On A More Positive Note...

This has been the most magnificent Spring I can remember.  March was warm and started things rolling, then April cooled and prolonged it.  And I have a young hound who needs a lot of exercise so we have been out in it almost every day, walking miles and miles.  Various governors would be pissed off at me, too, since I'm in and out of West Virginia, Maryland, and Virginia and no I don't self-quarantine afterwards.

"And miles to go before I sleep..."

The bluebells have been amazing - just acres and acres of blue blanketing the forest floors.  They are at the tail end of their bloom season now, and once completely done not only will the flowers disappear but the foliage will also fade back into the ground, leaving no trace of the plant until Spring comes round again.

Virginia Bluebells

Acres and Acres of Bluebells

Wake Robin Trillium

Trout Lily

Bloodroot

Dutchman's Britches

Squirrel Corn

Jack-In-The-Pulpit

Grape Hyacinth - A Pretty, Invasive Non-Native

Nodding Star of Bethlehem - Also An Invasive Non-native But Beautiful

Just Really Cool

It's warm enough now that I'm seeing frog eggs in puddles, turtles, and snakes, and hearing Spring peepers.  The hummingbirds are back and video is already circulating of the first bear raids of the season.  Spring is well and truly here and we're loving it.

Springy

It's always a scramble in the Spring - things grow faster than you can get gardens and flower beds cleaned up and ready.  This year I was away for a lot of the time that the prep work would have been done, so now I'm racing.  Trim, weed, rake, mulch and oh-dang-I'm-not-going-to-get-that-moved-this-year-again.  Yesterday involved some mulch moving, and as I tossed a shovelful into the wheelbarrow, I saw what I thought was a big earthworm.  I hate it when I accidentally whack earthworms apart, so I separated it out to move it to safety.  Except it wasn't an worm - it was an eastern wormsnake.

My neighbor tried to get a pic for me, but the little guy wouldn't hold still and pose:

Very pretty little thing, others out on the web have snapped better pictures than I got:

A rich caramel brown on top, peach pink underneath, and scales that were iridescent in the sun.  I moved him to the woodpile, where he can choose between there, a mulched flower bed, or rocks in which to hunt his buggy meals and where there's less chance of him getting stepped on or having an unfortunate run in with my shovel.

I do love Spring.

Spring

I love Spring.  I love the return of light and life and watching Orion slide back down towards the horizon, taking long, cold nights with him.  I love opening the windows and letting the sounds and smells come in once more, pushing winter staleness out.  I love watching my plants shoot up out of the ground and cover themselves with bloom in what sometimes seems like just hours. I love watching the lawn wake up out of Winter brownness and shoot up dark green faster than I can get the mower ready to deal with the season.

This has been an early and spectacular Spring, and I've relished every moment of it.  I had to close up and turn the heat on for the first time in a couple weeks yesterday as we briefly sank to normal temperatures, but mostly my house has been open to pollen and bugs and I don't care - I love Spring.

We had an electrical fire at the office last Thursday morning.  The buildings had to be closed, which normally wouldn't matter because I telework, but it knocked our servers offline.  Once I finished up the work I could do without them I was free as a bird and Thursday and Friday were spectacular.  The house, front porch and porch furniture got power washed, the porch got re-stained and the furniture got a new coat of polyurethane.  The new hummingbird/butterfly beds got dug up and supplemented, and yarrow, dwarf butterfly bush, and abelia joined the bee balm.   Mulch got put down.  The patching of a problem area began - I need to get the grass established there before the Summer heat gets here.  Some flowers that weren't doing well in one place got moved to another where I hope they will do better.  And all the while I mentally sorted through what I want to put in a couple beds that are shady and the deer keep wiping out.  No impatiens this year.  Maybe a variety of ferns.

I'm exhausted.  My joints are sore.  There's 400 more pounds of top soil in the back of the SUV waiting to get shifted to bad spots that need leveled.  I need to mow today.  I'll probably need to mow again Saturday.  My sprained finger is pissy and sore because I don't stop long enough to let it heal.   I haven't even made it over to St. Peter's to start on Mary's garden there, or started on the beds over at St. James.

And the trees are covered in hazy green through which bright birds fly and I am very, very content.