Without a doubt, spring is my favorite time of year. After some earlier tedious work when the cold soil quickly turned fingers numb, now the days are noticeably longer and the temperatures rising, bringing forth a burst of backyard activity. We live in the Northeastern United States where winters are too cold and summers are too hot, so spring is the magical time when one can do some work in the yard without breaking a sweat. Now that our early plantings are thriving, I love just walking around, keeping tabs on who is doing what.
My raised beds (above) on the patio are tiny, but perfectly placed for making a quick salad. We have lots of kale going this year, along with some different lettuces and spinach. There are some garlic bulbs there on the end of the far bed that are doing nicely, and along the right our mass of sugar snap peas are already in bloom! (below)
A few years ago we began making a switch to more fruit. Here are the first crop of strawberries just starting to ripen on three-year-old plants. We should have an excellent crop this year, as long as we can keep the pesky rodents from eating them first!
Here's a pesky rodent now . . .
On to the tiny apples on a ten-year-old tree . . .
I haven't had much luck with beets, but here are some new sprouts giving it a go. Probably should have gotten them started a little sooner.
The tomatoes we started from seed indoors are looking fantastic.
Okay, a closer pic of the chickens for the chicken people . . .
The patio was partly designed as a grape arbor (along with a very posh canoe storage unit). I have a four-year-old vine, a two-year old vine, and a one-year-old, and this will be the first summer when the entire underside of the roof will be hanging with juicy fresh fruit!
Just getting started . . .
Tiny grapes already forming . . .
And then there are the hopvines, currently growing a foot a day! I swear if you look closely at the photo you might actually see them moving :)
I hope you enjoyed the tour of my backyard! And I hope if you are not in the midst of your own growing season this might have inspired some rolling up of the sleeves. Spring is a truly magical time when you slow down, get close, and pay attention to what is actually happening. It is an annual opportunity to reconnect with nature, and it is hard for me to imagine letting a season pass me by.
Cheers!
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