It's not a given that May should have such days. In fact, next week, I'd be surprised if we have a single morning breakfast outdoors. But for now, revel in it! It's absolutely stunning! The birds are a riot of song, the air is just right -- we find it hard to turn away from this porch moment of complete contentment.

Again it is a busy gardening day. Friends stop by for an early afternoon visit, so we do take a slight pause. Only for a few minutes.  All the other daylight hours are filled with the most important of all gardening activities: planting. And, of course, with shooing chickens off. And let's not forget about weeding. Not a day will go by this spring where I will not pull out at least 500 sprouting tree seeds, burdock roots, creeping charlie trails and today, in addition to all that, I finally give up on trying to contain the lilies of the valley at the side garden and pull the whole lot out -- to be transplanted later in the day by the barn. Near the chicken pen. Enjoy the (short lived) fragrance of this pretty flower, chickies!

Chickens. Oh, those chickens! Whitney is there every time I dig a new hole. Scotch hovers to the side, not wanting to appear dominant. Oreo is never as quick as the girls. Butter -- she's a happy-go-lucky chick. If there's digging, she'll partake. Maybe. To a point.

I can't say they are not at all destructive of my flowers. Something will catch one's fancy and she (or he) will nibble away. But it's a rare event. As the beds fill in, they find other places that have greater access to soil.

Isis watches all of this and I cannot tell whether he is accepting of the imposition, or reconciled, or still a tiny bit on edge. Was it coincidence that when the chickens got up from under the picnic table (their favorite resting place) to scratch and search, he spread out there himself, even though he has never shown interest in that place before?





And how about when he went over to the silo to chew on some blades of grass and Whitney followed him: was he okay with that? Or a little apprehensive?





As you can tell, the level of stress, here at the farmette, is rather low. We watch a humming bird come and go, I frown at the chicken that (deliberately?) knocks down the lupine bloom, I heave the hose to water the new plantings because there just hasn't been a lot of rain lately -- these are the issues that consume us now. Nothing more than that.

In the evening, late evening, we thrown down the tools, drink copious amounts of fizzy water and take long showers. It's a date night!

Since it's Saturday and we want to avoid crowds, we stay local. A new Indian restaurant opened just a couple of miles west of us and we want to keep them in business! And I take my laptop and he takes his magazine and you may not fully understand why this is such a wonderful date, but for us, it truly is that.