Pictures of a rainy day

Iris reticulata 'Cantab' blooming in a 'tufa pot. They've been there for several years and have made gorgeous little clumps now.


Looking back up at the house from one of the trails into the trees. That large debris pile was here blocking the view. Almost gone now.




We've been clearing in the trees around the house. This is one of th many old stumps scattered about from previous years logging. The woodpeckers make holes in them, and in the summer at dusk the termites come flying out and the birds swoop about the clearing snapping them up.



Click the pics to see the larger version.

I don't know that I can sit in the house today...

It looks like I'll just have to put on rain gear and go putz around outside. I miss that nice weather we were having. I want it back. In fact, the weather site says it'll be raining forever, or at least for the next week, which might as well as be forever.

This is no time to be stuck in the house. Things are happening outside! Daffodils are up, and would like to bloom. Snowdrops, crocus, cyclamen and Iris reticulata are blooming. The Osoberry (Indian plum) is budding out, and the alders are blushing. The temperatures are warming and the sunlight lasts longer every day.

The veggie garden beds are full of soil, and I've even got some shallots planted already. I don't know if they'll survive or not, but Mike found a plastic shopping bag of them just sitting all lonely and abandoned on the sidewalk at his office recently. We thought we might as well stick them in the ground and see what happens. I've planted a dozen bulbs. I love shallots, I hope they thrive.

We've been playing with seeds this past week. I've potted up some white ribes seeds (and will do some red ribes seeds today), and scattered seeds for columbines. Mike has gotten a number of items out of pots, where they had overwintered in the courtyard, and out in the big bed in the front of the house and in the shade garden next to it. That shade garden, btw, is coming right along. Mike has pulled a number of trees out recently, and planting areas are becoming apparent.

It's still raining - sigh. I'm just gonna have to get wet, I suppose. I hope I don't melt. ;-)

One Big Pile

.. eh, not so big anymore. here's a few photos of one of our debris piles from it's creation to it's (almost complete) destruction.









The trees have grown so much in the past year and a half that you can barely see the trunk of that tall tree in the background of the first and last shots. We used to have a view of the foothills of the Olympics too - not anymore.