March Madness

After what seemed like an especially long and snowy winter, spring suddenly sprung up last week like a flashing neon arrow in the dark, pointing you off the freeway for a midnight grub stop.  If 75 degrees and bright hot sun don’t get your attention in mid-March, I don’t know what will.  So I quickly scrambled out from behind the computer, where I’d spent winter days emailing clients and placing orders for farm supplies and pretty design do-dads, and got myself into the flower fields again.   It’s a strange double life I lead at the moment…case and point: yesterday I was in the field, ankle deep with my muck boots in mud, weeding the larkspur bed one hour and then the next I was hurriedly scrubbing the dirt from my nails and putting on a dress and fashionable riding boots for a meeting with a wedding client.  Spring is definitely a bit nutty around here… 

There’s so many signs of growth in the fields, albeit some are tiny and require a keen eye to see.  Others are pretty blatant, like the Allium and Narcissus literally growing before your eyes, at least 2 inches in a day!  The Baptisia are just starting to put out tiny shoots at soil level.  The Abelia and Hellebore are in full bloom!  The Larkspur seed sown last fall has begun to germinate and put out tiny frilly leaves among the mat of weeds that seem to always have the upper hand.  The Aquilegia and Dicentra are leafing out nicely, so fresh and green.  The Ranunculus are doing great under the low tunnels.  The Anemones are sprouted but I fear it may be getting too warm for these cold weather lovers already.  I pruned back the Hydrangea paniculata bushes yesterday and noticed they’re already pushing out tiny leaf buds.   Freshly sown sweet peas should send up tender shoots in a few weeks.  Most of the perennials in the field are showing some green again, though the deer are sampling from them, and I need to get the fencing fortified pronto. 

In the greenhouse, so many seeds have been sown, it’s hard to keep track.  Most are doing well, but there seems to be some problem with the sweet williams.  The stems are very weak, perhaps from the light levels being a bit low when they were germinating.   The summer crops, the real heat lovers like zinnias and coxcomb, will be sown soon.  Tomorrow the order of lisianthus plugs arrives…all 1050 of them!  They’ll need to be quickly potted up from their tiny cell trays to 72 trays so their roots have room to expand.  I think there won’t be much empty space left in the greenhouse after that, but I’ll need to make some room for the antique mum cuttings and the dahlia cuttings coming in April. 

There are two new fields (totaling 1.35 acres) that need plowing, tilling, and bed building done.  Fencing needs to go up around one of those new fields, and the old fence around the existing fields (in the form of burlap to help reduce wind) is currently being replaced. Not an easy chore, let me tell you.  Whew, I’m getting tired just re-capping all of this!  Good thing I have help this season with my new part-time partner-in-crime, Bench!   Aren’t we adorable? 

And to top the March madness off, next weekend is the first Love ‘n Fresh wedding of the season!  I’m super excited to be designing soft romantic spring blooms in delicious shades of white and pink for Laura and Lee at the Down Town Club in Philadelphia.  Plenty of pictures and details to come, I promise…eventually…after I get a few other things done first…