Cool Garden Stuff

Some eye candy from the gardens. Please enjoy!

Strawberry bloom

Arctic Poppy

Columbine (rock garden variety 6 inch tall plant. Bloom 1")

Aquilegia flabellata? (not sure if this is right and if you can help me verify please chime in :-)

Closeup Beautiful Jacob's Ladder

4 inch tall rock garden Iris (sorry can't remember actual name)

Pasque Flower

Pulsatilla vulgaris

Fragrant Crab Apple (genus/species unknown)

at Palmer City Hall across from 1st Nat'l Bank on Cobb St.

If you live near, go see it and smell it; it's a wonderful tree and the only one of it's kind in all of Palmer and Wasilla. Smells like spiced apples and has so many blooms that you can't see the tree for the blooms! Full branch view of the tree below this photo.

Net Leaf Willow (ground hugging alpine plant, leaves 3/4 inch long)

Salix reticulata

Trollius europeanus

Shooting Star

Meadow Rue bloom (unopened)

Thalictrum aquilegifolium

Euphorbia epithymoides

"Cushion Spurge"

Alaska the Beautiful

Okay, multiple posters from many progressive blogs have pissed me off today. Alaska is not defined by Sarah Palin, as a matter of fact, many of us think that she is not worthy of our attention.

Please remember everyone that Alaska is a beautiful wonderful place that should be visited by all. I wish that every commenter on every Alaskan blog or others that mention our fair state would come here and see the magnificence that is here to behold. I'm serious; when I moved up here in 1990 I went places that made me cry because they were so unbelievably beautiful. I still get tears in my eyes when I head to certain places in this state. IT'S AWESOME AND WORDS CAN'T PROPERLY EXPLAIN IT'S APPEAL....

That's why we have to focus less on Palin and who's baby was birthed by whom and how someone so stupid could govern this lovely state. We just have to be here and be, and be present and revel in the beauty that is unmatched by any other place.

It's Cat Time!

Sorry I've neglected to post for a while but I'm back to work, and work it is; physical "digging in the dirt" and "hauling heavy things around" type work. Not only at my job but in my own yard as well! Busy time of year here in Alaska and the nice weather has certainly put the pressure on to be productive and get everything looking lovely.

So finally pulled the latest photos

off the camera and here are the cutest of the kitty photos.

Jimbo has adopted one of my terra cotta planters as his "nappy spot". Hmmm, wonder if he'll still be trying to nap there once I put plants in the pot? I sure hope not, but I have a feeling that he's still going to have his naps in this pot, plants or not.

Here's Hemingway, in another one of my planters. He jumps on the trash can and then onto this cedar planter that I have bolted onto the side of the shed. He too will have to curtail his activity in this planter once I plant things in here. Although, I seriously doubt that a few little green things will stop him from sitting here. After all, he has a great vantage point for hunting mice!

BELOW: Funny Hemingway, caught in mid-yawn.

So that's it for now, I hope to post at least once weekly but we'll see how energetic I remain this summer! It's been so beautiful here this spring. We've more than made up for the soggy summer of 2008 by having twice as many sunny days within a two week period than we had from June-August of last year! So, don't hate me for not blogging!