The Gardener and the Cook

Another beautiful Sunday in the Willamette Valley. It seems like we haven't really had much of a winter this year. (Easy for me to say today, not so easy last week.) Oh, yes, it's been cold, and it's been rainy, but we haven't had many of our usual protracted gray, damp, cold, and dreary days, weeks, or often, months. In the past week we experienced three of those days which resulted in an entire city of grumpy, depressed people. How quickly we forget.

It was 34 degrees when I walked Ollie this morning, but it warmed up quickly. I enjoyed a nice long run along the mill race and Willamette River. The flowering trees are in bloom, the woodland bushes are putting out their fresh green leaves, and the water fowl are very active. I expect to see baby ducks and geese any day. I truly appreciate living near miles and miles of running and biking trails. It was a great day to be outside.

Ollie joined us outside for a little garden work. He napped while I cleaned out and weeded another bed. It certainly looks better, but I have a number of Hebe plants that suffered during our bit of cold weather. I'm waiting to see if they'll come back. It's not looking good.

Reyn's cold-frame is working beautifully. It was 84 degrees under the frame shortly before noon today. It is steamy in there and the plants are all loving it. He started new lettuce seeds last week and chose today to transplant his first starts into the garden. As always, he was surprised to find out exactly how many little plants he had propogated. After giving starts to the neighbors, he tucked in his progeny wherever space and good soil could be found. We now have several kinds of lettuce, spinach, and chard growing in and around much of the garden - under the blueberries, between the rhubarb, next to the asparagus. When the plants get a little larger we'll have beautiful edible borders all around the yard. I'm thinking about those salads already.