Welcome Spring

This has to be my favorite time of the year. The yard is wonderful. The beavertail cactus are blooming, there is nothing like those magenta flowers. All sorts of plants are vigorously pushing blossoms, the dissodia is rampant through the yard. Those are those small yellow mounds. It is commonly called dogweed, I have no clue why.


The lovely purple shrub is called desert sage. Sages (salvias) are one of the largest groups of plants. Their main characteristic is their fragrant foliage. You tear off a leaf and crush it to see if it has an odor. There are another group of shrubs called Texas Rangers that some people call sage but they really aren't.

These lovely small flowers greet visitors near my front door, they are angelita daisies and freesias. The freesias have a fragrance that compliments the purple stock on the other side of the walkway to the front door. A few years ago I went to Death Valley and saw fields of spring flowers that were purple, yellow and white. They say Mother Nature is the best designer and that combination of colors is prominent in my garden's color scheme.


I really like native plants in my landscape. The grasses are so graceful blowing in the wind, this is purple three awn grass. Looks beautiful but very invasive. I'm constantly hoeing up volunteer plants. Thats what you get when you use native plants, some are more opportunistic than other. Last but not least is one of our native penstemons, Eatons or firecracker penstemon. It's been a good spring here in the desert.

Almost Done

We've had a big push on to finish our remodeling. Although we're not quite through, I wanted you to see our fireplace. I think it exceeds my expectations for that part of the project. This isn't the best picture and we're going to paint the walls a light gold but you get the idea. The back wall is painting and you can see it's a soft color.

We celebrated Passover on Monday and my house needed to be in order. I know I should have cancelled but I love this holiday. There were 12 of us including 3 of our grandchildren from New York. We only get to see them a couple of times a year so it's always special.

Our yard is wonderful this spring. We've had weather in the 80's and are already swimming. My next post will be about the garden.