The cold weather has passed—MAYBE—so hopefully there won’t be any more frost. We’re always a little late planting here at Pipi’s Pasture, but we have to be careful because, for some reason, the garden is in an easy-to-get-frost zone. So this last weekend I started planting garden and flowers. As  always  I’m amazed how things remain about the same, spring after spring.

For example…

*because the garden spot was tilled some time ago, the weeds are growing so it’s “hoe as you go.”  I hoe weeds until I clear a row and then plant. The most plentiful weed is bind weed.

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*the wind blows while I’m planting so the sack of seeds has to be weighted down.

*the cows watch every move I make, probably hopeful that they will get a little snack of some kind.

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*robins enjoy hunting worms when the sprinkler is wetting down the planted seeds.

*killdeer fly overhead making plenty of “kill-dee, kill-dee” sounds as they wait for a chance to land on the garden spot and hunt for bugs.

*a friendly cat enjoys rolling on the ground right in front of me as I hoe and plant, not realizing that he risks being “stepped on.”  

*twine, tied to stakes and laid out to mark rows, is often found tangled and even pulled out of the ground if left overnight – guilty parties include cats and skunks.

*volunteer plants, such as squash, potatoes, and onions, can often be found growing in the garden at planting time; this year it’s onions.

*no matter how hard I try, some of the rows end up being crooked.

*one thing I can count on—there will be a wind or hail after I put out started vegetable plants.

*I love pumpkins, but every spring after I plant them I wonder why I put the seeds so close together; this year’s pumpkins include a giant pumpkin, Cinderella pumpkin, Jack-Be-Little Pumpkins, a white pumpkin, and others.

*I plant flowers in the evening when it’s cool so they have all night to adjust to being outdoors and won’t immediately wilt.

*after planting I have to remove old blooms and water every day.

*each year after flowers are in bloom, a spider makes a web over the pots and fills them with what seems to be thousands of eggs that grow into brownish-colored tiny spiders that crawl around everywhere; knocking them off the flowers does no good—they’re back on the pots in no time at all.

*deciding which colors of flowers to put together in pots is one of the delightful rewards of planting time.

Planting season is underway—next is waiting for plants to sprout and then the weeding and digging around in the soil. It’s all about the enjoyment of gardening.