Garden Diary Number Four

To shorten winter, borrow some money due in spring. ~W.J. Vogel

Diary number 4

I am delighted to have this, another diary.  The book was published in the 90's by the Boston Museum of Art.

I had filled 3 and gave up on finding another.  I bought the first in a shop in the 90's and searched for the second locally and the 3rd on the internet.  Then, there were no more. None on the Web, none in the shops.
I periodically checked on line and had not seen another diary and then a few weeks ago, there it was!

Each page has a lovely piece of art and squares that I can note in 3 or 4 years.  I use a different ink color for each year.

I tried another diary or 2 and just could not settle into the writing as the pages were so different.  I guess that makes me pretty rigid in my thinking.
Actually, the lack of another diary was what got me to thinking of writing a diary type note to my sister and from there was encouraged to blog.
Typing frees up my brain or something and I can think better this way than my cramped unattractive handwriting.  Both my sisters have/had lovely hand writing.  Me, never.

In seed-time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy. ~William Blake

Time passes

Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen.

Willa Cather, My Antonia

It is nearly the end of January.  I finally got out yesterday and worked  an hour or so.  It is quite disheartening to see what the dry wind and biting cold and freezing weather for days on end have wrought. Unfortunately, the sun was bright and although the temperature was in the 60's, I was sweating and hot.  I guess the sun "allergy" is not going away.

The front yard "project" is at a stand still. The weather has been just too cold and windy to work outside. 

All of the California poppies and most of the bluebonnets I potted up in November have died.  I had even covered them lightly with leaves thinking that would protect them from frost.  We really didn't have too many days of frost.  More of bitter cold (in the teens and below freezing) that is really winter weather for our part of the country.

We can only dream of March and April bluebonnet survivors

The dry freezing temperatures is the culprit.  This happened years ago when we had dry and low teens and single digits for about a week. That was the only time I remember bluebonnets succumbing to the cold.

There are lots of California poppies and bluebonnets sprouting with warmer weather. It would be nice to get some rain.  I guess I am never going to have that "perfect drizzly, chilly, wind free day".  

Right now, the temperature is 45°. The wind is out of the north and bitterly cold. Not a good day to putter in the garden.

Winter in North Texas

We have had weeks and weeks of winter weather.  Days and days of wandering to the kitchen window and checking the temperature.  "It has dropped another degree." "Sure is windy." How cold is it supposed to get tonight?"  "Look, the woodpecker is back!" "Where is my sweater, it's chilly in here." "How about a pot of soup for lunch?"

Then, as in years past, warmer weather.  50 degrees last night!!  65 high for today and 60's for the rest of the week.

The discouraging thing?  There are still unfinished projects in the house.  I had no excuse to not finish as I was "trapped" inside by the weather.  I make lists and more lists and then find them weeks later with nothing finished on them.

I am a list maker, a to-do planner, dreamer of what the garden will look like when things begin to sprout in the garden.  Oh, joy!  I finally have an excuse not to complete the list projects as "all my energy goes to the garden." :)