Spring has sprung! FINALLY!!!

Wednesday:  Good day to all!  It's a glorious day outside, the sun is out, it's 66 degrees and my plants are budding all over the yard!  The chickens are happy the snow is gone (they don't like snow on their toes!)  The cats are rolling around in the sun beams and the dogs are playing like they are puppies again!  And we are all stuck in the house with a horrific cold.....

 I'm not breathing well from this cold, my asthma gets triggered easily when I am ill so I have to take breathing treatments every 4 hours and keep my inhaler close.  I hate having asthma, I have missed out on so much because of it---and I've tried most of the drugs available, most are just too expensive and I can't afford the one that keeps my asthma under control.  STINKS!!!

Oh gee, I digress, LOL!

Anyway, I told the boys the get their shoes on, we're going for a ride!  I put some gas in the van (OMG, gas!  The cheap place that is 20-30 cents cheaper than all the others was $2.69!  Who knows what it was in town!)  We made a pit stop at Dairy Queen for some cruising ice cream, turned up the radio and cruised through our neighborhood.  We live in the country---so for our cruise today we drove within 10 miles of the house.  Here is what we encountered, I call this---barns of Medina County:  Click on the pictures to get actual size.

An Amish farm in the neighborhood, they have their laundry on a pulley system, sometimes it goes all the way to the silo!

Another Amish farm, they have their laundry hanging on the front porch.

This is an Amish one-room school that is in the neighborhood.  I believe classes were in session when we passed, as there was a buggy parked in front of the school, most likely the teacher's.

This is a big Amish farm/family compound, there are 3 or 4 houses here, I believe.  They, too are doing laundry, Wednesday must be laundry day!

Another family compound.  There is someone working on something in front of the barn but I don't take close or face pictures of the Amish, it is against their beliefs so I make sure I respect that.

A beautiful red barn

This was an Amish boy, probably around 12 years old, pulling a wagon of manure! Stinky job!

Another compound and more laundry, LOL!

Amish haystacks.  They are so much more interesting that the big, giant, round bales from the "English" farmer!

Ok, that's enough of my neighborhood for now.  Next time I'll take pictures of Lodi's square and city, it's a quaint little town with a lot of history!

Friday:  Now, for gardening news.....

My garlic is growing nicely, I thought I had lost it all last fall, but it is coming back strong!  I don't have much planted, but a little to get us through and maybe some garlic scapes so I can make garlic scape pesto  YUM YUM!  I'll post the recipe at the end of this post.

 Garlic coming up.

I started cleaning out the herb spiral, the chives were coming back with a vengeance.  Unfortunately, my rosemary didn't make it through the winter, sometimes it does, this year it didn't.  I'll have to order more from Territorial Seeds.

The thyme is bouncing back nicely as is the oregano.  I'm starting some basil, lavender and cilantro this weekend, and whatever else I have in the box, I have to get it out of cold storage and see what I have.

Chives coming back from the dead.

Front of spiral getting cleaned up and weeded.

My garden beds are atrocious!  Since I was so sick last fall, I didn't get to do any weeding or preparing for winter so mother nature just took over and weeds came back with a vengence!

You can't tell the difference between the bed and the path!

So, I have my work cut out for me.  Seamus goes back to school on the Monday after Easter, and Jeremy is on spring break that week so I plan on recruiting him and Sean and Jaret to help get these beds ready for planting.  I also want to start planting some lettuces, we have some old patio doors and I can put them over the beds at night for a cold frame to protect them from frost.

This is the small creek that runs through our property.  In the dead heat of summer, it dries up but it runs well from spring until late July/early August.

A snake that Jaret found in the yard. This was his 4th of the day!

Our chickens happily free ranging.

That's it for today.  I'll be posting gardening updates and tips throughout the weekend, probably.  We weren't planning on having family over for Easter, since we've been sick no one wants to come over, boo hoo!  But, I can't blame them so our Easter feast is being post-poned for a week while we completely heal and get back to health.  I hope you all have a nice weekend, the weather here in Ohio is supposed to be awesome, I hope it is where ever you live as well!  It's 84 degrees right now, on the 2nd of April!  WOO HOO!!!!

We need this after the winter we went through!

TTFN!

Leslie:-)