Garden Small Steps

Look at my new lovelies. My first plantings for the backyard. I feel a tremendous responsibility for them. Did you know that Calalilies come in some amazing colors these days. I am not a fan of the white Calalily but these are so lively and colorful.

Lotta rock in the yard here in Carson City and I found once I started digging that it doesn't end on the surface. My mom and I had quite a workout digging up rocks to get these planted. Now I can admire my Calalilies and my mystery pansies and feel like I am making progress in getting a garden going. My mom was an incredible help while she was here. She is so knowledgeable about all things gardening. We visited nurseries, made lists of plants, decided how and what I should start with and what to do next. She gave me several ideas for how to move all my rocks around to make functional flowerbeds and room for shrubs and stuff. She even complimented my half-assed attempt to prune back a voracious juniper that I actually hope to rip out eventually. We got a bee trap for some rather bothersome wasps and...ick....it is very full in just a week. I am not fond of wasps or yellow jackets. I am rarely bothered by honey bees and you should see the funny 2 inch long bumblebees we get here. They are so funny looking and flying so precariously it is hard to feel at all threatened by them. Truly from whence the word "Bumble" must come from. They sort of bumble and tumble through the air with a precarious aerodynamic. Deck entertainment.

While my mom was here we ambled down to Minden for the Minden Street Festival. Crafts and food and the usual street fair type stuff along with about 30 or so vintage restored cars to envy.

My mom is partial to this one:

While I wouldn't mind cruising around in this one:
Once it got warm and we had perused all the goods we sat a spell in Minden park and just enjoyed the beautiful day.
We had many good, uninterrupted conversations and spent alot of time on the deck just enjoying a lovely weekend while we mulled over possible paint colors for indoors. We had chocolate and coffee and a couple good meals out. We watched "The Queen" and agreed it wasn't "Spectacular" but it was good and that Prince Charles was seriously miscast and the portrayal of The Queen Mother was horrible. We watched some A's games (I am a Giant's fan: my mom is an A's fan) and I learned all the players names and nick names and now I can't look at Travis Buck without thinking "Rock Star" which is my mothers nickname for him. She's quite knowledgeable about baseball MMmom is. Basically, she knows lots of stuff and I am grateful I got a weekend to pick her brain and my soul was just happy she was here.