an intro pro!

 Late May is the best.

It's finally PEONY TIME.

Did I trim back the sprawling plants around the peonies to give them room to grow?  Nope.  Did I remember to put peony rings around the different plants to help with the flop?  Nope!  Which means that the ones on the edges that droop dangerously close to the ground are mine.

The air is perfumed for one glorious week.  Windows open and bouquets in every room.  Ahhh...peony time.

Foxgloves are popping up, too.

I have many of them growing in my weedy plots by the back barn.  I'll get there eventually, but not yet. Since foxgloves are toxic, I don't dare bring them into the house with my curious kittens.  So I leave them in the field, something pretty to look at when we walk by.

I don't feel the same pressure as last year to get everything cleared out so quickly, even though I've got so many flowers struggling amid the weeds.  These foxgloves...

those yellow flowers?  weeds.

...and the biennial sweet williams that I planted everywhere last year, too.

Mountain mint, anise hyssop, bupleurum, poppies, forget-me-nots, orlaya, and yes, more foxgloves are all blooming amid the weeds.

I'll get there...eventually.  I'm plugging away at the beds around the house, with Todd's help.

...and Claudia's, of course!

Meanwhile, enjoying the wildlife outside.  A possum runs through a rain storm, heading to cover behind the fence...

Barn swallows fret as I walk too near their nest...

A green heron pokes around the muskrat house while a plastic decoy duck watches.

Meanwhile, the wildlife INSIDE...

Despite what this photo shows, cat introductions are going well.  As of yesterday, the kittens have free run of the entire house.  Calliope shows them who's boss with an occasional hiss.  Although they look SO sweet...

...they are WILD.  Todd and I sometimes look at each other, amazed, at their thundering rampages around the house.  How can two tiny kittens make so much noise?  They do, somehow.  They're into everything, demanding food and play and head rubs.  Tearing up and down the stairs, over and over again.  Causing a series of mysterious thumps in distant rooms...gulp!  Despite the noise and the chaos and the discovery that almost every houseplant here is TOXIC TO CATS (sigh)...we're enjoying kittenhood!   

Have a great week!