Garden Log, Dec. 25 2009

Now we are past the solstice, so the days will start to lengthen. Even so, the coldest days are ahead of us. Today is bright and sunny, frost on the ground, so a new banner is added showing the frost on the candytuft.


View of my home office, from outside. It's great having a green place, with flowers blooming, and where I can look out to the birds in the feeder.

The Rhode Island Reds ('Rhodies') are laying an egg each day. So are the Australorps, which are too shy to photograph, and the Leghorn. We've been giving away a lot of eggs. They are one of the few things from the garden now, so it's great to have a reminder that the yard can still be productive in the Winter.

The Leghorn, having a "private moment" laying her daily egg.

A "Street chicken" during the trip to China in October. I don't know why, I just thought it was fun to take a photo.




The frosted Candytuft. Low, low maintenance- haven't done a thing with it in 6 years.

Helleborus starting to push up flower buds. It's the small things that tell me life continues, and give hope for Spring.

I didn't know if the Lycoris radiata would even survive. Here are the small, striped strap-like leaves. The hard freeze didn't seem to hurt them at all. This is the first time growing this bulb, so I still don't know what to expect. They look rugged, there, still green and standing up in the frozen leaf mulch.

The pond pump is broken, so the top froze over. You can see the koi and comets swimming around under the ice.