Today the yard, tomorrow the world!

This camelia is one of the few things in the garden that actually looks presentable, and it is facing the empty lot next door wedged between the school and shed where no one can see it. The store bought pansies are starting to come back after being squished beneath the snow, but once again I started pansies from seed too late and the seedlings are just sitting there not doing anything.

I did manage to get a bit of pruning done today and chop off all the dying mums. I am not super-fond of chrysanthymums, but they sure do love our garden. I do my best to kill them, but they come back stronger every year. Actually some of them were quite pretty. I did take photos while they were in their glory and will try to get around to posting those at some point.I didn't finish pruning though. What is with our rosemary? It grew like the dickens during December? Is this the usual season for growth spurts?Our kinkan (kumquat? maybe? They are like itty bitty oranges and you eat them whole) tree finally has actual kinkans this year. hooray!
The avacado and mango trees are surviving the winter well so far in our little greenhouse.

Here are some daikon growing, for those who are not familiar with daikon. I have to go figure out what to do with the other half of one that is sitting in our fridge tonight. Sigh.This is another photo of the area my husband built for the blueberry bushes and baby trees at the bottom of our side of the embankment. He hauled lots of dirt up from the river bank. All part of his plot to...


take over the world!!! Or maybe the neighborhood...


Here is the expansion so far. Out on the the embankment and down the other side. And nowinto the empty lot next door (with the owner's permission). We will stick to underground and inedibles here, however, because the guy with the plot next to this uses enormous amounts of chemicals. He lives a few blocks over, but must have a spy cam trained on my laundry poles, because he invariably shows up with huge tank fulls of noxious spray as soon as I hang out four loads of laundry and all the bedding. When there is a particularly well aimed wind he sometimes also burns plastic .
While I was hiding out at the computer upstairs the girls suddenly noticed I was missing. I heard them knock over the coat tree and found them ready to mount an expedition into the dark windy cold yard to find me. They seemed a bit confused about whose coat was whose.