Spring Notes

I made a few Spring notecards with a new to me (but old in availability) die.  I saw some cards on Pinterest using this die and immediately wanted to add it to my stash but it was first marketed in 2014 so I had to look around for it online and was lucky to find it on Ebay.  (There is a bigger version that I'm  contemplating purchasing also.) The stamped image is an older Unity stamp that I used a portion of for the center of the die cut.  I also dipped into some older colored cardstock in an effort to start using what has been collecting dust in my paper stash.  I only have a few sheets left of the Mint Macaron and Certainly Celery used on this first card.  Petal Pink and Cameo Coral were used on the others.  

The stamped image was colored with Copic Ciao markers.

I absolutely love the spring wildflowers that have taken over parts of our yard in recent years.  Some of it was planned and some was spontaneous.  It always makes me smile when I find them en masse or in in unexpected places.

Siberian Squills have spread this year like wild fire.  This is a portion of our "fake brook" and it makes me so happy to see the blue Squill water.

These are Marsh Marigolds and unfortunately they are very invasive and I will be trying to pull some of them out this year.

More Squills and a the white flower is called "Bloodroot" because the sap from the root is red.  These move around the yard as they seed themselves but there aren't many of them to be found.

Up closer to the Marsh Marigold and some Spring Beauty.

Spring Beauty in pale, pale pink.

Confederate Violets.

Yellow Violet.

More Confederates.

The primroses aren't wildflowers but they do come back each Spring.  HWNSNBP will buy them at Home Depot for the kitchen windowsill when they come out in late winter and we always try to transplant them to the garden when they are done blooming inside.  We have had some luck with them reviving in the outdoors which is not something you can count on when flowers are originally started in a greenhouse situation. 

I have forgotten the name of this pink flowering plant but I love that it has made a home in this bed.

The Chionodoxa's are scattered amongst the Squills.

  

I haven't seen a Puschkinia in this bed for years.  I even had to make sure that that was the name of it.  It might be confused with a Wood Hyacinth but it is much smaller.

This Anemone or Grecian Windflower was a surprise also where it decided to bloom.  There are a couple that have come up in the walkway and I'm glad that I decided to leave those clumps of leaves when I did some early weeding.

This flower is a mystery to me also.  I don't remember planting it and don't know it's name either but I was happy to find it in this bed.  I actually didn't even see it until I was weeding some the other evening.

The naturalized Daffodils are blooming on the hill and the Redbud trees are just about ready to pop.  I hope to have some pictures of them together soon.

We have daffodils planted in the garden to use for cutting purposes and HWNSNBP brought some in a couple of nights ago.  I say night because we often do yardwork at the end of the day when it is cooler and usually work until the sun goes down.  Anyway, he brought in a beautiful bundle of Daffodils in a large mason jar and put them on the kitchen counter.  Later on, when I was doing the dishes I looked over at them and there was the biggest spider I've every seen on one of the daffodils.  I don't do spiders.  I didn't even want to take a picture of it.  He got a tissue to catch it and I told him that he'd better not miss.  Thankfully he didn't, but I am so glad that we saw it sooner than later when it might have found another cozier place to hang out in.  Needless to say, I reminded him that he has to shake out and inspect those flowers before they come into the house!

And one more note in this long post.  We have been looking all over for a particular Lavendar variety called Dilly Dilly which we had success with in one of our borders last year.  The other two varieties that we had in that border didn't fair well and we wanted to replace them with the one that did.  Of course the nursery that we originally got them from didn't have them again this year (we've been back there three times checking) so it's been a bit of a wild goose chase until yesterday.  Even though it was raining off and on, HWNSNBP suggested that we take a ride to the Great Swamp Nursery.  On the way there I finally saw an eagle in the wild.  It was in a field with the carcass of what looked like a deer on the side of the backroad we were taking and HWNSNBP even turned around so I could try to take a picture of it, if only with my phone.  I usually take my camera with me when we go that way but because it was raining I had decided not to.  Well, by the time we turned around to get close again, it had flown off, or so we thought because turning back around to go in the original direction I saw it again a little bit of a distance away but at that point we were again past it and he wouldn't turn around again.  So no picture, but the other good news is that a last peek at the labels of the Lavendar plants amongst the many that they had at the GS before we gave up rewarded us with the last few Dilly Dilly plants that they had.  Success on a rainy day!