Little pine trees like this have sprouted all over the place under my Canary Island Pine tree. I don’t remember this happening in the previous 30 years I’ve lived here.
The snow peas I planted in the fall are blooming purple flowers! All the other peas I have grown over the decades — the varieties that are grown for food and not flowers — had white flowers, so this is fun.
I am thrilled to see that my ever-languishing Dutchman’s Pipevine has two flower buds and many leaf buds presently. We’ll see if that is enough scent to attract the Pipevine Swallowtail butterfly. It would be awfully exciting to see one of them in person. This is what they look like in pictures:
Maybe this year I’ll get the other Swallowtails that like parsley; I have a good crop of that, too. And at church, I’m the gardener of a very small planter, which requires little work. It’s on automatic irrigation, so my only task is to plant and deadhead. This picture was the Before Deadheading this week:
The last couple of days we have had a cold and fierce wind blowing through. It makes me want to hide indoors, but I managed to buck up and work a tiny bit outside today — mostly in the greenhouse, where I intend to plant seeds tomorrow! (They don’t all start with P.)
Gladsome Lights 
This is a delightful post – beautiful colours too.
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I confess I laughed at your reference to a “cold and fierce wind.” I’m not one to play the “You think your weather’s bad?” game, but — let’s just say cold and fierce can be relative. I’ll bet our Texas homes were colder than your California weather during the worst of the recent unpleasantness. Thank goodness that’s over — and I hope you have more benign conditions, too. You and your pretty flowers deserve it!
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I knew, Linda, as I wrote about it, that my Texas friends would laugh – especially the former California residents.
It was a case of being unprepared for the weather, having temperatures in the 70’s with no breeze, then suddenly that wind, and the wrong clothes. Also, no fire in the woodstove!
The rapid change sounds like the normal Texas weather described by one of my friends who recently emigrated.
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My Dear has been sending info about butterflies to our grandchildren in L.A., encouraging them to plant their own garden. I’m going to forward this post to our son so he can show them that picture of the Swallowtale and the photograph of the “Dutchman’s Pipevine [with] two flower buds and many leaf buds” so they might get an idea of where to start. I take it that parsley attracts butterflies in CA too. Another example of the inspiration you provide! (The photograph that moved me the most is the first one. And the background story added even more meaning. “Hope springs . . .”
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Your planter at church is very pretty. I can see that all my gardening friends are so anxious to do real planting. I’ve enjoyed your recent posts on day trips and also the Chesterton post on humility. I studied on that one, hoping to remember it more often.
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The cross shaped Planter filled with Purple Pansies is Perfectly Pretty.
Likewise the Poppies.
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Spring is coming to you.
We’ve had spring knocked out from under us by this unexpected week of winter storms, but I see signs that it’s returning here, too.
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What beautiful photos. The world looks like it is coming back to life in your part of it. I love seeing that. Happy week.
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Oh the poppies! And that pretty pea blossom!
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I love that butterfly!
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I hope one comes around!
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I love the pansy cross! I need to do some weeding and reseeding of my garden boxes – I’m missing prime growing season. But the nasturiums in them right now are blooming profusely, so I hate to pull them out. I also have a broccoli that keeps on producing. Beautiful photos!
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