The Groundhog Day Blizzard

February 1, 2011, a Tuesday night, proved to be a testament to the power of prayer and a mouth that should have been washed out with soap. We were expecting to get hit with what the meteorologists were calling blizzard conditions starting at around 3:00 p.m. CST. I put my feelers out to my husband (at the farm) and to my sister in Dodgeville that once they saw the snow start to come down, they should call or email me right away because at that point I would head for the hills. My sister Kristi emailed me around 3:30 to say it had just started snowing in Dodgeville. Bob waited until 3:45 to say it has started, so you better head home now. He said the snow wasn’t coming down that hard, it was just that the wind was picking up and getting stronger by the moment.

So by the time I finished up a few things at the office, I finally headed out the door about 4:30. Yep, should have probably gotten on the road a little sooner, but whether I am trying to get out the door in the morning to head to work, or get out the door at night from work to head home, I am always trying to get one more thing done. Hence, the case again. The winds almost seemed like they were whipping in from the East (I suppose more of a Northeasterly wind) because everything was drifting on the east side of the road. The whiteout conditions were the worst. I couldn’t see anything except for a few feet in front of me; okay, maybe more like yards, but seemed like feet! I had my headset on and, as usual, was talking to him all the way home. My end of the conversation was mostly limited to two or three word expletives like “Holy Sh_t” or “Oh My God” because each mile down the road seemed to bring a new adventure. These are the types of adventures I don’t really care for.

My 35-mile ride home seemed to take forever. What normally would have taken me 45 minutes turned into around two hours. Not your scenic Sunday drive, that’s for sure! In essence, if I really want to give myself a little credit, I would say that I did leave just in time. Some of the roads were starting to plug up from the drifts across the road. And since my trusty four-wheel drive Durango is no longer in service, my front-wheel drive Grand Prix had to learn to buck a few drifts she wished she hadn’t seen or will ever see again. My biggest fears along the way were meeting cars. Those that I would meet would be heading North, as I was heading South. Their lane was the one that was completely drifted in, heading into my lane. When the whiteout conditions were happening, the approaching car couldn’t see me and if they were trying to avoid the drifts in their lane and were driving in mine, it does not bode well for them or me. Luckily, once I got off the four-lane highway and was on the two-lane roads, I met very few cars; only two, in fact.

Once I got into town, I quickly ran into the store to pick up a few extra staples that I thought I might be running low on because we had already planned that I wouldn’t be at work the next day. I knew that the last four miles out to the farm might prove to be the worst, but heck at least I had milk with me! I can say for certainty, though, that once I got to my driveway – and even though Bob hadn’t plowed it for me yet – it was a sight I had been looking for in the past two hours and could have gotten out and kissed the ground underneath, except I would have had to dig down quite a bit to find it. The milk truck had just pulled in so I did have some tracks to follow. When I pulled up to the house, Bob was just getting ready to head down the driveway to plow for me, just a tad too late, but that’s okay as long as I had the milk truck tracks.

The name for our little snowfall – The Groundhog Day Blizzard. The snow continued into the night and got worse with high winds meddling a little, too. I haven’t seen snow and blizzards like this since I was a kid. At the farm we received about eight inches of snow Tuesday. Then Tuesday night into Wednesday, we got socked with 18 inches more. We now have mounds, or more appropriately, hills of snow piled higher than our tractor with the cab on it. Now these were the types of snow hills we liked to play on when we were kids. This snow has stuck with us for a couple weeks with below zero temps and below zero wind chills. (The picture above is of the farm after we started digging out on Groundhog Day).

It has definitely been a rough Winter, but the one good thing is that Jimmy The Groundhog didn’t see his shadow. Heck, for that matter, Jimmy probably couldn’t get out of his hole in the ground. This means, of course, that we will have an early Spring. Now I don’t care if Jimmy’s prediction percentage is good, bad or in between. When you have had a long, rough Winter, any little slip of hope that Spring will be just right around the corner is good enough for me. So if Jimmy wanted to come out of his hole, cross his fingers behind his back and tell me that Spring is on the doorstep, I’m a believer. Hope is one thing that no person (or animal) should take away from another. Just look what Jimmy has done for the economy – now that I think Spring is coming rapidly, I’ve been busy ordering plants. I’ve made new plans for what I am going to do outside in the yard. See, Jimmy has got the rhythm of what the country really needs. Hope!

Now here we are the day after Valentine’s Day, and I am happy as a lark. The weather is in the 40's (we even had highs in the 50's on Sunday), it is staying light longer at night (my car lights don’t even come on now until I am a couple miles from work) and the Winter Blues are starting to melt away. Speaking of melting away, even this huge dump of snow is melting away. The snow banks along the way home, where there was sometimes only one lane to drive in, are now to the point where you can actually meet a car and not have to worry about who is going to end up in the snowbank.

The birds are out and about, too; some never having left this Winter – which is a reminder that I need to get out to check my bird feeders. The birds have made quite an impact on what I had put out there so far this year, so I need to try to stay ahead of them. After all, if they wanted to suffer through Old Man Winter’s bad mood swings with me, I had better give them a good feast as a reward.

Yes, I’m looking forward to Spring, and it can’t come soon enough. And, if Mother Nature and Old Man Winter are still crotchety and want to throw one or two more snowfalls at me, I can suffer through it, too, just like the birds have. After all, hope has different names like the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus, and in the dead of Winter, hope is called Jimmy The Groundhog.

Spring May Not Yet Have Sprung But I'm Preparing For It

Why does it seem like when life is busy, it gets even busier? Or it's similar to when you put a little on your plate, then it looks real good, you get hungrier and pile more on. Some people are like that, I am one. I’ve always liked staying busy and that will probably never change. Hence, I haven’t been able to write for a few days. But, I’m back.

Spring is coming. I can feel it. I’m making it come. I’ve order perennials and at the first signs that Spring may be coming – not matter how far off – I’m ordering plants. I placed an order the other day for some two-for-one deals. I like these and am always choosing when and what I order by what is on sale. If it is something I want and it doesn’t go on sale, then I will finally order it before it is too late and may go out of stock. But this order consisted of 2-for-1's or buy 3 get 3. I usually always order my plants in three’s anyway. If you are going to add a splash here or there, it needs to make a statement. Threes make a statement and adds a sense of balance. If they are smaller plants, I’ll do six.
　
My order the other day consisted of Mixed Dutch Iris, Cinnamon Ferns, Jacob’s Ladder, Toad Lily Mix, Cloth of Gold, Maiden Pinks, Red Rocket Carnations, Corina Lilies and a double Red Perennial Garden Collection. These are all fill-ins, which means they are going to fill-in spots in some of my other garden beds where I need a color of this or a color of that, or I’ve got a bare spot. As for the Red Perennial Garden Collection, I haven’t got a spot picked out for that yet, but don’t worry – I’ll find it. I have ideas but I need to wait until I can walk around the yard some to get the right spot. The problem is when Bob sees me walking around the yard with a tape measure and old garden hoses (I keep these and use them to lay out garden plots which makes it easy to visualize them) – he starts thinking that maybe it is time to pack his suitcase. Just kidding, of course, because he’ll stand in the window and watch for a few moments, then come out and want to know what I am up to and what kind of work that means for him. This is my subtle approach to telling him, hey, Honey, I’m planting some more flower beds.
　
My next order is waiting for me to say go. It's in my "shopping cart" and is patiently sitting there, pleading for me to hit the "checkout" button. This order consists of Blue Bird Rose of Sharon, Freedom Rose of Sharon, Blue Fringe Daisies, Blue Fusion Everblooming Hardy Geraniums, Chinese Lanterns, Clara Curtis Daisies, Diamond Grass, Double-Decker Coneflower, Fiesta Daisies, Little Business Daylily, Maximilian Sunflower, Northern Lights Grass, Purple Love Grass, Red Hot Poker and Super Aster Daisies. Some of these are fill-ins but some are replacements for along the front of the house. I’m pulling out a bed that I have had for about ten years that I am just not happy with. It is mostly greens and it definitely needs color. So I’ve got some digging out and replanting to do. Plus I also want to do some landscape blocks along this area.
　
My plans last year were to do some landscape blocks around some of my beds. I got carried away with quite a "few" new, big flower beds, so I put that on the back burner. It is now pushed to the front. But we are also putting out bids right now for a new roof on the house and the barn and I know that will cause some chaos in the yard whenever the roofers come to do the house, so I am going to have to time this perfectly. I’ve got to draw up some plans for the front because it will have to also incorporate my 50th birthday present from my sons. They gave me a sentimental gift which to some may seem foolish or of no consequence but to me it meant a lot. It was the old dinner bell from my family farm. The farm was in our family for well over a century. When my dad’s health deteriorated, my parents decided to sell the farm and one of the things that got sold was the old dinner bell. A cousin of mine bought it and he planned to keep it in his family thinking it was a family heirloom but then realized it was the wrong side of his family. With his health deteriorating and knowing that I wanted it, he decided he would sell it back. I hadn’t gotten around to getting it and my boys jumped on the chance to get something that really meant a lot to me – especially for my 50th birthday. (I now realize that the bell has a date on it of 1869). With that said, Bob was supposed to do something with it – as in make a stand where it could be mounted outside. That hasn’t happened yet – so I’ll have to remind him it is now on his Spring project list. I’m sure he will quickly try to forget it. It’s funny how swiftly that "selective Alzheimer’s" comes and goes.

The Spring of Your Life

Living in Wisconsin and when you are in the dead of Winter, you yearn for any little speck of something that indicates Spring is on its way. Yesterday, Jimmy The Groundhog didn’t see his shadow. We are now expecting an early Spring. Yippee, Skippee!! The alternative, which Punxsutawney Phil in Pennsylvania experienced, is six more weeks of Winter. By most calculations, we will more than likely have six more weeks of Winter. But there is hope. Jimmy gave us hope.

For the last few weeks I have been dealing with an elderly aunt who has been hospitalized. She is a spit fire, is 86 but not a normal 86. Until before Xmas, she was still mowing her 3 acres of lawn, shoveling snow, snowblowing, climbing ladders – all the things we tell her she shouldn’t be doing, but she still does. She has just experienced a new Spring in her life and she doesn’t want to head into Winter. After 60+ years, she has reunited with her high school sweetheart. They have both lost their spouses after years of fulfilling marriages. He retired out West but came back to look up an old love; to share some coffee, some conversation. A spark reignited and they had entered a new phase in their life. So he has helped her with tending to her home, leaving the warm weather for the cold. They are the version of an older flower bulb that fights every year to come back bigger, stronger, more beautiful. But now they have a hard time to get through because they both want to get onto the Summer of their lives – just a second time around.

Some cousins of mine and I are looking for our own little sparks of Spring. With sharing the cold days of the Minnesota and Wisconsin Winters, we are searching our recently received gardening magazines in search of the sunshine that comes with planting the seeds and watching them grow. One recently helped add to my gardening addiction by pointing out a company that I had not dealt with yet. It is van Bourgondien and I am now simply in love with this company. The one daylily in particular my cousin Carol mentioned is a reblooming daylily called "Exploded Pumpkin." Now, I love lilies of all sorts so this started to help warm me up. I ordered a book from this company (and a few others) and I could feel Spring thriving in my veins.

We all need something that helps spark the warmth, that brings the sun shining in. Mine started the minute I ordered plants for spring planting. I have some more garden beds in mind and every Spring I undertake a new one here or there. Last year I was too ambitious and planted five huge ones – a huge butterfly/hummingbird garden, a rose garden, a shade garden, a 3-season cutting garden and an endless bloom perennial garden. My husband dutifully dug some dirt up for me out of a composted area that we use for my flower beds and after quite a few skidloader buckets, I had my blank canvases to fill. I ordered plants, I planted, I mulched, I weeded. The first year the plants aren’t always as ambitious as the one who tends them so I have learned to be patient - to wait for the reward. They will come back – a little stronger, fuller, more beautiful than before.

This year, I plan to put in some more beds. I’m feeling renewed with the thoughts of Spring, because Jimmy said it is right around the corner. If my husband finds out what I am planning, I am sure he will start praying for a longer Winter.