Tend

Underneath the St. John's Bridge: Cathedral Park

Spring is on its way. The cherry blossoms have been in bloom now for a couple of weeks, we've received several dozen eggs from our chickens, and the bees have been busy collecting pollen. I am hoping to harvest honey next weekend. Today it was sunny, warm and spring-like after one of our colder weeks of the winter, including some snow.

Our baby trees in the snow

Friends of Trees gifted us with two new baby trees on our street-side lawn. We chose a red-bud tree, one of my favorites from living in Ithaca, NY, and a semi-dwarf janigold apple! We plan to return the favor by volunteering as tree inspectors this summer, strolling our neighborhood and checking on the health of the trees that they planted.

Speaking of trees, I am getting more and more excited by the little tree in our backyard. It has waxy green leaves and is not much to look at in the summer, but the buds on the tree are filling me with the hope that it's a tulip magnolia! If so, I will plan my yard around it, including moving our chicken coop so that it can grow and thrive. I'm not doing much with our yard this year, although I am prepping one of our first gardens and hope to plant some beets, beans, and maybe a few other rather simple veggies there.

Lucky Beans

Leno, our white cat, has been a challenge for us this winter. His teeth have been plaguing him, so in order to make sure that he eats, we need to make him smoothies: water and dry food, sometimes with a touch of canned food. He also needs to spend the majority of time outside as he's taken a shining to spraying in very inconvenient places (but really, is cat spray ever convenient?). He seems to prefer living outside when the weather's nice, but this week, with the cold weather, we had to make a nest in the downstairs bathroom for him. He seems to be okay with a warm place to curl up, a wee bit of affection, and a reliable soft meal. We've jokingly changed his name, thinking that maybe we cursed him by naming him after a song that goes, "Poor Leno," so now we call him Lucky Beans.

Elijah in a sunny spot on the stairs