Spring is on the way

My back yard doesn't look much like spring this weekend.

Nor does my forsythia, at least from a distance.

Up close, the forsythia does show signs of spring!

So, I ventured onto my back terrace in search of those tiny blue flowers which are always an early harbinger of spring, and found them "on the way"!

And, my magnolia is breaking bud! (Imagine, a strain of what we typically think of as a southern tree, able to grow here in the cold climates! Oh, happy day!)

My house is nearly 80 years old, and some of the plantings are about that old. I am just thankful that the original owners didn't do this:

Those are cedar arches, from a photo in the 1928 Audel's Gardener's and Grower's Guide. I do love the 1920s era books; they are full of unusual information and wonderful pictures. Consider this , the opening paragraph in the same book's Chapter XVIII, "Lawn Making":

"An English gardener, when asked how to make a lown, replied: "Oh, it's quite easy, quite easy, I assure you. You prepare the ground carefully, and you sow it with a mixture of the best grades of lawn grass seed, and all you have to do is roll it for about three hundred years. And there you are."

Obviously, our lawn fertilization program is mulching our autumn leaves, and that didn't happen last fall, since the snow flew before all the leaves were down. Nonetheless, as soon as our ground dries out somewhat, it's raking and mulching for us (by which I mean my sons, since I don't do outdoor labor). It's been raining 4 or 5 days a week of late; I feel like I've moved to Portland with Paula!