More gardening

I wish someone else would post sometime!!

The Pink Tree is shedding. There is simply no other word for it. With normal cherry trees the process of dropping petals from flowers is lovely. The bloom still on the tree looks more and more delicate as the petals drift around. Our overblown and fluffy friend simply dumps great numbers of petals and even bits of flowers on the ground producing a particularly unattractive effect both in the tree and on the ground. How (and why) did anyone ever got a cherry tree to look like this when the real thing is so marvelous? They are very popular in our neighborhood, these pink monsters, although I am proud to say that ours is the oldest and largest. As noted earlier, it's a fine tree when not in bloom, especially since Roger began careful pruning. I will wait until all of this is over and take another picture when it has leafed out. One problem of being old is that I can't count on having enough time to plant a real cherry tree and watch it through to magnificence. I'll just have to keep going to Washington at the right time every spring.

In the shedding picture you can see the front yard vegetable garden which stands in sharp contrast to the neighbors' lawns in the subsequent picture. There have been only mild complaints so far but let's see where we are when it really starts growing. It is supposed to have mostly potatoes and corn and Roger can be seen most mornings standing over it with coffee cup in hand, rather like a wistful father in the newborn intensive care unit, peering at his tiny baby. In Roger's case it's little plants that are being watched. The corn is doing fine but we see no potatoes. Truth in blogging: Roger dug up a potato to check and it did have a good sprout so he planted it again. I have no pictures of corn but do have a good one of the beans, which seem very happy to have their poles to look forward to. I like watching beans sprout--they seem to leap out of their casings and the dirt, giving a real sense of how much energy goes into growing.

Gardening is all about hoping. I am looking forward to perfect beans this summer.

Our next major garden project is the fence shown in the picture. It appeared last year while we were away--the neighbors got a good price on a used fence, bought and installed it. It looks better on their side. I agree with them that the increased privacy is good and don't much mind the lichen-clad battered look. We added the trellises and I planted roses to grow up them. I'd hoped to simply make it go away but we've decided that another color will make it go away even faster so today will start on a process of cleaning and staining. This is the principal view from the patio so it matters quite a bit. I hope the roses survive.