Remember that delicious spinach I raved about in an earlier post? Well guess what: it survived the mild (for Minnesota) winter and has begun to grow anew!!!! I found it yesterday as I was picking up the weird trash that pops up in the garden occasionally. (A mechanic used to live on our property before we did, and we often find broken glass and rusted pieces of metal lying around in the soil after a rain. We found two abandoned cars out in the woods behind the garden last year, hopefully there aren't any more under the garden! At least the rusty metal adds iron to the soil.)
A couple of romaine lettuces look like they might be coming back as well, and my chrysanthemums, thyme, silver sage, columbines, and even those extremely hardy snapdragons are all sending up new growth as well. I'm so excited to finally be able to have a place to grow food and flowers on a permanent basis. It feels great to finally be able to put down roots (and to offer a place for the plants I love to put down their roots). This early spring we're experiencing up here in the north woods is getting me so excited about this growing season!
I had the day off yesterday so I ran errands in the morning while it rained and then I did some yard and garden work in the afternoon. I cut down several large branches from a ninebark that was growing too close to the garage. I spent another hour or so afterwards cutting off the smaller stems and twigs from it to burn later (perhaps with a wood gassifier/biochar generator...) and creating long, curved poles that I hope to use to make an arbor at the garden entrance. I will post photos when that happens. Have a great weekend!