Poof. Spring is Here!

Moved my mother-in-law to a new apartment in April.  It went very well.  She's getting used to her new neighbourhood - a church, a market and a dollar store just 3 minutes away - and Kevin for everything else.  She's been enjoying having friends by to show it off.  Very stressful at anytime in your life and even more so when you're 87.  So far, so good.

Fortunately Spring seems to have been waiting for me up until last week.  The garden is slightly chaotic - leaves where I don't want them; ground mutilated from the crane used to remove the tree last Fall; and the coup de grace - Bell Canada sent a group of four men to destroy one of my side gardens. Yes, I know that's not how they look at it, but that's about the size of it as they plunked a Ditch Witch right on top of my garden.  I was mad enough to call the Prime Minister.  Instead I called the police; notified the Mayor and my councillors both for the Town and the Region; wrote a letter to the Chairman of Bell Canada asking for my plants to be replaced....  The upshot is the Mayor was very kind - he referred it to the Engineering department, and the police officer got them to take their Ditch Witch hoses off the other beds and move their trailer out of the No Parking Zone.

Kevin was very impressed - he said, "Didn't you notice that those guys were kind of scary looking?" I tell you, when a woman is defending offspring, it doesn't concern her a bit!

Between elder care, business, and everything else, I'm really looking at changing the garden design on the street side.  In the past I've delighted in wandering around the garden finding Heuchera here and there - now I'm thinking I'm going to put them all together.  Things that have similar maintenance will learn to be friends and live together.  I'm also thinking more mass plantings.  I want a native section as well - perhaps something with prickles and darts for those darling Bell men?  Am even thinking more straight lines to help me mow.   And from the windows, I want things to look like composed pictures.  We lost several trees in the ice storm a couple of winters ago - do I replace them or rethink?  When I first moved here I threw caution to the wind and planted woodies that needed more sunshine - they now look like stork plants - skinny legs with leaf blobs - not a good look - so out they go.  But what should replace them?  My plan had been to have a plan done in early spring - I'm thinking I'll mull it over this summer, draw this winter and have it ready to roll for next year. Nothing like having a plan to plan to keep a girl on her toes.

What follows, is the progress of April in my garden and on my walks.  There was a wee bit of snow on the Hamamelis:

The earliest daffs were at least 2-3 weeks later than normal:

The blue-grass season was better than ever this year.  I was so happy to see the Scilla I almost jumped the fence and rolled in it:

Neighbours have started to put their spring pots together:

Mid-April, there were still the remnants of last year's blossoms combined with the fun of spring at their feet:

Two cold daffs:

And Scilla to die for:

The colour of the sky rivals that of the flowers - here's Bart wanting to get too close to a randy Canada Goose:

Is this not one of the happiest sights ever?

Our winter was exceptionally fierce.  I thought for certain the magnolia blossoms would be damaged - instead this was one of the best years ever - didn't matter - Star Magnolia, Saucers - all great.  Here are some pretty stellatas:

Note to self - more daffodils for next year:

Someone woke up on the wrong side of her satin pillow:

The last week of April/beginning May the Epimedium started to show off.  It was one of those years where there was actually time for me to cut away the dead cleanly before the start of this year's flush of growth:

Lovely red tulips on the hospital grounds.  I'll really miss the gardens next year when the hospital is dismantled and the staff relocated 5k north of here:

So nice to have some of the old neighbourhood wildflowers reappear in my Aunt Win's woodland garden:

So the last photo of the day and back to my newsletter for Kevin.  It's a big day tomorrow.   Yet another marker of Spring - the Lawn and Garden Program at Loblaw is revealed!  I am looking forward to seeing what's new and telling you about it later this week.  Can hardly wait!