Summer is My Favorite Season

Greetings From Domelandia,
This time of year, I practically live outside. Gardening (and all that that implies) is one of my passions. The Viking and I decided that one of this year's goals is to see if we can grow some food for real. So I have bitten off WAY more than I can chew and sometimes feel overwhelmed when I wake up.

Here's what I've been doing: I moved flagstones from an old patio area and used some of them to build a little sidewalk around our new dining room add-on. I had to use ropes, levers, and 2' lengths of fenceposts to move them. I dug out a bushel of old iris--now I need to decide where their new home will be. They are a deep purple color and smell like Grape Koolade. The yellow Dutch iris are in full bloom right now, are 2+ feet tall. They are velvet perfume.

The Viking (obviously, he GETS me) built me a state-of-the-art gopher-proof garden (cross your fingers!) Tilling as I go, I have thus far planted 3 kinds of onions, zuccini and yellow crookneck squash, pumpkin, Italian flat pole beans, baby limas, and Blue Lake green beans.
I planted 3 raspberry plants. For pretty, an assortment of sunflowers and hollyhocks, planted to face the morning sun. Columbines, lilies, delphiniums, and hosta in a shady spot. I've kept them all watered, and applied compost and mulch. I'm expecting to water them through June, our driest summer month. I feed the birds daily and remember to bring in the feeders at night so we won't have bear problems. I take the dogs for their daily walk and keep up with office duties for our business. I cook supper (not culinary triumphs--I just can't get into cooking right now), wash dishes, do laundry.

I make neverending lists for the next day: (Need to Plant: Cukes, carrots, corn, chard, cabbage (?), Anaheim pepper and tomato sets.)

This is the time of year we look forward to. The heat! The green! The wildflowers! The songs of birds from dawn 'til night. The beauty of our little valley.

Those little bags of seeds crammed full of possibility and hope.