It’s Wednesday here still. In other places it’s Thursday already. Every week the story repeats. Every day a similar story is told. I am not one for annual resolutions, but I can relate to those who are. I do my best resolving in the moment when the inspiration, necessity, or courage descends. When it’s time, it’s time. Time for change, as so many will attempt to do tomorrow. Or time for a walk, or time for a bloom.

It’s 37° F here and has been all day. The They People say it feels like 23. After the walk I took earlier, I’m inclined to believe them. Wrapped snugly with a baby, two jackets, a scarf, gloves and hat, my daughter and I set off to walk the dog. The dog? He was quite stylish in his green, grey, and brown sweater rescued from the Goodwill. (He’s a large dog such that they don’t make sweaters in his size, but short haired with little body fat and a big shivering mess when it’s cold, so there you are.)

No one was out. A few cars rolled by, but not a single person was walking, or raking, or checking their mail. The birds were hunkered down on power lines and in bamboo stands alike. The squirrels were happy to leave you wondering where they went.

Ah, but the wind. The wind blustered and billowed. The wind cut through sleeves and ripened cheeks. The wind made no mistaking why no one was out.

You may think we were out walking for the dog’s sake, and while he does enjoy two walks a day most days of the year, he would’ve been more content, I’d wager, curled up on his new Christmas bed by the fire. No, this walk was for her. Our little runchkin who was rather angry that she’d forgotten how to nap today. There are a few magical tricks in our parenting bag that work when “nothing else does” and the best bet is tucking her into a wrap while I walk around the neighborhood. Even that doesn’t always work, and when it doesn’t (like today) it takes a little humming and she’s fast asleep.

So I enjoyed the abandoned yards and still constructed (or half-removed) holiday decorations, because it meant no one would interrupt her precious nap, and no one would hear my humming of two verses of Little Drummer Boy for a mile and a half.

And when we got home, and she’d woken up again, we visited my current favorite volunteer plant and had a seasonal surprise.

Happy New Year, near and far.

Or: Why? How do you dispose of your invasives while adding ash to your soil?

Fall here can be glorious. Instead of the omen of dark and dreary winter days holed up waiting for cabin fever, autumn in this part of the world is a release. A release from the air-conditioning, a freedom to breathe the fresh air after a storm, the ability to enjoy spending time outdoors again…and the flora put on their Sunday best to welcome in the escape from the heat.

The instructions said “place in water and watch expand like magic!” After days in water with no expansion, I took to it with prying and pulling and now merely have smaller chunks whereas I was hoping for a sowing material.

I mowed the front lawn for the first time in ages. A new mower even, as the one we’d had the past near-four years blew a head gasket. Replace the head gasket, right? Well, yes, if they still made head gaskets for this model. It is super old though, being that it’s a whole six years since manufactured date, so it makes sense…(not.) This mower had a bag, and while I haven’t bagged lawn clippings since perhaps 1992, the length of the lawn and the hungry new garden beds in the back changed my plans. Six full bags of clippings later and the front yard was done and the beds had some more soil food.

DH was about to grill some dinner for us and thought to empty the ash bin. What a delicious meal the garden beds had yesterday!

When mowing the front lawn, I dodged a few things. Obviously this little resilient blossom was spared the mower’s blade. When we moved in nearly five months ago now, someone kicked or knocked or otherwise took a rose bush off at the ground. It ended up in the gutter. Here we are, nearly five months later, and that little root system has chugged along and plugged away to give it a go and show those careless rosebush kickers! (And the blossom smells amazing to boot!)

That’s not the only rose showing its fall colors…

I also cut around these little guys…

and these little guys.

Why yes, that is a volunteer tomato in an abandoned pot. And yes, I am leaving it be to see if we can’t have a winter tomato harvest. Why not?

And it looks to be near time to harvest our first fruit from Oscar the Meyer Lemon Tree.

Happy seasons change to you, where ever you may be.

As the sunlight left the sky to brighten another’s day, the street lights came on and the critters came out. (Why yes, I did consider a light jacket for the chilly 72 degrees.)

As the sunlight left the sky to brighten another’s day, the street lights came on and the critters came out. (Why yes, I did consider a light jacket for the chilly 72 degrees.)

Not even halfway through the stash, but I’m not sure I have enough even so. But it’s a start. One of the benefits of moving to a new place: lots of material to reuse.

The gardening is much more interesting a mere few miles east from our last neighborhood. The variety of flowers, the number of backyards with veggies (and roosters) and then there’s this backyard off the greenbelt…what will they do with all that corn?

I’m even more excited to plan our home’s transformation from suburban grass and shrub into something more our style.

Enjoying my first Mother’s Day and some strawberries from the garden thanks to DH’s careful tending.

Happy day to all the moms and motherly folk the world over.