In one minute of listening this morning, I recorded the following birds: Common Yellowthroat (with a yellow throat), always the American Robin, the American Goldfinch (gold all over), Cedar Waxing (beautiful yellow belly), Mourning Warbler (ditto), Song Sparrow, Yellow-billed Cuckoo (ha! With a yellow bill). So much yellow! Such a bounty of birds and, therefore, birdsong. This is why I took our breakfast to the porch, despite the still chilly morning. (It's just 55F/13C, but the sunshine changes everything. The psychological warmth is at a perfect 75F/24C!)
First though, there is the walk to feed the animals. We are definitely in the Allium phase of flower blooms. The peonies and irises will be next but honestly, the Allium is the finest transition flower: long lasting and a standout in a sea of dense greens.
(the first bearded iris blooms)
(and then another...)
I have two bouquets going right now -- one from yesterday's farmers market (false indigo and peonies) and one from the flower farmers' CSA (tulips). I like both of them so much that they will be the breakfast focus here, on Ocean.
Ed and I both worked outside on and off all morning. My Clematis vines are picking up growth speed (in their third year now, they are finally climbing nicely) and so I asked Ed for ideas on a support system. He suggested a tripod -- similar to the one he put up for my older clematis vines. We put one in around the stump.
And I'm still moving some flowers around. We took out a dead lilac and put in a couple of stems from the old lilac to get that going. And of course, there are the weeds -- too many to count! Too many to pull out in any one sitting (well, actually standing: I bend down to pull, which I'm told is terrible for the back but this is what I do).
The flower fields are at their moment of growth. This is a calm set of weeks for me. Aside from the weed pulling, I can pause with the hard work. Nothing needs staking or deadheading. There are no mosquitoes yet, so a walk cutting through a flower bed can be leisurely and really peaceful. May is such a good month for me! Especially (but not only) on a sunny day.
The kids are here again of course. They, too, are in a good phase right now. Maybe it's that the summer is just a couple of weeks away. Maybe it's the sunshine?
It's not that we all need sunshine to feel joy. But I will say this much -- a sunny day, especially when it follows a string of the cold and the wet, enhances the good stuff and blurs the rough moments. At least that's the way it is for us here, on farmette lands.
with love...
