Annie Laurie's Hellebore

 

This week, I found my hellebore blooming. I brought it from the old house and planted it here under a big pine tree among various vines. It's not an ideal spot, but it is surviving despite the vines enveloping it every year to the point that I've put a flag up to find it. The plant makes me smile every time it blooms. Below is a previous post that explains why. 

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I first met Annie Laurie at the library, where she had been a long-time volunteer for over 30 years. She came once a week and did whatever was needed, and before she left, she picked up a bagful of books to read. Reading was her passion. Then, she developed breast cancer, and eventually, she was not well enough to volunteer anymore. That's when Beth and I began to take bags of books to her house, primarily mysteries, which were her favorites, and stay for a visit. In the comfort of Annie Laurie's home, I learned what a character she really was. She was opinionated, strong-willed, and very funny. We always had a good visit with lots of laughter, even when her health was rapidly failing at the end.

One of our most memorable visits was when Annie Laurie took Beth and I on a tour of the flowers around her farm house. Flowers and plants were another passion of hers. Rail-thin and hobbling with her cane, she showed us lilies, daffodils, and hellebores. The hellebores were the favorite of both Beth's and mine. Over the years, Miss Annie Laurie had developed a forest floor of them. Under the shade of large trees, she showed us the many kinds she had. I didn't really appreciate all the different varieties she was showing us, but I did appreciate the unassuming, downward-facing, simple blossoms I saw.

After that, Beth and I fell in love with hellebores and wanted some for our gardens. But you know how it is: We never got around to getting any. That is why we were both so thrilled and honored when her sister, Dot, gave us some from Annie Laurie's garden after she passed away.

I carefully chose a shaded spot by my front door to plant mine. It didn't take the transplant so well, and its large leaves flopped. However, it seemed to be surviving. Beth and I exchanged letters with Dot from time to time, and she always asked how our hellebores were doing. I said mine was doing fine. I didn't think that she needed to know that maybe I hadn't done such a good job transplanting it and that it was struggling. Then, a few months ago, she said hers were blooming and wondered if ours were. I told her not yet because I didn't have anything more than one small bud forming at the base of the plant. I figured when that bloomed, I would take a picture of it to send her and carefully crop out the flopping leaves.

Bloom on the end of smashed stock

Well, the stalk with the bud grew and grew until it was about 6 inches tall and ready to bloom any day. And that's when it happened. A workman at the house stepped on it. I was upset but worried more about what I was going to tell Dot. However, a few other buds showed up, and they actually bloomed this week. And the best part of all is that the stalk that got stepped on also has a flower on its end.

Now, I could say something about the tenacity that Annie Laurie had in her life and how that was represented by my hellebore's blooming smashed stem. Or I could say something about the blooms and how they were a sign from her that she was still with us in a way. However, I would really like to think about my hellebore in terms of how much Annie Laurie, Beth, and I would have laughed during the story I would tell about the hellebore I tried to plant and how it got smashed. :)

But wait, there's more - After I first wrote this, the hellebore plant got stepped on again, but it survived!

Ramblings

 I've been kind of aimless recently, so to focus myself better, I made a list of goals for the week. It included things from housework, yardwork, paperwork, and personal matters. In addition, it included all of the week's commitments, including appointments and work. It's not a comprehensive list, just something to make progress on things that aren't shouting, "I must be done now!"  I love to cross things off a list, so this should work well for me. I won't bore you with the details of my goals, but one of them was to write at least one blog post this week. So here I am.

Ward's latest puzzle. 

The great thing about a blog post, especially on a blog where you're not trying to make money, is that you can write about anything. Or nothing, which is what I seem to be doing thus far in this post. 😀

We finally have a new car. We're still wading through the insurance paperwork and the paperwork to title it in the trust (we have resigned the papers 3x now), but we have it. However, I'm still a little gun-shy about driving it. That's what happens when you're in a crash, but you gotta do what you gotta do. 

Boy, our life is boring. Or I have a bad memory because I can't think of anything else to write about. Let's see. We continue attending dance class and learning the cha-cha and waltz. We're slowly meeting people there and having a good laugh as we try to copy what the instructor is doing. It was recommended that you get dance shoes that are flexible and have a sole that lets you both slide and stop on the floor. Patches of suede on the soles supposedly accomplish this. However, dance shoes are expensive, so we got little slip-on sleeves that go over our shoes that help accomplish the same thing. For the level that we're on, they work just fine.

There goes my timer (12 minutes today). I have to leave now to see the allergist. We'll discuss whether I need to continue with allergy shots now that we don't have any cats. He once said that it takes a good six months to get rid of most of the cat's dander, even with thorough cleaning. I'd be happy not to have to go for allergy shots all of the time.

I hope you're enjoying some nice spring weather, although I see on the news that much of the western half of the country is having snow. Today, we're having a warm day, and I'm hoping to take advantage of it between my appointment this morning and my work tonight.

Until next time...

Look What I Found!

 We had two wonderful spring days last week among the cold, blustery days we've been having. I took the opportunity to work outside during these days and start the spring cleanup of the various beds. While I do some fall cleanup, I leave much of the growth to protect the roots of the perennials. Cleaning that up and pulling the winter and spring weeds seems overwhelming at times, but I like to be outside and touch the plants and the dirt. I see and learn so much when I'm up close and personal with them. However, the best part of this week was seeing my first spring flowers with their bright, cheery colors, signaling that winter will soon be over. Every day, there are more blooming. However, our last frost date is not until the middle of May, but spring is definitely on its way.

Here are some of the things I found this week in my yard.

When we first moved into this house, I found that among the various plants, there were no crocuses. So, I promptly planted them here and there for spring surprises throughout the yard. 

Another set is around the corner.

However, some crocuses are just coming up or are being eaten as soon as they do. 

The squirrels bury various nuts around the yard. Here is an acorn they left behind. If you look closely, you can see it is just starting to sprout.

And speaking of squirrels, you can see their teeth marks around the bird feeder. This feeder is touted to be squirrel-proof, and unlike all others that say the same thing, this one actually works! Last fall, the birds stopped coming to the feeder completely, so after a few months, we took it down. We put it back up this week, and the birds have returned. Hooray! Here, you see a male house finch and a female one peeking from behind. Finches are our most frequent visitors to the feeder.

The daffodils that are close to the warm house are blooming. Others are just a few leaves poking above the ground. 

A few of the forsythia buds have opened. 

The high winds blew part of a giant bee's nest down from one of the pear trees. (That grass looks pretty green, doesn't it? I guess it's enjoying all of the rain.)

I hope you are finding some signs of spring where you are.

Until next time...

Good Intentions

 Gonna try my hand at speed blogging again. That might be the only way I'm going to make another post happen. I've been meaning to post for about a week now, but somehow it hasn't happened. You what they say about good intentions... 

The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the greatest intention. Khalil Gibran

Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work. Peter Drucker

Old habits eat good intentions for lunch. Change your habits so you can change your outcomes. Darren Hardy

An ounce of action is worth a ton of good intentions. Michael Josephson

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Samuel Johnson

Apparently, they say a lot of things about good intentions, as just a little googling proved. I'm only familiar with the saying by Samuel Johnson. Although he is credited with saying it in 1775, there are many earlier versions out there, including some translations in the Bible. Or so Wikipedia says. Now you know all of my reliable sources -Google and Wiki. 😉

My timer just went off, which is set at 14 minutes today. I didn't get very far in the post because I got a little distracted wondering about the saying, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Oh, well.

Until next time...

This and That

  or Speed Blogging 

In an attempt to post more often and not overthink things, I will be doing speed blogging from time to time. I will blog for however long it is on my timer. Currently, that's 12 minutes. Read ahead for a bit of stream-of-consciousness posting. : ) Generally, I end up sharing this and that from my week. Let's see where my mind takes me today.

No spring crocuses yet, but I found these little phlox braving the cold.

It's been a somewhat restless day - no big projects in mind. I've just been wandering around from thing to thing. I started using the timer about an hour ago, so I'm a little more focused now.

Last year, I bought an amaryllis bulb from a clearance rack. It was packaged for Christmas, but it was long past that. But it was cheap, so I took a chance. It grew leaves, but didn't bloom. I just stuck it out in the garage until I noticed it a few weeks ago and saw it was trying to send up leaves. I brought it inside to see what would happen. And much to my delight, it grew and bloomed. 

Today, I took it away from the window and into another room to take a picture. After placing it on a table with good light, I went to get the camera. And that's when I heard a crash. I guess it was top-heavy and toppled to the floor, breaking the pot it was in along the way. Not gonna lie. A few curse words were said when I heard that pot breaking. I cleaned up the mess and put the blooms, which had broken off, in water. I don't know if they will last since the stem is hollow. Oh, well. It was fun while it lasted.

We are continuing to wade through paperwork with our totaled car. Even though we bought the car at the end of January, we found out Friday that they had just submitted the paperwork for the title and tags. MVA says that it should take about another month. Unfortunately, you can't hurry bureaucracy, but you sure can get annoyed with it. Another- Oh, well. That's the way the cookie crumbles or the car smashes.

I took a neighborhood walk this afternoon with Ward. I'm trying to walk outside every day to help with sleep. While exercise is important, sunlight is also important to trigger certain sleep-related hormones. I have about a week's worth of data, and I would say, overall, that my sleep has improved.

We started our next set of dance lessons. This time, we will "learn" cha-cha and the waltz. After I finish here, we need to go practice. One hour a week on two dances is not enough time for me to learn them. I am not what you would call a quick study - at least not in this area.

My timer is beeping, so that's all for now.

Until next time...