Saturday morning...

As I sat sipping my coffee, it was perfect morning. Dame Nature was doing her stuff well. It was warm, the bees were busily roving to and fro spreading sweetness and light. A light scent of jasmine tempted me to get up and smell the flowers. The Carol Mackie Daphne, or perhaps it's the Summer Ice is sending forth a light tantalizing whiff of perfume, just to let the world know that it's been getting something special ready in it's blooms. The gold finches and common house finches are merrily chirping away and the robin has had it's early worm, but is looking for seconds. As King Soloman, or was it his father David, said, "God is in the heavens and all is right in the world." But all good things must come to an end, so I finally decided laziness had run its course and now it was time for the "get to getting" spirit to wax strong.
Man's work lay ahead and I wasn't going to shirk my task this week. (unlike last week and the week before) The kitchen garden needed weeded, the fragrance garden needed tending, the vegetable garden needed mending, and the rose bed was a bit shoddy. It was also going to be 80 degrees today, so work needed to be done early. I started with the pleasant tasks of the vegetable and fragrance gardens. Work wasn't difficult and with Lucy and Helen to help, it was fun to boot. Then I walked past the Kitchen garden and thought, "You can wait til next week I think." It wasn't as if it could get much worse. It was more a few nice plants thrown into a bed of weeds than weeds growing in a nice garden, but as I turned away, a rather rakish looking dandelion sneered.

The kitchen... well I call it a garden.

I don't know if this has happened to you before. Weeds have a way of giving you the eye, nodding their shaggy mop and suggesting that it was a good idea for you to do something else because you weren't up to the challenge. Swashbuckling. That's the word. They give you a positively swashbuckling look, twirl their mustache and possibly raise an eyebrow. Well, it would have been unmanly to let a comment like that pass, so we went at it hammer and tongs. The sun was rapidly rising and peaking over the roof of our house onto the battle ground as the fury began. Up came mounds of grass. Out came dandelions, some with root, others without. The tattered carcasses lay in heaps. Needless to say, I was victorious. Hay fever, hot weather, thorns, and even sticker bushes couldn't keep a good man down. As the foremost dandelion breathed its last, it only muttered "you missed one." It was true, I had missed one. But, I had gotten a whole lot more. The area looks more like a poorly planned kitchen garden again. Oh the sweetness of victory...

Now it's a kitchen garden

This is a tiny miniature rose, only one stem survived the winter. It's only 4" tall, but still putting on a show.