Spring!

It really feels like spring now. We've had a few dry days, and it approaches 80 degrees in the afternoon. Nights are still cold, dropping to the mid 40s. But the birds are singing, and the air smells like flowers. The trees have taken advantage of this bit of warm weather to burst into bloom. Here's a blossom on our almond tree at the farm, on Feb. 14.

And here it is two days later. All around town all the trees are blooming, and the bees are hard at work.

There are other signs of spring, such as when the comforter starts to make you uncomfortable, but nothing is a better indicator than Rick C. When he comes out of hiding, it must be spring. Look how sunny the farm is! We were working on our tans.

I'm really enjoying the daffodils. These are Katinka's favorite flower, so we think of her when we see them. Hi Katinka! We love you, Sis.

These lichens on the apricot are neat looking, but a bad sign. Also, the apple tree has fire blight all over, and probably should come out.

I thinned a few onions. They are just at scallion size now.

Totally random weirdness... saw this across the street from our house.

On Tuesday, the moon was just past new, and oddly sideways.

Wednesday I cleared more space for peas. I planted the Paso peas in row 1, and Maestro peas here, just behind the rose. The other shelling peas are Burpeanna Early, which went in Feb. 6, about the same time the snow peas sprouted.

Rick C. got busy and dug a trench for the irrigation. Rick J continues to work on the chicken pen. Here he admires Rick's work

The apricot started to bloom yesterday, Feb. 17.

And the forsythia is blooming as well. This is the very first flower opening up, but it's about to be a solid mass of yellow.

This little daffodil came up right in the walkway. We're trying not to step on it because it's so cute.

The mustard, which had put out a few leaves here and there all winter, hit a big growth spurt. I picked some more.

And we put it on pizza bread made from my homemade sourdough bread.

Mmmm. Rick likes it.

The last lettuce I planted is well up. I'll take this over to the cold frame, but it's all about ready to go in the ground. Ok... that got me all caught up for the week (except for the Organic Gardening Class notes but... sigh. I'll compile them later.) I'll do a separate post for the pepper seeds