Like most people these days, I am in self-imposed isolation, socially distancing, and confined to my ¼ acre bit of space called home. I pass my time while waiting for this evil virus to pass with reading, writing, gardening, and now a bit of photography. I seem to have more time on my hands than ever before, so why not put some time into the blog? I’ll not likely be making images of grand landscapes in the near future, although I may venture into the hills nearby on occasion. For now, I’ll share a few scenes I found around my home this morning and hope you take a few moments to enjoy the beauty of this season. It seems the earth isn’t threatened by the virus. We have storms passing through this week washing the landscape clean and encouraging bulbs to break forth from winter hibernation.

These Daffodils were planted in the fall. Several years ago, I came across a miniature variety called Tete-a-Tete. They only grow 6-8” tall and sport a small flower amid a grassy stem. I’m unsure why I’m drawn to this variety. It naturalizes well and will continue to spread through my garden in the years to come. It is one of the first flowers to bloom in the spring and a welcome sight at the end of a long and cold winter.

I also found a garden fairy. Actually, we found the fairy at a local thrift store along with numerous other knick-knack fairy-like objects. The idea was to generate a playful imagination environment for the grandkids to play with when they are over. We hide the fairy objects around the yard and under plants in the hopes the grandkids will take hold and explore the yard more. We don’t care if the objects break, they only cost 50-75 cents each.

Lastly, this is my salad garden I planted in January. We were still blanketed in snow and quite cold overnight. The secret to this little patch was building a cold-frame lid for the garden bed. The area is four ft. by five ft., so I have 20 sq. ft. of salad garden. It contains a half dozen varieties of winter lettuce that survive the cold well (Landis, Black Seeded Simpson, Forellenschluss, Red Salad Bowl, and Parris Island Cos), spinach, tatsoi, mizuna (Japanese greens), claytonia (Miner’s Lettuce), arugula, kale, parsley, radicchio, red-veined sorrel, and mache. One day in February when the air temperature was in the 30’s, under the lid of the cold frame, the temperature was 103°f. I had to vent the garden bed on any day the sun was out in order not to cook my tender plants. With so much time on my hands, many more of the beds are also planted. The beets, radishes, turnips, peas have sprouted, and the cabbages, collards, broccolis, kales, and onions have been moved from under my grow lights in the basement to the garden beds. I’m currently hardening off four rhubarb plants and four thymes that will soon be in the ground.

I hope your days of hunkering down are happy and fulfilling. Best wishes to you all at this odd set of circumstances we are under.