Let me tell you 'bout the birds and the bees and the flowers and the trees:)
It's here.
I am recommending this Hori Hori tool I received for my birthday in February.
It's great!!!Nasty roots of invasives ..dividing plants etc..So
I tend to overdo Spring.I can go out right after breakfast.. and start..either refreshing paint on obelisks.. looking around at what needs to be done..adding mulch to clematis.. After lunch..edging..( ;( )..
Digging out goutweed and those awful tall bluebells that have sprung up EVERYWHERE.Those cute bells have..tuber like roots and spread even worse than mint.Creeping Bellflowers they are called.. ..LOTV.I love them but everywhere now..
Fertilizing clematis and some irises.
Ripping out grass in paths..I just don't know when to stop.
My husband will say..:"C'est assez Monique".
I hope those of you who celebrated Mother's day..Had a good one.
Into each life a little rain must fall.
Not all families are gilded.
This is a very commercial holiday ...So like Valentine's etc..if you are without loves..or family..It can be very hard.
As in my little watercolor..Time stands still for no one..
At one point we become the lady in the middle.
It all goes by too fast in some cases..
Sometimes it seems to drag if we are not well and watching the world go by..
Other times.. the speed of lightning,especially looking back.
Have a really good week:)
Take care.
PS footnote /I found out something interesting from an Antonio Valente post..It is safe to plant annuals once the crabapples have lost their blooms..I usually plant around May 24h..I will see:)
"Spring is busting out all over" your property, Monique, and isn't is wonderful!? I smiled when reading your confession that you tend to overwork in spring. I just know that's an understatement. You must be working long and hard, but there's something so satisfying about taking care of creating beauty. This morning I woke to see my first peony opening up. The little 91 year old woman that sold us our little home, worked to keep them going, so I will too, in honor of her. Speaking of honoring one another, I was struck by your painting of the three women, and your words, "At one point, we become the woman in the middle." Oh my. So poetic. So true. I can tell that I'm moving toward that center spot, but I'm okay with it, because I have beautiful girls holding my hands, too. As always, many thanks, Monique. You touch my heart. --Pam
ReplyDeletePam..how thoughtful and kind that you are honoring her peonies:) Was she Tasha Tudor? A relative perhaps:)I think the invasives are getting to me..These rhizome invasives are the worst:( 24 yrs here and they have taken over too many areas.I can't start over..Anyway.....who cares right?:) moi.We are lucky Pam:) Family. Have a great day:)
DeleteThe little old woman who owned our home felt she needed to make the move to assisted living. At the same time, our daughter and her hubby were expecting. While at my daughter's baby shower, I met some of her neighbors and joked about how I wanted to move into their neighborhood, too. Well the word got out and one thing led to another and we heard (through a long grapevine) that a little brick home, just 2 miles from our kids, was going on the market. My husband and I quickly contacted the owner and asked if she'd consider showing us the place, and the rest is history. She was the sweetest person! I would like to claim her as a relative, but she is a friend, now. We bought her home one month before all the Covid shutdowns. How good is God!? How perfect is His timing!
DeleteThat was MEANT to be:) I must admit to missing my daughter and her family kitty corner across the street .Just knowing they were there..and the boys would pop over.In the little over 3 yrs that they have left.. things are rapidly changing with the littles being young men with plans of their own..but still so loving and tender.I could not ask for sweeter funnier grandsons.Enjoy being two miles away and good for you for taking action when hearing about it!
DeleteYour busy time is beginning now Monique! I always enjoy seeing the garden through your eyes and the lens of your camera. I admire you and your ability to do all the things that you do and do so well. Love your paintings always. I bet you have filled a couple of books when your people paintings now. Mother's Day for many of us is not the day that the retail industry would have us believe. I loved my mom and celebrated her every day, which is as it should be! Happy week my friend. I imagine it will find you elbows deep in the dirt! Your happy place! xoxo
ReplyDeleteYes just going out now.I have laundry started and I made J a tiny carrot cake that stuck..Ill be happier outside I think:)I really push myself but once I am lost in it..it's a gift Marie.Until I can I will:) Im a homebody you know that and no fun sister to galavant with;) ENJOY..Such fun..
DeleteAnd the Breath of Spring, as only you can convey it! Oh, those plants---those must-be-hardy plants just jumping from the ground---I just want to pick up that little fiddlehead and hug it to my bosom---those tee-ninecy frills and fingers a-curlin' up out of the ground. All those stirrings and rustlings and "showings" as we always said at the first peek of the neat green dicots marching far away across the beanfield or cottonrows.
ReplyDeleteI'm still just Cloud Nine-residing since the picture arrived. It's simply so sweet and charming, each small fade and shadow conveying exactly the image I'd had in my mind through all these years (your kind and flattering idealization of me just makes me smile---you time-traveled and captured the ME of decades ago, always up and going, with with a tiny hand to guide almost at all times)---the hair is the exact image I saw in my college mirror all those years, and there's such a vulnerable sweetness to our Girl, belying the grand strong smart young woman she is now. The braids and the dress---she couldn't decide, so settled on two, marking her mercurial, magical personality.
I cannot say enough---words enough fail, and I'd need some great mathematical exponent to keep going with the gratitude. Thank you and Bless you for this---it's a Lifetime boon and treasure, practically a Mitzvah. Thank you from my heart.
You are MOST welcome.I thank you for enjoying my humble offering!! I felt the photo:) As sweet as sweet can be..I will look up Mizvah and wonder if it\'s like Mitzpah..I see not the same.Thank you for this new very kind word:) Keep well..Love your hair!!
DeleteI love seeing you garden come alive. Such awesome variety. As I have already told you, so envious of your FMN's.
ReplyDeleteim going to send you a bunch of seeds..:)Mine ressed..so I guess you could sow some here and there when you get them..we will just keep trying:)
DeleteThanks M
DeleteSpring has sprung and you are so busy with the gardens. It's a good thing because after you can sit back and enjoy the hard work you applied. Your paintings are always so fun and cute. As you know for my Mother's Day I chose to entertain family and friends. My gift to them.
ReplyDeleteYou are a giver:)Having people over.. entertaining them with food and attention..is Loving them.Its funny I wonder if I ever sit back and enjoy them lol as soon as I am out I see things that need attention:)
DeleteOh, this is so lovely. Your garden -- you are in your element, the season is ready for you! And i really do love your painting -- the thought behind it is so very true. I know we've only just started to see the bountiful beauty that will come in the weeks ahead -- and I can't wait!
ReplyDeleteI think my body is having trouble adjusting to shovels and edgers and pitch forks lol...The worst part is digging out invasives that just laugh at me because they return in droves.Thank you re my little painting:)
DeleteI hope you had a nice Mother's day too :-) Thank you for recommending the Hori Hori knife as my bestie has a birthday coming up, and she loves garden tools. Spring has sprung, and I enjoy seeing snippets of your garden.
ReplyDeleteIt's a great tool! Perfect gift:) It's all happening fast now:)
DeleteOh Monique your beautiful post echoes so much of what’s going on in my life right now. That horrible ground elder, every year I work tirelessly to dig it out and every year it comes back to taunt me, and since my fall last week I’m moving at a snail's pace whilst everything in the garden is galloping! I can’t keep up. And your lovely little painting, that is how I see myself, complete with a walking cane. But I know the bruises and aches will soon heal and I can back to sorting out the garden 😊
ReplyDeleteYou will heal! I had summers where it was impossible for me to do anything.One in particular.One of my daughters said..the next yr..
Delete"It looks like your gardens waited for you":) I loved that.Yours will also..These horrible spreading invasives are the killer for me:( Take care:)
Monique, your photos are touching. I love the way your eye zooms in on nature. Keep doing it!
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, time moves on and at some point we become the one in the middle. How lucky to have two younger ones by our side. Thanks for sharing. Happy Spring!
You have a true eye for beauty:) Happy Spring to you:)
DeleteIt's so sad when the cutest flowers become invasive! Ferns that I had dug from my parent's lake up in Northern Wisconsin have become invasive too! I love them but they also send out those underground shoots and pop up everywhere they are not welcomed LOL. I bought a Hori Hori knife two years ago and use it all the time. Excellent for digging out those ferns between other plants. Another wild flower that has popped up in the strangest places is the red trillium called Bloody Butcher! I had to pull dozens from my groundcover around the house this year. At least we have flowers blooming again so all is good. I don't think I'll be able to plant my tender annuals until next weekend. This next week is going to be so COLD with lows in the 40s F. Love your painting...so poignant.
ReplyDeletesame ! I did plant some but all heck has broken loose..so the remainder..most..will go out after the rain/cold spell..The Bloody Butcher lol:)It's so damp and drizzly today.. the weeds are proliferating.I agree at least we have flowers blooming again:) have a nice Sunday Susan:)
DeleteOh the beauty of spring - it's all over your lovely post, Monique. Thank you for mentioning the Hori Hori knife - I have debated with myself whether I should get one. It's more likely now that I will do so. Those bellflowers look beautiful, but I can understand your frustration with them turning up everywhere. About three years ago I had Salsify in my garden, just a couple plants, but they reseed so readily that I'm still pulling them whenever I spot them. Forget-me-nots come up EVERYWHERE as well, but at least they don't smother the other plants. I have dominantly native plants in my garden and I would like to keep it that way. However, there are a few plants I like for sentimental reasons - French Lilac because my Dad loved it, peonies because my mom loved them, and red poppies because they remind me of home. I love the rock with the quote - my mother didn't have a garden (I grew up in a flat on the third floor), but she always loved to tend to her flowers on the balcony and whenever we went to the cemetery she would start to pull weeds etc. I think she gave me her botanical genes; gardening is such a joy for me and like you I seem to never be able to stop doing something in the garden. My daughter seems to have inherited this as well... Oh, your painting - it is beautiful and very touching. Yes, one day we will be that old lady in the middle; I just hope I don't have to end up in a nursery home or something similar (or worse). Thank you for this lovely post, Monique, I enjoyed it so much.
ReplyDeleteI don't want to burden anyone when I am older as I am old already according to life..71.I am active..and usually always moving when not doing a craft..But to age so old that I must have carers to wash me etc..I would abhor.I prefer caring than being cared for.We never think of aging when young.We never think of losing our minds..:( To me..you should be rewarded later in life.Aging seems like a punishment.OK back to gardening lol..more gloomy talk.Our weather has been nothing less that awful.Continuously chilly..cold ..wet..rainy.Bah Humbug.So much rain..C'est la vie..sometimes..Yes that knife.I should have purchased yrs ago.A friend many yrs ago gave me a Lee Valley curved garden knife..I have often used it..This one is more versatile..Do it:)
DeleteSo much thought and beauty...
ReplyDeleteThank you:):):)
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