A Cloudy Day

Up early enough to get the daily routine well in hand and that includes what we call our "nursing home chores" - all the while thanking the powers that be that we can take care of what must be done leaving much time for doing enjoyable things.  This morning I looked out the kitchen window to see that the blooms on the salcam (acacia) are fading and that the rose bush is full of pink blooms.  It is the kind of bush that I have seen in paintings of times past that I had considered to be the fancy of the artist, but I am astonished at the accuracy of those works whose evenly space blooms appear each year on this plant.  Well, not so evenly since I trimmed it back rather severely last year! (Well, what a treat to have figured out how to get this picture from the iPhone onto this blog!)

I look out the bedroom window and see that the jasmine are ready to burst into bloom and there is one red rose rising above the weeds and the day lilies that are crowding out most everything.  The treat is that as the spring weather unfolds so do the the flowering plants and the fruit trees whose blossoms survived the late spring snow.  There will be no apricots this year but the apple trees were full of blossoms as are the gutui (quince) and the pear trees.  The cherries are beginning to turn red, but the visine (sour cherries) were much affected by the weather this year.  The wisteria produced lovely blooms just in time for the birthday celebration.  Other blooms lasted until this week and now there is much to do in the garden.  The chard is out of control and the asparagus has grown as tall as me!