Thursday

Neither Ed nor I are rushing to work outside this year. It really is the messy weather. In other years, I'd be looking forward to the arrival of perennials in a couple of weeks. Now? I haven't finished clearing the flower beds yet. 

The gardener in me wags a finger at my efforts thus far this season. I dont even have a good plan! And, I am a little apprehensive about the spring bulbs: my daffodils are coming in awfully dense, shade has taken away precious sunlight -- all of this makes for lots of foliage and too few blooms. I recognized this last year but was too busy with other beds to do anything about it. My tulips? Well, I seem to want to defy nature. Sure, I put in new bulbs each fall, but I rarely dig out the old ones after they're done blooming, which is a real no no in gardening with bulbs. Tulips do sometimes come back with healthy blooms, but most often they do not. They are not a perennial and treating them as such will eventually catch up with you. When I was in Giverny I did ask if they really dug out and chucked all their massive tulip plantings and I got the expected "yes, of course."

So I'll be digging out and composting lots of stuff this spring so that I can get a good start on the next spring season. Fun. 

And in the meantime, the temps stay in the shadows of spring and Ed and I stay indoors all morning long.

In the afternoon, though, I am once again picking up Snowdrop at school.

It seems funny to have her here as opposed to in a room overlooking the Grand Canal or a narrow street in Paris (she notes this as well), but on the other hand, it's good to have this mellow time at home with her, where we do nothing ambitious at all. Eat and read her entire time here.

Today is a day I also pick up Sparrow at his preschool. 

So, both kids, back in the swing of things in their post spring break routines, while Ed and I twiddle our thumbs at home waiting for spring to really take hold.

With love...