Welcoming the First Day of Spring

Often I share images of blooms from my yard to welcome in the first day of spring. This year my fresh blooms are in the form of a new pair of floral earrings I created.

I recently acquired a strand of carved jade flowers. When I was storing my new supplies this strand and the spring-like weather we were having called me to create something using the flower beads. I pulled out several other strands of jade to see what I wanted to pair with the carved flowers to make a pair of earrings. I settled on using a head pin with a ball end on the open side of the carved flowers and a darker green jade sphere on the stem side. For some reason the spherical beads made a more pleasing design than the cylindrical ones that mimicked a stem better.

Now that we have reached the spring equinox marking the first day of spring, we begin to enjoy more light than darkness from now through the fall equinox.

As the daylight portion of your days lengthens, I hope the weather is warming where you are and that flowers and trees are budding out. Sunshine, flowers and spring green everywhere is a great tonic after a very gray winter.

First Day of Spring 2018

A couple of hours ago, it officially became spring here in North Texas. Except for the brisk north wind, it is easy to concur that spring has arrived. Today we have sunny blue skies. My early spring blooming bulbs are done blooming and now my azaleas, "Candy Stripe" creeping phlox and redbuds are in full bloom. My bluebonnets and wisteria are beginning to show some color too on this First Day of Spring for 2018.

It is time to put tomato and pepper plants out in your vegetable garden and you can still plant some annuals for spring color. The warm season annuals are likely a few weeks away from being in your local nursery. Pull out any winter weeds in your garden beds before they reseed and replenish mulch as needed. I little maintenance gardening now will provide a great backdrop for the continued unfolding of blooms throughout the year.

Happy gardening. Happy Spring!

Spring is in the Air

The spring equinox is one of my favorite days of the year. According to the calendar, we can officially say we are through with winter and can welcome in springtime. Unfortunately Mother Nature does not always follow the calendar. In North Texas it feels a bit like we jumped straight from winter to summer with a forecast high today of almost 90 degrees. Signs of spring have been around here for a few weeks already, from spring blooming bulbs to flowering trees and the pretty green of new leaves on trees that don't put out a flush of flowers. I have been watching birds gather nesting material. I saw a crow this past weekend flying with a big twig in its beak and the blue jays have been gathering up fallen bald cypress leaves.

Along with the signs of spring outside, it is almost time for a favorite indoor spring event, Spring Gallery Night. Join the Texas Pottery and Sculpture Guild (TPSG) for their 2017 Spring Gallery Night Sale at the Fort Worth Community Arts Center. The sale begins Saturday morning, March 25 at 10 am and runs until 9 pm that evening. The guild has invited a few non-pottery artists to join them and I will be one of them. Many of my photographic art pieces are spring themed. Watching this YouTube video showing examples of artists work will give you an idea of what works you can expect to find.

Typical Gallery Night crowds are fairly large, so if you want to avoid the crush come early to do your shopping. The Fort Worth Community Art Center is located at 1300 Gendy, Fort Worth TX, 76107 across Lancaster from the Amon Carter Museum.

Happy First Day of Spring 2015

My pear tree is in full bloom and looks like spring. It is right on time considering spring officially begins this evening, March 20, at 5:45 CDT. However, it has been the bulbs in my garden this year that have been giving me hope that spring really would be coming soon even when winter hung around long after it had worn out its welcome.

It started with two varieties of paperwhites followed by February Gold and 4 other varieties of daffodils and jonquils. My favorite spring bulb growing up was crocus. They often bravely poked up their pretty little flowers through the snow. I have not had luck getting them to repeat in North TX but I do have some hyacinths that I planted in a micro climate that they are happy with and have just begun to bloom once again this year.

If you got snow today on your first day of spring, may it melt soon and may you see signs of impending spring in your area. If you already have spring blooming bulbs popping up, you might want to run out to the nursery for some spring flowering annual companions to plant near by. Later as the foliage of the bulbs ripens and dies back, the annuals will have gotten larger and begun flowering to help disguise the retreating bulb foliage. By allowing the foliage to fully ripen and not cutting it back prematurely, you will help your bulbs store the needed energy to produce a good flush of flowers next spring too.