Congratulations, Northern Hemisphere! We made it through winter! It was a long, hard slog, but we did it.

We still have a stubborn snow pile that, while it shrinks daily, will probably be here for a couple more weeks. After the last of The Snows I bet Jesse that the plow pile would probably be there until May. It looks like I’m going to be proven correct, though I now wish we’d actually wagered something on the claim.

I’m busy getting ready for the next show: Punkcake is Springing Up Again! It’s in Worcester, MA on Saturday, April 25th. I hope you local folks can make it out, because it looks like it’s going to be a super fun day. There will be music and all sorts of vendors, and while it’s being held at a pub, it’s an all-ages affair. I am really looking forward to it!

In the meantime, here are some spring-time photos:

The first of the crocuses emerged on April 6th.

It was soon followed by several more of its friends. Here they are nine days later as my subjects while I play around with depth and focus on my new camera.

Our Hyacinth (said like Daisy and Rose from “Keeping up Appearances”) opened yesterday and the warm sun really brought out the fragrance.

I put out more of the garden ornaments. I try to not go too Pinterest-mad, but I had to hang out an old teapot. I’m not sure what to plant in it yet, but I’m sure it’ll be Pinterest-worthy.

I like gnomes. A lot. I’ll save you from a photographic tour of my gnome collection, but here’s one of my newer ones. My mother’s an enabler and she gave me a set of solar gnome lights last summer.

The veggie garden is coming together slowly. I planted a batch of seeds in these peat pods, but I left the heating pad plugged in on a sunny day and I cooked them. I started a new batch and am trying to not kill those. If all goes well, I’ll have two kinds of tomatoes, cucumber, melon, lettuce, and cabbage. The beets and carrots and herbs are all getting direct seeded outside, but probably not until late May.

I planted a few kinds of peas in the one raised bed I’ve cleaned up thus far (I added some not-quite-ripe compost, hence the egg shell fragments everywhere). We need to make a cover in case I started them too early, and we usually have potential for frost through mid-May. The cabbages and lettuce will be going in next as soon as they’re ready.

And because ending this with a picture of dirt is a little boring, here’s one of the faded, plastic whirlygigs stuck in the fence surrounding the veggie garden. Happy Spring, everybody!