Saturday morning, and March has been roaming the hills like a cold hearted lion, ensuring that the month departs in the traditional way with the traditional roar. Spring has either been frightened away, or has arrogantly turned aside until March has stopped his shenanigans...

On his early morning walk Caspar was ecstatic to discover fresh snow was there for the snuffling, and he had a continual little white moustache until we got back to the house.


The tender little cameos from yesterday all have a frosting of icy snow embellishing them. And high in the trees are the Crows, who may have a hand (a claw) in all of this. If this late snow fall is a western rendition of the Crow Snow on the prairies that is a mandatory precedent to Spring, then their presence in the orchards and tall trees the last few days has been a dark omen.

The snow on the roof of the Leaning Birdhouse had disappeared by noon. This afternoon brought another flurry, - but I think that The Lion Does Not Roar Tonight, so we will open our arms for sweet April's arrival.If Caspar has to do without his little gulps of fresh snow early in the morning, so be it.......

An appealing morning in the garden, before the clouds gathered and the wind grew chill. Spring continues to languish just outside our ken. Nevertheless, the May/June flowers are flourishing. The lovely new green of the delphiniums spreads against the fence, and that sweet June twosome, - the Iris and the Oriental Poppy are getting ready to delight us once again. The Forsythia is bursting its buttons, and I expect it to be gloriously golden in just a few days, along with all the daffodils that are skimming along on the verge.

And the perennial alyssum is beginning to bud up..... If I were to burrow down beneath the enormous Elephants Ears I'm sure I would find new stalks with little pink swellings.

Here is one of the peonies we brought from the Lost Garden, along with the sweet violets that couldn't bear to be parted, and came along with them. It sends its rosy, succulent stalks through last year's dried leaves, and I hope that this year they will begin to regain some of the beauty and vitality that they had before we moved them.




The Lenten Roses continue to bloom, and another small purple Hellebore is just making itself known.

This evening we had a visit from a flock of sleek Redwing Blackbirds, who had discovered a newly filled feeder.

The Starlings occasionally turn the meadow into a shiny black carpet, - and here they are, startled starlings in flight...


In the house Husband's prunings from the Flowering Almond and the Forsythia promise a pretty sight outside - soon

I gaze across the valley and see the lovely puffs of golden willow, the red of the maples and the faint green aura that surrounds the poplars as they all prepare to burst into those magnificently tender green welcoming costumes that should lure spring along the creeks and through the meadows and right up to our back doors....

I have a great longing for a picture taking drive down south, along the river, and around by Ginty's Pond to see what is happening there. Perhaps the turtles will be out sunning themselves - other fans of Ginty's Pond tell me about them, but I have yet to see them.....life continues to hold such unseen pleasures.

Easter Monday - early in the morning and Husband is eager for the day to start. The sun shines, as we breakfast, and a couple of thrashers flutter around the outside of the deck, issuing invitations to come and see.......

I put on the laundry, and then follow him outside (Husband, - not the Thrasher...). I find him looking seriously at the cottonwood that sprang up in the middle of the perennial garden, overnight growing to about three feet so that it was impossible to get in amongst the jungle flowers to move it last Fall.

Now, however, I have moved all the tulip bulbs within a radius of two feet of the tree, and carefully replanted them. Husband has used the pick-axe and the shovel to make a little moat above the roots. On Easter Saturday we dug the new hole for the cottonwood, over by the fence where it would grow big and tall and cast welcome shade into the back yard. This sounds like such a casual action, - airily - we 'dug a new hole' to accommodate this errant tree, - believe me, it is a casual occurrence when you are 23, or 43, or even 63. It's a major operation when you are 83 - albeit a pleasant one if the company is beloved and you can be leisurely about the way you do it. No flinging dirt back over your shoulder, in wild abandon, as the hole grows deeper and deeper...

The fence is located along the back pasture, where once a glacier dumped mega tons of rock as it retreated northwards. They call it Similkameen chip loam now, but where we were digging it was mostly chips and large stones, - I couldn't believe that the treasured loam we piled so carefully to one side had ever had room to squeeze itself in amongst the rocks.

Husband pried and shoveled, and I got down on my knees and brought the rocks to the surface, - at the end of the morning we had a lovely hole. When we told Son #3 about this venture he had the temerity to ask which one of us we were digging the hole for, so great is our antiquity....

In response to his saucy question we went and 'borrowed' some fine, rich black soil from his compost heap and on Easter Monday we were all set to complete the operation.

It required a great deal of pick and shovel work to loosen the roots of the Cottonwood, - a great deal of instruction as to 'lean on it this way, Honey (through gritted teeth) or pull on it as hard as you can that way'. I was amazed at Husband's persistence and calmness - we worked in air that was only very faintly blue. Because he suffers from post polio syndrome his balance is very precarious, and he has developed a fine patience (not always evident) in times of physical stress.

The cottonwood fit beautifully into the hole, - we lavished it with son's fine soil, watered it well, and came in for lunch, proud of the morning's work and with a great deal of satisfaction and thankfulness that we are able to accomplish this task of moving and planting a tree. It has been such a big part of our lives, - planting trees.

I was able to move two little Spirea bushes into the hole left by the Cottonwood, - tiny ones that I thought would be great fountain heads of Bridal Wreath and so planted them at the back of the bed, along the fence. They turned out to be delicate little shrubs, barely a foot high, lost in the sunflower jungle into which last year's garden evolved. Now they are preparing to bloom front and centre stage, and their thank you was quite audible......