Great Celebrations...Birthdays and Gardens

Elsa turned two last Sunday on Mother's Day. Now that was a celebration! We went to the park for cake and ice cream after a lovely brunch with Elsa's parents, her grandparents from the Twin Cities and me. I had made a carrot cake in the shape of a 'peep' (chick) and that was a hit,
however, it was the ice cream that truly made her drool.

....mmmmm, I just can't eat this fast enough...

One of my favorite children books is Baby Owls, a sweet, tender story with really beautiful pictures. As Elsa, above all other else, loves things that are tiny I thought that this little book would be something she'd like. As soon as I picked up the book at the bookstore, I knew I would make the three baby owls, and the mama owl and give those to her as well.

...and here they are....

When she opened the box containing them, without hesitation she...

picked up the babiest owl and clutched it to her face. It was really sweet.

It was a happy, happy birthday party and we were lucky, in this spring of unpredictable weather, that the day was quite nice despite what the weather man said.

And it has been a tough spring in which to get the garden started. First of all, I put my very large garden to rye last fall wanting to plow it under for green manure. It has been slow growing and never reached the height I would have liked. On top of that, it has been wet and there has been little access to the garden. Finally Freddie was able to plow the not-long-enough rye under, and just yesterday finally got it tilled.

This is one of the plots, and just beyond the green strip is another, perhaps half this size.

For several years I have been raking the newly tilled soil into 'raised' beds. I do not enclose them with boards but simply pull them up into beds that measure about 8" high all around.

It is quite a task raking the soil into beds of varying sizes, (as my shoulders right now can attest to) but I so much like having a path around each bed, being able to walk on all sides and to reach its middle easily.

Above a bed of Swiss Chard, a bed of lettuce and not quite visible a bed of radishes.

Two very long beds, one of leeks and one of onions.

With a gloved hand, I poked a finger into the loose dirt, set an onion in each hole, and gently packed earth around it. I must have planted over a hundred leeks, and perhaps nearly as many onions.

I haven't yet hauled the straw bales down from the top of the barn, but raked this straw off my asparagus patch and repositioned it around the beds. When the sun shines on this straw, I am afraid that 'the miller's daughter' will come snatch it and spin it into gold, it is so beautiful.

There's is a lot of garden yet to be planted, but it feels oh so good to have gotten started!!

And I even started another rug today.............

and that was a pleasure, as weaving tends to have to 'wait' until the planting is complete.
I've raked...I've planted...I've woven today....I'm happy.