The Sun Shines Hot and The Wind Blows Cold.

Check out the flower buds. I've never seen a Wandering Jew flower. Is this common?

Busy month. Celebrating double birthdays, trying my luck on the ski slopes, finally biting the bullet and remodeling a 30-year-old kitchen, flying to LA to witness a California Poppy super bloom, re-potting nearly every houseplant in my house. Well. Now that March is finally over. I think a nap is in order.

Yes. I know. This is a terrible photo. :)

The Dahlias are blooming. Don't be too impressed. We're months out from beautiful flowering gardens, this high in the mountains. Sunny windows are the playground when it's snowing outside. 

Chopped most of the roots off my Kalanchoe - and she went absolutely bonkers with the blossoms.

Was equally abusive to the yellow Kalanchoe. With the same wonderful flowering results.

Which naturally inspired me to beat up on the orange ones, too. 

Kalanchoe are a favorite of mine. Quite common, most folks throw them away after they flower. But they're perennials. They'll re-bloom given half a chance. 

* Root trimming helps keep much-loved houseplants to manageable size. Inspires lots more flowers. Trim the skinny roots, don't cut the tap root, that's the one that matters.

I'm so head over heels in love with this girl, I thought you needed an extra large photo.

My darling granddaughter turned 6. 

Which prompted everyone to insult me about how I'm getting old. 

Why insult me? Howsabout complimenting the kid? Her dress is beautiful, she picked it out herself. It is not a blinding neon rainbow pattern. My little girl is growing up!

* My own daughter has the same birthday, hence the double celebrations. She avoids photos, believing that she's "getting old."

Age is a box people put you in. 

We decided our own mother was 'old' when she turned 80. Which seems appropriate. Thanks to media brainwashing my generation is considered old when they turn 60.

Lifting the lid off the age box, I decided to go skiing. (I live in a ski resort, it's only about 10 minutes to the slopes.)

Haven't skied in a long time and everyone assumes that's because I'm old. Enough already. I'm not that old. But I am rather tight-fisted! And I just can't believe it costs $240, for a single day lift ticket! 

Wish I could say skiing is like riding a bike. But I hardly ever fall off a bike. Though it was a nice fluffy powder day. The apres ski bar was fun and the tumbles were soft.

During.

Plus. Skiing got me out of the house. While noisy men with power tools caused some mass destruction. I've been tolerating The Horrendous Kitchen for about as long as I can remember. It got particularly bad during covid. Remember covid? When everybody painted the walls because they were tired of climbing the walls? 

Before.

I chose a paint color called Grey Flannel Pajamas. Such a cute name. Turned out to be periwinkle, a purple Easter egg kitchen. Been scowling at that color choice ever since.

Poppies blooming in France.

Have you ever seen a super bloom? I was lucky enough to see one in France. And it's true what they say. Well, I don't know if anybody actually says this but I will. Once you tip toe through a stunning flower field like this one, you're desperate to do it again.

To continue avoiding the men with noisy power tools, destroying my kitchen, we took off to LA. The location for the most amazing super bloom Poppy Fields. And I had it all figured out. You know. Me. The gardener. Believing I know what I'm doing. Monitoring the nightly temperatures, the rain fall, etc. 

Yep this is gonna be the perfect week to go! 

We did not see a single Poppy the entire time we were in California.

Though we were surrounded by stunning yellow wildflowers along the beaches. While eating and drinking our way across Santa Monica. < Which is always a wonderful Plan B.

After.

Returned home to a brand new kitchen. Where I sit at the new kitchen counter in the early hours of the morning, sipping my coffee and asking myself repeatedly. Why didn't I do this 20 years ago? It would have been paid off by now! 😉