A cherry blossom snowfall...

The bulk of our cherry blossoms fell softly to the ground last weekend...

... resulting in a beautiful carpet of pale pink spread across the yard.

Days before, there was just a smattering of blossoms on the ground.

I love this rustic old bench that sits below the branches of the cherry tree. 

It was built by hubby many years ago.

There used to be an arbor over the bench, but our New England winters ravaged that years ago. The bench is still flanked, however, by the gnarly trunks & branches of the trumpet vine that once weaved their way through the lattice sides of the arbor.

(Here's a photo of our handsome Mr. O'Malley sitting on the bench back in March of 2000. 

What a wonderful dog he was.)

Many of the blossoms landed in the 'secret garden' birdbath during their descent.

I'm so happy I took photos while the tree was still in full bloom since the blossoms are now but a memory.

The following little videos were taken on May 11th, when it looked like it was raining cherry blossoms:

My prayers and thoughts are with the people of Oklahoma tonight. I've put a link to The American Red Cross at the top of my sidebar, and have also earmarked certain prints in my Etsy art shop as fundraiser prints for Oklahoma if anyone is interested (100% of the purchase price will be donated to the Red Cross).

This week I'm joining Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show & Tell Friday.

Donna

Whitewashing the birdhouse...

 Our poor old birdhouse really needed some freshening up.

 It was inexpensive to start with, and has fallen apart over the years, but I love the shape of it and am willing to glue, screw, and repaint to keep it going for many more years!

This is what it looked like last spring after a very rough winter where high winds had blown it off its post. Hubby spent a lot of time putting the pieces back together again.

Hubby built a new, strong base for it so it wouldn't blow off anymore. But, boy oh boy, did it need a new paint job.

To be honest, I actually like the rustic, weathered look.

But I also want the wood to last a l-o-n-g time...

... so I got out my white paint and gave it a fresh coat of paint..

Hopefully that will keep the wood from rotting any more than it already has. Don't you just love all our landscape fabric? We desperately need more plants and more bark mulch back here. Hopefully soon.

These photos were taken just last Thursday.

Look at the difference in our flowering cherry tree, just 7 days later!

It won't be long before the salvia at the base of the birdhouse is blooming and the vinca vines are once again cascading out the birdhouse windows. I can't wait!

And take look at the difference in our honeysuckle vine. Again, the photo on the left was taken one week ago, and the photo on the right was taken today. It is getting soooo green and there are buds galore. I've decided to plant two more honeysuckle vines to climb the front posts of the swingset.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. We're looking forward to more beautiful weather. We're on a roll here in New England!

Donna

I think that I shall never see...

...a poem lovely as a tree. (Joyce Kilmer)


Back in the mid-80's, when we were busy planting trees in our little yard, a friend (who had several acres) asked if we'd like to transplant some small trees from his property to ours.


We gladly took him up on his generous offer and came home with a maple, a double white lilac bush, and a mulberry tree, all small enough to fit in the bed of his pickup.


At this time of year, the mulberry tree takes center stage. Its berries seem to ripen right before our eyes....


Oh, there's no doubt about it, it's a messy tree. Due to very limited 'planting locations,' our above ground pool once sat next to this tree. Over the years, as the tree grew and the branches spread, mulberries would fill the pool as they dropped from the branches. (When the girls were young, one of their favorite games was to swim to the bottom of the pool and gather as many berries as they could to help keep the pool clean)... Now that the pool is gone, the mulberries cover the ground under and around the tree...

The birds and wildlife this tree attracts far outweigh any mess from the berries (at least as far as I'm concerned!). It attracts squirrels, bluejays, robins, cardinals, mockingbirds, catbirds, flickers, orioles, and mourning doves, not to mention the possums and skunks who stop by for late night snacks.

This afternoon, while out filling birdbaths, I came across a mourning dove on the ground. It was so close to me, yet didn't fly away. The doves usually fly away long before I get that close, so I was concerned that he might be hurt. I stood still for a minute, watching him, and vice versa. Apparently I had stumbled upon him during dinnertime because, after a minute or so, he went back to eating mulberries off the ground and ignored the fact that I was just a step away. Those must have been awfully good mulberries for him to ignore the instinct to fly away!

This trunk belongs to our non-fruit bearing cherry tree (why, oh why, did I let hubby talk me into a non-fruit bearing tree?)

I'm not sure what this 'interesting' growth is on the trunk, but hubby says it's probably "not a good thing." We don't have it on any of our other trees so hopefully, if it is a bad thing, it's not contagious.

I just love the main trunk and the multitude of branches that spring from it...

It has been a very, very, very wet June here in New England. Not much has been accomplished in the yard due to the constant rain.

It's also been difficult for me to find time to post anything recently due to my dad having been sick and in the hospital for a while. The good news is that he is now home and feeling much better. There are still many transitions taking place so I don't know that I'll get back to posting as frequently as I once did, but hopefully I'll get to visit blogland a bit more regularly in the upcoming weeks!

Have a wonderful week, everyone!

Donna

It's cherry and apple blossom time

... here in New England. It's in the low 50's and rainy today so many of the blossoms are now on the ground rather than on the tree...


(photo of flowering crab apple tree taken from my office window)

... so I'm glad I snapped the following photos over the weekend when most of the blossoms were still intact!


My beautiful vintage Mary statue survived the winter (although she may be a bit chippier than last summer).


She's currently residing under the flowering cherry tree, but I might move her to a different spot in the garden this summer.


You can see one of the hoppa crab trees in full bloom from the living room window.


I gave this guy a serious pruning last year so it would be easier to mow underneath. The branches used to pretty much touch the ground... I suspect several more branches could come off around the bottom, but I shudder at the thought of taking off too much because once they've been taken off, there's no putting them back... So I think I'll leave well enough alone and continue to be a conservative pruner!


From my office desk I look out on the other hoppa crab in our front yard. We didn't know if this poor guy would survive or not as we lost a good portion of the maple tree behind it during a devestating ice storm this past winter. When the large sections of maple tree broke off, they fell onto the crab tree, completely crushing it, but luckily the front portion of the tree survived...


You can see one of the sections where the maple tree snapped toward the top center/right of this photo. The other areas of the maple that snapped off are hidden behind the apple tree. From the street view the apple tree looks fine, but from the side and back, the entire tree is missing. We're grateful that we were left with this much though. These two crab trees were pretty much the first things we planted when we bought our house back in the early 80's, and they weren't much more than big twigs at that point! We brought them home from the garden center in the back seat of a convertible (with the top down), root balls plunked down in the back seat with plenty of room to spare, and look at them now!

The blossoms don't last long, but while they are in bloom they sure put on a beautiful show!



I'd also like to thank Mel from Country In the Town for listing me as one of her top 10 fav's in the "Makes My Heart Smile" award she received... You may all remember Mel from one of my past posts where she allowed me to share the lovely embroidered "envelope pillow" she created!! Please stop by and visit her... you'll be glad you did!!


Hope you are all enjoying the spring wherever you are!


Donna

Camelot...

"Don't let it be forgot, that once there was a spot,

for one brief, shining moment that was known as Camelot."

The cherry tree in the back yard was in full bloom....

And the crab trees in the front yard were covered with blossoms..

It's such a PRETTY time here in New England!! It's unusual that our cherry and crab trees bloomed profusely at precisely the same time, but that's exactly what they did this year and the yard took on the most magical look! Yesterday's strong winds, however, wreaked havoc with the delicate apple blossoms so we must now refer to them in the past tense...

These pictures were taken over the weekend and I offer them as evidence that Camelot really did exist, if only "for one brief, shining moment! "

Donna