Easter comes, Easter goes...

We were out in the backyard on Easter morning, playing in the dirt.  Azaleas are planted in the box-garden now, along with a gardenia plant that's about to bloom, and a bright yellow 'sweet broom' that is covered with sunlight yellow bursts of color.  There are three rose bushes in that garden as well, left-overs from the previous owner who must have loved roses because they are all over the property.

I had a decorative length of black wrought-iron fence, bought at a yard sale years ago. We had it in the flowerbed at our other house and we moved it here before we really knew where to place it.  In the four years we've been here, that length of fence has been in three different places. But now it's in its final resting place.... smack in the middle of that box-garden, in back of the sweet broom plant, with a child's-sized metal chair stuck in the dirt near the fence.  A little box-garden vignette, if ever there was one.

On Sunday afternoon, we drove around the county a little bit, searching for fields of wildflowers. We found small patches of bluebonnets here and there, but certainly not the ocean-covering of blue that we usually find on the two-lane roads that wind around the hills here.  There were very few Indian paintbrushes, and a scattering of yellow Texas stars, and I guess we'll have to wait two or three weeks for the usually prolific bluebonnets. Hope floats, as that old saying goes. Or, in this case... hope grows.

On Easter afternoon, in the middle of our drive, the sky darkened and we drove through part of a rainstorm that drenched this part of the Hill Country. It was bright and sunny and warm when we set out on our drive.... within an hour, the weather changed to cloudy and damp and muggy. The newly-planted additions in our backyard flowerbed were most appreciative, I'm sure.

We took advantage of the free mulch being given away at the local recycle center. All the mulch you can bag-up or bucket-up, as long as you do your own shoveling.  My husband went to the center with buckets and tins..... he loaded all of them up.  When he got home, we both carried them out into the garden and I spread that mulch all over the box-garden. How can a garden that size take up all of that mulch? 

The Easter Bunny has come and gone........ we colored a dozen eggs (some fresh ones from a neighbor, some of them from the supermarket).  When we peel the eggs, it's easy to tell which ones came from the chickens down the road.  When I see those bright orange-yellow yolks, I miss having our own chickens.  When I look at our newly planted and mulched flowerbeds, I know that they would be hard to keep with chickens scratching in the mulch and pecking at the blooms of the plants.

I am still decorating the flowerbeds, the garden, and the porch.  The vintage wicker baby buggy now has an old teddy-bear sitting in it, and she's wearing a straw hat to keep the sun out of her eyes. The little table on the porch has a new tablecloth and a patina-green metal tea kettle in the center of it.  There's a painted wood chicken perched in the hollow of the mesquite tree, and a tulip-shaped wood trellis supports one of the rose bushes.

Working in the garden has driven away part of my squeamishness of the insect world.  I moved worms out of my way when I planted the azaleas.  I shooed away a striped lizard when I was spreading mulch--- I must have disturbed his nap because he turned around and gave me a disgruntled look before he walked to the other side of the driveway.  I haven't screamed once when one of the bumble bees hovered around my hair too long (admiring my earrings? attracted to my hair clips?)  For the most part, whatever is out in the garden doesn't want to be disturbed and will most likely get away from you before you even realize it's there.  (Note to self:  Re-read that last sentence the next time you see a snake.)