Sunday - 44th

This is what spring looks like!






Can you go outside? Do you have something bursting into bloom right now? If so, isn't it just a sight to behold?!

(Calico, coming out of her hiding spot to "smell the flowers...")






It's a beautiful day in south central Wisconsin! It cannot be improved upon! (Ed brings out the three pots wintered over in the sheep shed)






Needless to say, after breakfast (and this is the only photo you'll see of the indoors)...






... Ed and I go out to work on any number of things in the gardens of the farmette. For me, the top priority is planting Natalie's annuals. They're in small containers and they need room to grow. Into the tubs and pots they go! I do them all! Right now, they offer just a handful of blooms, but there will come a time in early fall when their color will be deeply appreciated. If only the cheepers would quit nibbling on the buds!









I'm not using as many flower flats as I typically would, but I have seeds to help me fill the pots more fully if need be. It's a glorious day for this kind of work!





I stop in the mid-afternoon to fuss a little with dinner prep. Shrimp tacos, to be served on the porch -- our first outdoor meal of the year!

The young family comes over, but we don't go inside at all. The kids... well, they do kid things.
















For a minute, I am transported to last summer, when meals outside were a routine summer thing and Sparrow couldn't walk yet and Snowdrop danced and pranced, making up little games, while we all talked about such things as swimming lessons and county fairs. Sometimes we were six, sometimes the younger family would come up from Chicago and we were nine.  Lovely days then. And they will come back and we will once again talk about swimming lessons and county fairs -- perhaps wistfully, but with the expectation that this too will pass and we will be frivolous and carefree again. I can tell that today, because honestly, the weather begs for such feelings of hope and optimism. We will get there. This weird stuff is not forever.






(Snowdrop loves trying to find fragrance in a flower. She says it cures a sore tummy...)






So, I do hope you are well. I hope all the tired people who work way too hard during the week had a moment to exhale. Outside maybe. A good long exhale.

With love.