Spring Has Sprung

         Spring has sprung here in the mountains of northern Pennsylvania. It brings so much joy to my heart to see all the pretties blooming. Like this shot of a wild apple blossom that currently adorns my desktop. 

          Besides this shot, I picked out four other shots of the blossoms to show you. Can they stand to see five pictures of apples blossoms? I wonder. Then I answered myself. What the hay. Why not? So here are the other four.

         "Peg, that's only two more," you say.

         Yeah, well, here's the thing. When I got all four up here, side by side, and started looking at them, I decided two of them, although different, were close enough to the others that I would spare you.

         Thank you? Did I hear someone murmur thank you?

         You're welcome. Just because I love my photos doesn't mean everyone else does.

         "It's not that," you say. "I just don't need to see five shots of the same thing."

         And I couldn't agree more.

         I am eagerly awaiting the opening of the lilacs. With them will come butterflies, bees, and hummingbird moths!

         The forsythia is on the downside of full bloom.

         The mustard plants are blooming.

         Yellow rocket, or winter cress, is a variety of mustard.

         And this white one is garlic mustard. Both are eatable— edible, and the garlic mustard is listed as invasive.

         "Mike, how would you feel about a pot of mustard greens?" I asked. He didn't answer. Not verbally anyway. He wrinkled his nose.

         My frog nest, or clutch as it's really called, is covered in sediment. I picked it up and looked at it. The tadpoles are developing nicely. I'll go down there one day and there won't be any left in the nest—clutch. They'll just be gone.

         The violets are blooming and if you didn't know, you can eat those too!

         I don't know what this one is and I did look, and look, and look until I'm all looked out! Maybe one of you know what this one is.

         Everyone knows what this is! Dandelion! They're a pretty flower and edible too!

         Nature's bounty.

         I know what this one is. It's the green flowers of the Norway maple.

        This one happens to be in the neighbor's yard, on the edge of it, near the road. Mike and I were out riding around on these country dirt roads in the golf cart and he stopped for me to take the picture. Something else going on in the neighbor's yard is lots of damage from the ash borers. Can you see all the trees in his yard that have been affected?

  

      

         This is a red maple.

         On down the road we go and I look at a pair of trees as we go past. I'm looking so hard I didn't take a picture.

         "Turn around Babe, I want to get a picture." Mike didn't question, he turned around. "Keep going," I direct. "A little further," I say keeping an eye on the trees. Then when we were a little ways past them I say, "Okay, turn around now." Mike whipped a u-ey and back the other way went. He was looking to see if he could spot what had captured my attention and he had been so good about obeying and not questioning I figured I owed him an explanation. "I want to get a picture of those trees," I say but don't point out which ones.

         His eyes went from the roadside to the trees. "Oh, the hugging ones?"

         "You see it too!"' 

  

         As we get past them, we glance back and see the huggee tree had 'arms' on both sides of the hugger tree.

         At the lower bridge we saw ducks in the creek. "There's a baby!" I say as the ducks quickly swam away from us.

         "Where?" Mike asked.

         "It's right there with them. It's a little brown one. See it?" (Rosie, stop laughing.)

         About that time he spots it.

         I snapped a few pictures as the ducks shot the rapids down the creek to another pool. "Are they stopping?" one or the other of us asked. Then we see them shoot another set of rapids. "Nope. They kept right on agoin'," Mike said.

         On the way home Mike stopped every time I saw something I wanted to take a picture of.

         This one is called Downy Serviceberry (thank you for the book on trees, brother Michael—it was very helpful). Just as the name implies, it does get a small fruit on it and surprise! It's edible too!

         Pine cones or new growth?

         After downloading all the photos I took, I see that my 'baby' duck happens to be the brown head of the female merganser. I bet Miss Rosie knew what I was seeing before I did.

         Life isn't all fun and games here at our Mountain Home. After more than ten years of neglect, we are paying the piper, so to speak.

         We are pulling small trees and bushes out with the tractor, spreading dirt to fill the holes left behind, picking rocks — all backbreaking work.

         After the mower mulched our huge burn pile, we discovered that after years and years of sitting, our burn pile was turning back into good, rich, dark, soil. 

        We picked out and burned most of the larger pieces of wood then Mike scraped the leftovers together, mixing wood pieces with the dirt, creating a

huge pile!

         It turned out to be a blessing in disguise though. After having a roaring fire going, and burning as much as we were going to burn for the day, Mike scooped several buckets of the wood/dirt mixture on top creating an oven that sat and burned on the inside for the night. The next day he would stir it up a little, get the fire going again, throw more brush and trees on top, and repeat the process all over again.

         And now, today, all that is left is the oven itself and the scrap metal pile in the middle.

         "It's looking good, isn't it?" Mike asked.

         "Yes it is!" I enthuse.

         Our neighbor Jon Robinson popped in a couple of times to check on our progress.

         "Jon, what are you going to do with the sliding glass doors in your daddy's old machine shed?" I asked.

         "Nothing," was his quick and short reply.

         "Can I have them?"

         "Yep. You can have anything in there you want."

         "Thank you!"

         Glass.

         I kinda have a fetish for glass, don't ya know.

         "You better get it before the shed falls down," Jon said.

         So Mike and I went down that day and I picked out all the glass windows and doors I could find.

         "I bet the seals are broken on the doors and they're foggy," Mike said as he helped me carry them out.

         "I don't think so. I rubbed the dirt off and they look fine to me."

          I got several single-pane windows, a domed skylight (with a small crack in the corner), and four sliding glass doors. We brought them home and washed the years of dust and dirt from them and yes, Mike was right. The seals were broken and the insides of the doors were foggy .

         "What are you going to do with them?" you ask.

         I've asked Mike if I can have the room off the upper barn.

         "What for?" he answered my question with a question.

         "I want a place to hang herbs and flowers to dry."

         He agreed and I was thinking we could put a window or two in there for me.

         I also want to have, (someday) a seedling starter bed like my grandfather had. Make a frame and cover it with a piece of glass. Something like this.

         Glass or gardens? Which should we go to next?

         Glass.

         This is what's on my table right now. I've cut and ground a butterfly, four dragonflies, two hearts and they'll get rose buds attached to them. I was hoping to have everything completed before today's letter blog, but that didn't happen. I did get them foiled and I got one dragonfly soldered, that's it.

         It's good to have friends, you know that?

         Some friends of ours gave us a nice big helping of fresh picked asparagus from their garden.

          Mike and I love asparagus. I washed and steamed them and we had them for dinner that night.

         "What! No butter!" you exclaim.

         That's right. No butter. I'm on a diet and they taste good without any butter on them anyway.

         We had enough asparagus leftover that we warmed them up for dinner the next night too.

         I'll tell you what. Having asparagus two nights in a row became evident when I peed. Yup. There are foods that come through in your urine, like asparagus — and red beets. Too many of those will make your pink pee — pee pink!

         And I can't think of a happier note than that to end this one on.

         Let's call this one done!