Well, it will come as no surprise to anyone, after blessing us with a nice warm weekend at the start of the month, Mother Nature whammied us!

Thursday morning I woke up to this:

Happily, it didn’t amount to much more than that. And by the afternoon it was raining. It was a very COLD rain, but at least it wasn’t snow.

In between precipitations, I went to check on the gardens..

We have crocuses! They are, of course, closed because of the cold temperatures, but they have popped up none-the-less.

These purple ones are my Whale Shark crocuses. They are as big as you can get in a crocus. They have that lovely pale purple outer petal, and darker inner petal – which you can’t see when they are closed up. But trust me, they are stunning.

The Snow Drops were all closed up too – but of course, the snow doesn’t really bother them at all. I’ve got them popping up all over the place now. This particular patch is big enough to divide this year, so my snow drop collection will continue to grow!

The pale Hellebores weren’t bothered either – and the pinkish ones should open any day now. I definitely want more and more hellebores. They can be quite expensive (usually around $30 a plant) so its a collection that’s going to grow slowly.

The pink pussywillows are looking quite fine. Once the weather warms, they will be covered in pollen and swarming with bees. I can’t wait!

Spring is springing!

I could wait no longer.

Last Sunday, I grabbed the seed book, some bubble wrap, some soil and some tape… and I got to work!

12 beautiful seed snails got rolled and stood up in an old baking tray I thrifted (this makes it easy to keep them watered). In those snails are mostly annuals – Cosmos, Sunflowers, Zinnias and the like. They will bring a riot of colour later in the fall/summer, but this is where they get their start.

So the above pic was taken on Sunday the 8th, immediately after cleaning up all my mess. And the below pic was taken yesterday afternoon.

Holy Instant Growth Batman! I can honestly say, I did not expect this level of germination this fast! Of the 12 rolls, 11 already have sprouts. The only one that doesn’t is a native perennial – and it make take a little more time because of that (all of these are annuals – they die every year so their seeds have to work extra hard for the survival of the species.)

I think its going to be seed snails from here on out for this girl! In fact, as you’re reading this, I’m probably rolling up some more! I got some more supplies on Friday, and I have no shortage of seeds to plant!

I didn’t make it into the studio last weekend… but the weekend before we hit a little milestone!

All our four patches were used up and turned into eight patches! Now we get to take all those eight patches and make 16-patches! Once they are all together, we can lay them out on the design bed and get real idea of how many we have – and how many more we’ll need to make!

I’d like to say that inter-cat relations have improved. And they have… albeit minutely. I think part of it is that with the nicer weather, Furby is getting out and running off all his energy more. (I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to confine him to the house/catio).

But he still loves to corner the boys when he can. ESPECIALLY Lemmy. But… he does seem to get bored with it after a minute or two. Which is an improvement. The above situation resulted in some horrible yowling from Lemmy (he really is a drama queen) but no swatting. Furby stared at him for a minute then hopped down and wandered away. And Burton just watched the whole thing impassively from his perch.

It took Rupert over a year to accept Relic when we brought him in. So I remain hopeful peace between kitties will reign in the house once again one day.

I’d like to finally share a properly framed hummingbird paint-by-number

We couldn’t find a thrifted frame/ready made frame/mat to fit (it was an off-size), so I waited until Michael’s had a 50% off framing special and took it in.

Even then, it almost didn’t happen. It turns off that 50% off is only on the frame part itself (not the mat, not the glass, not the labour) and it’s only on the fancy expensive frame options. I just about messed my pants when they told me the total price. I knew it would be expensive (I had Mom’s foxes framed and that was about $100) but I thought the coupon would make more of a difference.

But, when I was ready to say thanks, but no thanks “It’s a Paint By Number for heaven’s sake! It’s not worthy of such a frame.” Dave reminded me that I spent over a year painting it. And he’d love to see it hanging in the living room. So he told them to go ahead and put down his card and called it a Valentine’s present (we took it in a couple days before V-day).

We picked it up a few weeks later and he immediately set to work hanging it above the couch.

I still don’t know that my humble efforts are worth it – it’s not like its an original or anything. But it is nice seeing it hanging there every day.

And I’m putting away the pennies for my cross-stitch witch sampler… it’s long and narrow and there’s no way I will find a ready made frame for it. We’ll be shelling out the dollars to the framer again soon!

As I mentioned yesterday, we had a beautiful weekend here. Temps reached 17C/62F. They’d been calling for rain all weekend – and we got some on Saturday, but it didn’t start until early afternoon.

So the boys and I

Spent some time cleaning up the dead stuff in the catio. Normally, I don’t do much cleaning this early, but Burton has been eating the seed heads of the sedums… and of course…. barfing them up all over my floors. So anything still standing that he could chew on got chopped. As soon as I dropped the compost bags off at the compost depot, the rains moved in so I timed everything right.

Sunday dawned bright and sunny, so I decided it would be a good day to prune the roses.

Since most of the roses are in the front yard, Furby accompanied me for that task.

And since the weather was so warm, all our snow melted and I made several exciting discoveries.

Pretty much all winter, the raised beds were covered with a thick layer of snow. And under that snow, it was quite toast it seems. The first picture is a zinnia from the fall. It’s quite flattened, but if you look closely, you’ll see it’s starting to form a bud. The middle pic is a carrot! It must have been a stray seed that managed to germinate under the snow, because I cleared all the carrots from the bed in the fall. And the last picture isn’t from the beds – but in the front walkway garden! It too spent the winter under a thick pile of snow…. and the Black Eyed Susans managed to create a small bud! And not just one – there were actually three – but this was the most well-formed!

Now that they are uncovered, they will probably get killed by the frost. Though we’ve enjoyed some nice warm days, Mother Nature will still find time to freeze us out! Temps are expected to dip drastically today or tomorrow. But the above is an amazing example of the insulating properties of snow!

There are a couple things the frost won’t bother much…

The snowdrops have finally started to show. I have them in both the woodland garden and the catio.

I have three clumps of Hellebores around the base of the holly bush, and this one is in full bloom. Such a beautiful flower that can take all that Mother Nature throws at her!

Soaking up the sun certainly lifted my spirits. Even if it means I never made it into the sewing studio on the weekend!

We had an absolutely beauty of a weekend (more on that tomorrow). I got plenty of fresh air and as a result, I was pretty pooped by the evenings.

But I did manage to finish the frame on the final section of the witchy sampler. These little checkerboards are honestly sooooo tedious to stitch. It’s nice to know that it’s all wrapped up. I can stitch all the fun bits inside, and then the whole thing is done like dinner! Maybe even by the end of March!

Hey look – finished socks!!!

That second sock just flew off the needles! And aren’t they so bright and spring-like?

To recap – pattern is my Undine. Yarn is Katia Jaipur that I got at the thrift store for just two dollars. It’s a cotton/wool blend and normally I wouldn’t knit with it – but for $2 and great colours – I figured it was worth a whirl! It was a little rough on the hands, but it did make pretty socks. Now we see how well they wear!

Now that March is here, I think I’m going to start a new thing on the blog… Seedy Sunday! The day where you see what I’m doing to prep for full-on garden season.

It’s still a little early to start any seeds indoors, but I have been doing other things.

First… I’ve struggled to get annual poppies to grow. They have to be started from seed, in the location you want them to grow (they don’t like to be transplanted)… and they’ve just never grown for me.

Then I read that they like a little cold/moist weather before the warm stuff to get started… and late winter is actually the best time time to spread the seeds.

So I got a pack of mixed California Poppy seeds and went out and tossed them in the front gardens. Fingers crossed this works!

The back inside, it was time to take stock of my other seeds. Last year, I bought a lovely little organizer that came with seed envelopes

Partly to have a place to put seed I collect from the garden, but aslso to help organize the chaos that is my seed box. Sunday afternoon, I finally sat down and got it all done

I also wrote down everything I have already, so I know what else I still need to order (which I need to do this week!)

It went quite well, with the exception of one thing….

I’m going to need a binder with bigger rings, because once all the seeds are in, it’s too thick to close! But snapped tight or not, the seeds are organized and I’m feeling VERY optimistic about the upcoming garden season!

You all saw and loved my little sleeping concrete kitty thrift…

Well it seems it’s concrete garden ornament season….

Meet Gerarrd. I have wanted a gargoyle for the garden for AGES! I’m going to see if Dave can rig up a little shelf on the edge of the shed roof for him.

It didn’t get a pic of these Mourning Doves before Dave started his restoration efforts so I had to wait until he was finished. He gave them a good base and now it’s up to me to bring their details to life with some paint.

And last… I’m debating on painting this trio, or leaving them as is..

Aren’t they cute?

All I know is I can’t walk by them without singing a little Bob Marley.