It really is spring, and I really am starting to love it. Of course it’s mostly been raining, but we go out as much as possible (even in said rain). This weekend though we got a little bit of not-quite-sun-but-not-freezing-and-only-a-little-wet weather that was good to get things started in the yard. The first thing you see coming to my house is the front rock wall we put in last year.

Next week this is going to be all kinds of wonderful colors, exactly what colors I don’t quite remember (I waited too long to order tulips and basically took what they had). I forgot to show you pictures of the crocus’ blooming (purple and white), they were very welcome in winter! The tulips coming up the drive and in the back are blooming now though:

I think planning on a few different bulb types (early-late blooming) was a good call, I should have color in my yard from now until November (not just tulips of course). So much is popping up now!

(try not to cringe at my text handling Sciarrino!) I took way too many pictures so I made a little collage. I say, we won’t have much dirt showing in September. I guess this year I’ll really know what it’s like to have a full on cottage garden!

The backyard is looking amazing! I’m so in love with my garden. Last year it was a bit of “oh my goodness we have a yard” shock, especially since the plants didn’t come until the hottest days of the year. This year I know where the gaps are and where we can sneak in edibles.

That’s an apple tree (honeycrisp!) surrounded by a few types of strawberries. Let me know if they really hate each other, I forgot to look it up. I figure if anything it should be fine while my apple tree is tiny. We also planted two Asian pears on the other side. Turns out they prefer to be in pairs so we had to jostle things around a bit over there. So that we can have shade the next few summers we’re keep the holly and hazelnut trees until the fruit trees crowd them out, then we’ll keep the fruit trees and chop the others down.

With the addition of two vines you can barely see here we’ll have tons of fruit! I chose a marionberry vine and a raspberry variety (both do great here). Plus we have the well established plum tree already. I planted peas (on the homemade trellis in the back), spinach, and lettuce from starts. I know my weakness, and it’s seeds. I do have some carrots sown in the back boxes with the lettuce, we’ll see if they come up. The front box will hold tomatoes, and I’m thinking of doing a few potted tomato plants because I don’t think that’s enough room (will tomatoes live in pots?). Plus the herb garden you can’t see behind these boxes has to be restocked with the things that couldn’t overwinter.

Here is the view from the other direction, those white tags sticking up on the left are our pears (the plum tree is the big one in the back). The yard looks huge with this lens, but it’s not that big. So far Tuesday and I have been handling the weeds and pests completely organically. And I think our soil loves us.

At least the worms do. There are tons and some are HUGE (side note: I also found a crazy huge and weird shaped spider UNDERGROUND while I was digging. It was alive and had a ball thing?!?! Scared the crap out of me).

Tuesday moved her babies around for a while, naming them and comparing length, until Bj took an unfortunate step back onto a rock…

Tuesday says, “do that again papa and you’ll get the business end of this shovel” She means it too, right after I snapped this picture she walked over to show me the shovel and my lens took the hit. So glad I’ve taken to lens hoods AT ALL TIMES!!!!
 
p.s. it might snow today…