Getting Ready for Spring!

I needed yesterday. Bad. Though we get cold weather in the winter here in the Carolinas, we don't often get consistently cold weather. The mountains are an obvious exception, but the piedmont and lowland areas are generally pretty mild. We'll have a couple days of extreme cold, or maybe a week here and there, but with days in the 40's, 50's, even 60's or 70's peppered in. I remember spending plenty of winter days in shorts and t-shirts.

This winter has been one of the exceptions, one of the "cold winters" that I've experienced a only few years of my life.

So far the last couple weeks of December and almost all of January has been below freezing - some drops as low as single digit temps and many days not getting above the freezing mark at any point.

I don't particularly mind the cold, but the consistent nature of it this year has really gotten me yearning for some nice days to work in the yard and in the garden. Yesterday was one of those, though our benchmark for "nice" and for warm has been altered and lowered just a bit. After a week of nighttime temps in the teens and daytime temps in the 20's, yesterdays high in the low 50's was a much needed break.

We ended up working on a number of projects that had been put off, but needed to be finished to get geared up for the season change to spring. Joey had started a large new potting bench, we'd ordered a "tower garden" planting system to try out that was still in the shipping box, and crepe myrtles and fruit trees needed to be pruned.

We got the potting bench finished, orgazined our various pots, planting tools and other planting items, turned some compost, got the pruning taken care of and put the Tower Garden together.

We followed all of this with some general meandering around the yard, checking out various plants, shrub and trees, enjoying some wine and playing with the dogs.

I remember now just how motivating longer and warmer days can be. We have quite a bit to do this year, building off last year and getting the gardens and landscaping ready not just for ourselves, but also for the Charlotte Garden Club's annual "Art in the Garden Tour" in late April. We have a lot more to prune, hundreds of seedlings to get started, a few hundred bulbs to get planted and tons of beds to mulch. A few plants and trees need to be moved. A covered sitting and dining shelter is in the works, and a few more fruit trees and berry bushes are in transit from Raintree Nursery and will need to be installed when they arrive.

And I can't wait! I love spending long warm days outside and after the winter we've been having I think my normal spring fever will be in full bloom! ~~Scott