Sunday

This afternoon, as Ed and I cleared the grapes, chipped the young orchard and dug out weeds in this year's tomato bed, I blurted out to him -- it's too hot!

And it was. I'm sure we toppled a record with an afternoon temp of 74F (upwards of 23C). And the air was fairly still and it felt, well, sultry!

It didn't start off that way. Indeed, as I got up and set the thermostat somewhat higher (we keep it cool at night, but fairly pleasant during the day), I was greatly dismayed that the mechanism was non responsive. In other words, the furnace was broken.

On the one hand, you want the furnace to malfunction on a warm day, on the other hand, you don't want it to malfunction in April in Wisconsin because as sure as there are buds on willow trees now, we will most definitely need furnace warmth in the course of this spring.






And so we did the usual division of labor, which is pathetically gendered, but very much in line with our own skill set: I clean the farmhouse, Ed fixes the furnace. A new circuit board and boom! We have heat again. Even as we do not need or want it on this day.

Breakfast is late and therefore an easy slide into the great outdoors. It's warm, it's lovely, it's on the porch!






After, as I noted already -- we worked the land. And I have to say, it isn't anyone's favorite sort of work. Digging out quack grass roots and other terribly invasive weeds is only fun for the first hour or so. But we were ambitious and went after the whole veggie patch, which took a long time and left me thinking -- wouldn't this have been easier if I wasn't dripping with sniffles?

Nah... So long as you're feeling congested and miserable (did I mention that I'm fighting sniffles?), you may as well do the most tedious outside chores.


It may feel sultry and perhaps too warm for early April, but it is true that the warm air does a little magic in our daffodil beds. I wouldn't say we're amassing yellow blooms just yet...






... but we're starting to see the cheerful yellow faces and they are an utter delight for me.






Cheepers, please go scratch somewhere else. Please. Not here!






In the evening, the young family comes for Sunday dinner. Snowdrop just cannot believe her luck: we're eating outside on the porch? -- she asks again and again.

Yes, we are.






Such joy to feel the full beauty of a warm spring day over a meal outside. Such total joy!






Snowdrop loves it all: the food, the company, the breeze that blows from one end of the porch to the other (and all I keep thinking is -- when did she flip from looking like a toddler to looking like a big girl?)...







After dinner, she's in. She's out. She runs this way, she goes that way. I fretted that the stairs Ed built that lead up from the porch to the kitchen would be too high and tough for her to navigate. I needn't have worried.







That moment when winter changes to spring comes quickly. And when the air is warm and the flowers do their thing, you just can't believe your luck!

(What are you eating, Snowdrop? Ahah gave me a cookie! Oh that ahah!)






We're two days shy of a full moon and I must admit -- there is a high cloud cover that makes it nearly impossible to see any moon at all, but no matter. The moon is there and the owls will start their hooting music and I cannot imagine a sweeter transition than the one we have now -- from winter, to full spring.