I’ve started walking again**. I’ve signed up for a walking app, and it’s challenging me to get in 7,500 steps a day. It’s going pretty well – but that’s partly because the weather has been fantastic for walking – not too hot, not too cold.

I try to get out on my lunch hour. I go to the post office, check the mail and then take the long way home (a different route every day).

And right now… it’s an amazing time to be out and about in town. Nothing really exciting is happening (it is a tiny town after all), but the town is absolutely crawling with flowering trees and bushes. The magnolias and forsythias are done, but there’s crabapples…

Eastern Redbud

I actually had to look this one up. I’ve heard of Eastern Redbud, of course, but I’d never seen the flowers up close! Like tiny little fairy shoes!

Here’s another I had to look up…

Apparently it’s a Quince! What’s neat about it is the flowers are mostly inside the bush.

Both the Redbud and Quince are in the small park by the post office.

But one thing Alvinston has a lot of are lilacs!!!

I’d say at least one in every five houses has a lilac bush. Right now, this town smells AMAZING!!! (and being an agricultural town, that’s saying something because it frequently smells like animal poo!). Wherever you walk, the soft lilac scent is just wafting on the breeze. And because this town hasn’t seen a lot of… updates… in probably the last couple decades or so, a lot of these lilacs are old. And that means HUGE!!!!

Easily 12-15 tall and just about as wide! They are just amazing. If I could change the name of the town, I would definitely call it Lilacville.

But one thing I did notice is that although there’s almost every shade of white and purple… there’s not one pink lilac in town.

That means my Tinkerbelle lilac is going to be quite the star when she finally pops open…

Which should be any day now!

** I don’t know if Walk-About Wednesday will become a regular thing again. While I’m getting out, there’s just not that much to document in this town. But I’ll give you a post whenever there’s anything interesting happening – I promise!

This weekend’s stitching helper was Relic

Several of us have noted that our sweet Relic is starting to show his age a little. We figure he’s about 10 years old now. (We’ve only had him since 2017, but we figure he was around 3 years old then). His FIV+ status means he might not make a super old cat, but he’s doing pretty good so far.

Under his supervision, I was able to finish the leaves on the right side.

There are some leaves on top, and a flower on the bottom to finish still – but this one is getting ever closer to that finish line!

Bit by bit, we are getting things done around the yard.

Last year. I bought a rain barrel on clearance, but we never got around to setting it up. But Dave decided to tackle it a couple weeks ago.

And it was pretty much full after just a couple of rainfalls! There’s no need to do any hand watering now (because of all the rain) but it will be nice to have when we get a dry spell. Just making the gardens a little more sustainable!

It took me a couple evenings after work (since the weather on the weekend hasn’t been cooperating) but I FINALLY got the new raised bed painted. And on Saturday I filled them with soil.

They look so much better painted green. Now I just need to get some mulch down on the pathways and it will be pretty much complete. We’ve still got a few weeks before I can plant much of the veg, though what I do have planted it doing well.

Spinach on the right, and wee lettuce sprouts on the right. I also have potatoes started, as well as the shallots. All of the above is new for me, so it will be fun to see how successful I am.

I realized I never showed you the porch boxes planted up for spring…

The theme was pink this year – Pink hyacinths, and pink tulips. Sadly, I didn’t get the hyacinths put in while in bud. They were in full bloom and they flopped terribly. A lesson for next year.

But that was weeks ago… this is how they looked now.

Definitely time for a refresh. I dug out all the bulbs (which will be planted in the other gardens), and filled them with some miniature roses and pansies.

I think this is going to be and amazing combination when it fills out more. And come fall, when I fill the boxes with mums, the mini roses can be planted in the garden.

Hanging above them I got a pair baskets just brimming with the prettiest shade of Calibrochoa

I will have to keep an eye on the predicted overnight temps, because it’s still a tad early for tender plants – but I can brings these in for the night if I need to.

There’s still lots to be done out there, but it feels good to have these few things accomplished.

Early May is kind of the inbetween time in the garden. The tulips (as you saw yesterday) are still putting on a decent show, but most of the spring bulbs are done or going over.

My ABSOLUTE favourite daffodil, Poet’s Daffodil is a late bloomer, and it’s just started.

They are a small daffodil, with a very short trumpet. And as you can see, a very pretty little red ring around it.

There’s still a few Pipit daffodils going too.

It’s bloomed for several weeks, and has and amazing scent! It was definitely a great purchase – I highly recommend it!

But now is the time to look to the late spring/early summer bloomers.

The irises are just getting started and it’s looking like it’s going to be a bumper year for a few of them!

In the driveway garden, the Spanish Thrift is blooming.

There’s a white one too, and it’s not far behind.

The dwarf Columbine is REALLY showing off.

It’s a native too. And it will reseed all over the place. There are a few other Columbines set to bloom – I think I have six or seven of them throughout the gardens – they come in sooo many colours, it’s hard not to collect them all.

There’s not much going on in the catio at the moment but there is one little clump of Summer Snowflake blooming.

There was more last year, but no doubt Lemmy put and end to it somehow. He’s a rather destructive lad.

There is one bit of excitement in the catio. Remember I showed you the Bachelor Buttons that turned out to be Forget-me-nots?

Well, apparently it’s both! See that big bud in the middle – that’s a Bachelor Button! The leaves of both plants are so similar, I really can’t tell them apart!

I got all the clearance perennials moved from their temporary home in the veg beds. This one is Leopard’s Bane.

You may remember it from the townhouse. The one I brought didn’t make the move, so I was happy to see it again in the nursery. It’s not happily ensconced in the Woodland garden

Speaking of which – a few of my shade natives came back, much to might delight!

On the right we have Wild Geranium and the left is Woodland Poppy. I was not optimistic about them so it was nice they came back.

And my experiment with the Hostas under the Norway Maple has paid off, despite what the internet told me.

There are about six of them out there, but these are the two that are the furthest along. They still aren’t my favorite plant, but they do the job in a shady spot.

And though Norway Maple are supposed to hard to plant under – pretty much everything I put under them is coming back – the Heuchera, the Astilbe, and Bugloss.

And there’s so much more to look forward too. We are just minutes away from these…

Lupin, Allium and Lilacs!

Today I thought it would be fun to take a closer look at some of the tulips in the garden.

Last year, I bought a bag of mixed “Fringe” tulips and they’ve really shown up this spring.

Such a great mix of colours.

This is one of the tulips that came from the previous owners, and it’s such a gorgeous tulip. You really have to look at it close to truly appreciate it – that red is just dusted on.

Have you ever heard of multi-headed tulips? Neither had I. But those three flowers all meet in one main stem a little lower down!

This pair are “Lemon Chiffon” – new this year. They are a triumph tulip, so there’s a good chance they will stick around for a few years, at least!

And this strange thing is an “Icecream” tulip! It’s gorgeous but a little on the short side for a tulip.

And the Peony tulips are always a delight! I should get more of these in the fall. I only have a few – in red and white.

The tulips are starting to fade, and will probably be completely gone in a couple of weeks. But they have been absolutely fabulous this year!

Shhhhh…

Do not wake the sleeping tiger…

Too late!!!!

Of course I love my gardens, but the real delight of my garden are all the creatures that come to hang out with me in it.

The most frequent visitors are, of course, the squirrels. They are also the most destructive… but I just love their antics.

If you look closely, you’ll see that this guy is covered in dirt from digging in my veg beds.

But, clearly, it’s tough to be a squirrel, so I try to give them a break.

And I’ve put the bird baths out, all freshly cleaned…

But this Robin decided a big puddle by the road was the perfect place for a refreshing bath! It was a pretty warm day, so I guess I can’t blame him.

It had just rained (as you can tell by the puddles) and that meant it was a good day for hunting worms.

I love these pics because you can clearly see the difference between male and female. You don’t always notice how much lighter the female is when they aren’t together.

And it appears they’ve been making good use of their time together…

We’ve got a nest in the maple tree. They’ve been chasing away everything that gets too close, and frequently make a big ruckus outside my office window. Sadly, I can’t see the next from the window – it’s blocked by the tree’s main trunk. I got this shot from below. I’ll be keeping an eye on them though, and I’m sure we’ll see them when the babies start to fledge.

But they aren’t the only red-breast to grace the garden.

A Rose-Breasted Grosbeak has been frequenting the feeder in Willow Grove. And as you can see – he’s a stunner.

He was a little shy at first, but he got comfortable with me pretty quick and I was able to get these great shots.

And no garden friend post would be complete without a blue jay

Or two!

My new craft paints arrived on Monday, and I’m so excited to give them a whirl!

Now it might look like I went a little bit overboard, but I wanted to get the free shipping. Plus, it is nice not having to mix paints – Especially when you are dragging out a project over a couple of days. It’s near impossible to mix the exact same shade twice.

And besides… they fit just perfect in my paint box, along with the few older paints I kept (Dave took the crappy CraftSmart.. I don’t know what he thinks he’ll use it for, but he wouldn’t let me throw it out)

The older paints I kept are the few Martha Stewarts leftover, as well as some Folk Art Metallic which are at least 25 years old! And still paintable like they were the day they were bought. I really hope the new ones are just as good.

Hopefully, there will be some time to get back to the other planters soon.

If course, there’s other projects in the works…

I’ve been collecting Fairy/Gnome Garden things…

But working on them will have to wait until the garden centres open and bring in all the fun sedums and tiny plants. It shouldn’t be long now!!!

Much like with knitting, there wasn’t much time for cross-stitching this weekend. In fact, I was lucky to get a little more than an hour to finish the lighter leaves on the left. It’s going to have to wait until next weekend to get balanced out. Then there some more leaves and flowers top and bottom. But with garden season here, it’s going to take longer to finish this project than I planned. Things should calm down by the end of May… maybe.

As the title suggests, I’m not going to make the end-of-April deadline for the pink Undine socks.

With garden season in full swing, there’s just not much time for knitting.

I’m still several inches from the heel… and after that, there’s still the whole foot to do.

It’s okay though. This pair is destined for the Christmas box, so missing the deadline won’t make me late.

But hopefully it won’t take too much of May to get it done. I’ve got another pair I want to cast on!