Garlic Sprouts and Maple Syrup

Here's a little picture (not great quality - sorry) of the garlic sprouts that are coming up from the garlic cloves I planted and covered up with lots of leaves last fall in a corner of the garden. We had an unseasonably warm day here yesterday - 84 degrees was the high according to my thermometer, and it made me think of gardening, even tho here in Michigan we can have hard freezes up through the middle of May.

The warmth made the bees really active. I have been feeding them sugar water. Yesterday they went through a whole pint of 1:1 sugar water, so I gave them more this morning. I want to make sure we get some honey this year.

Actually, I have been thinking of gardening already, and have already bought a lot of seeds. I will plant some peas today, and maybe put out a few potato sets, just in case we have one of those rare springs where we do not get a late freeze. I looked for any hints of asparagus, but saw none yet. Out in the woods, I do see the infamous garlic mustard popping up. I'll go pick some and put it in the salad greens for dinner tomorrow night.

I did get the maple syrup canned over the weekend. We ended up with just over 6 gallons, which is pretty good considering it was far from an excellent year for sap collection. Too cold, then too warm all of a sudden. It tastes great. :-)

Cherry Blossoms and Sore Throats

I just couldn't make myself go to the Buddhist services yesterday morning, and it is probably just as well, my throat was sore yesterday, and this morning it is very sore and I have nasty laryngitis - I squeak instead of my normal voice. Very odd - I usually pick bugs up from my students, but I didn't notice anyone in class with these symptoms. There were lots of absences but I chalked that up to end of the semester spring fever. Oh, well, it is 63 degrees outside right now, and the cherry trees are blooming, and the peach tree's big pink buds are going to unfurl any second now, and the apple trees have smaller buds just starting...spring is well on it's way. Today, grocery shopping, finish writing the Social Psychology test for tomorrow, paint the beehive parts that need painting, and work on the garden. The vet is coming this afternoon to give the ponies their vaccinations against West Nile and rabies, and then the farrier later to give them a manicure. Then, more work on the garden. Going to plant lots of vegetables and herbs this year. The last two years, my gardening efforts got stalled by too much stuff going on at the end of the semester. This semester, much fewer demands on my time. So, weird that I am sick. Left over conditioning from all those years being a student where the end of each semester had to be a crisis. But, no more.

Catching up !

The kiln is fixed, so I am firing it every other day to give the students a chance to finish up their ware before the end of the semester. Maple syrup is all made, as well. Now I will sell it to my friends, and donate half the proceeds to my favorite charity, Vision Builders, which promotes and provides health care and gender equality in education to children in the developing world, and well as cultural and environmental preservation projects in the areas where we are working with children. Vision Builders is doing a 5K race in a couple of weeks, which is what the little donation link over there is. Give money, or if you are in the area, come and run in the race, which gets rave reviews from participants. Moving on, time to think about getting ready for my bees and planting the garden, although today we are having major rain, so what I will actually do is grade a bunch of school papers and clean the house.