No time for lounging this year

Another hairy deadline at work has passed (or will have, I pray, by the time you read this) which explains the lack of posts last week. It's funny how what is normally a pretty laid-back time of year around here is so hectic this year because of the early spring.

In the past I've actually gone a little stir crazy this time of year, chomping at the bit to get outside and get to work but being forced back inside by the weather (since it's not at all uncommon for the ground to be covered in snow). This year I actually scheduled a few activities to keep myself busy and ironically I now find myself behind schedule in my outside chores.

Two weekends ago I drove up north to visit a good friend and help her out with some work on a nursery. She was 8.5 months pregnant, had just moved into a new house that they intended to do major renovations on, were caring for their first litter of puppies from their yellow lab (the puppies were just under three weeks old and cuter than you can imagine) and working overtime to prepare for her maternity leave. I was exhausted just thinking about it. I got the baby's room painted, put a fresh coat of paint on a changing table and got the carpet ripped up (although not removed because they didn't have the new flooring yet). Crazy stuff. Side note: This was the first time I've painted with no VOC paint (I usually paint with low VOC paint) and while the particular paint we bought didn't perform as well as the Benjamin Moore Aura that is my preference, it was incredible to paint a room with no fumes.

Beware gratuitous puppy porn! We spent a fair amount of time with these cuties, who were temporarily relocated to a laundry basket while we relocated the whelping box into the living room.

Anyway, while I was off doing that, the garden was really leaping to life. Bed clean out continues but I'm amazed to see that almost all the perennials are peeking up, even the ones that are usually late to the party, such as Baptisia. I've also done a bit of pruning on the shrubs (but nothing as major as what one of the Limelight hydrangeas endured last year).

Here's what a few spots in the garden are looking like.

The climbing rose CanCan that I bought last year to grow up a trellis and help disguise the downspout going down the center of the front of the house is looking great and is leaving out. It is almost as leafed out as it was last year in mid-May when I showed a picture of it in this post.

The first daffodil is still blooming. Others aren't far behind.

One of the tree peonies must have liked its winter home caged in and covered with leaf mulch. I see that a nasty little garlic mustard weed plant did too. There is so much garlic mustard weed in the beds this year. That's not good. It's not hard to pull, but I need to do it soon before it even thinks about flowering and spreading it's seeds everywhere.

The hellebores always surprise me because I usually forget about them until I make a conscious effort to go check them out and this year I found them full of blooms. More and more I am appreciating these shy plants.

I can't believe how open the rhubarb is already. And oh-em-gee I'm so embarrassed right now because looking at this picture I see there is some petrified dog poop in the picture. I'm so sorry. I wonder how that got there since I know my dogs would never use my garden as a bathroom. Grrr.