What is it? That lavender bush that I ruthlessly cut back to dead looking sticks a few weeks ago. After pruning I looked up how to prune lavender and learned that I had done it wrong and probably killed the plant. It now has quite a few little green sprouts coming out of those ugly branches! I was pleasantly surprised to see that new growth! In a few weeks none of the ugly, woody stems will show and I will have a nice looking bush. Hopefully it will bloom this year. The bees have been busy with a flowering bush in the garden. I don't know what it is. The blooms are yellow. I didn't see any honey bees but did see bumble bees and other pollinators. Actually I heard them before I saw them.
Yesterday I planted the peas and the onions. I buy the pea and onion seed at Andrews Nursery in Ontario, just across the river from Idaho, paying $2 for 2 ounces of seed. You'd have to buy several regular seed packets to get that much seed. Our farm store sells some larger sizes of common things like corn, beans and peas, charging $6.99 for 2 ounces.
Our lawn mower is back from the repair shop, easier to start and running better than it has in years. They gave it a tune up, nothing major so it wasn't an expensive fix. Today I finished mowing around the edges of the garden, the pathways, under the grape vines, around the raised bed. It looks much better. This is the job I was doing when the mower quit and wouldn't start a few days ago. And I mowed the yard. That was also a big improvement. The flower beds are still very weedy but mowing made part of it look better overall. I learned long ago not to expect perfection because by the time I get the flower beds weeded it will be time to weed them again.
Quite a few tulips are blooming now. The lilacs have flower buds, so far not showing much color and not open. I made hummingbird sugar-water and have a feeder up. No hummers so far. They aren't as predictable as the swallows returning to Capistrano on the same date every year but they do start coming when the lilacs just start to bloom.
Early this morning the temperature was 23. Today our high was about 55 which is about normal for days in April. We'll have another cold night tonight and then warmer for the next few nights. We are still 5 weeks or so from our last expected frost date which is usually around June 1. I'm thinking about planting potatoes soon but don't want to have to mulch them if we get frosty nights in late May. Probably should do that soon anyhow because I can mulch with the hay my horse wastes. I'm going to mulch the peas to help keep them moist until they germinate and then the mulch could be moved to the potato row right next to the peas.
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