Spring has Sprung (and so has the chickweed)

I know I shouldn't open with such an awful cliche, but I can't help it. We are having the longest spring warm spell I can remember and everything is just bursting out.  The tulip magnolia is a mass of blooms and walking by on a warm day the air is filled with the gingery-lemon scent of these two-tone flowers.  The daffodils and tulips are rushing to a finish, and lots of things I think of as April flowers are sending up buds and flower stalks with great speed.  We've had heavy rains and thunderstorms and temperatures in the high 70's and low 80's for two weeks straight now.  David has mowed the grass twice in the last week it's grown so fast due to the rains.

The view from inside the loropetalum is absolutely electric!

 

Stuck at my desk earlier this week I went out to sit on the back stoop in the sun for a minute and when  I looked over I noticed this garter snake sunning too on a stump next to the fountain.  It's been great to see all the reptiles re-emerging, lizards scurry up tree trunks and across the flagstone path.  Toads hop from under my feet and tiny chorus frogs spring away as I work my way through the flowerbeds pulling up the endless chickweed.  David unearthed Gertrude yesterday, her shell muddy, she moving slowly, not quite ready perhaps to wake up again.

It is the time of the great unfurling and the green up has begun. The red bud trees have been in full bloom all week and are suddenly wrapped in the green haze of the understory leafing out.  As I drive down country roads the many pastels of new growth surround me.  Here in our yard we stroll daily to take in the latest opening of a flower or fattening of a bud.  Pulling weeds as we wander along.  This is the camellia that my neighbor Portia said was X-rated and I believe she's right.

Kujacku Tsubaki

Weeping leaves, red and white tulip shaped drooping flowers, this one is hard not to love.  Well, at this time of year, the whole yard is hard not to love, accept for the chickweed.

This evening we took a walk down to the creek to check out the results of the latest rain, which were good, the pond creek was really flowing for the first time all winter.  On our way back home we saw first an osprey flying across the farm and then almost immediately we spotted three great blue herons on their way to a roost for the night.  Yesterday there were four red-shouldered hawks screeing and circling above our house in the afternoon. 

Everything is on the move and ready to begin the next cycle of life and growth. I want it to slow down so I can relish each moment, each opening of the petals.  I'm looking forward to a few days here at home with few obligations other than just being here in the space and taking in all the beauty, as I pull weeds...