Dear Carol and Mary Ann, It was nice reading your letters last week and seeing that both of you are now, in spite of the weather, getting some garden projects done.  I'm surprised that Mary Ann seems to have the harshest climate when hers is a hardiness zone between mine and Carol's.  It must be that mountain range surrounding her property. I think I made some progress this week on the entire garden including the flowers and the vegetables.  Spring is such a blur with all the clearing, planting and feeding that I forget.  Bear and I sowed some seeds for beets, lettuce, snap peas and spinach.  She is a great help in the garden, making tags and sowing seeds while I pull more Bermuda grass and get the beds ready for her skillful hands. I still have one type of lettuce coming in the mail and another bag of...

This morning, a Twitter conversation I had with Margaret from A Way to Garden got me thinking.  She'd woken very early (3:50 a.m.) because work  streamed through her consciousness.  I wonder if that work entailed garden design ideas.  I have this same problem before bud break.  I'm so excited about all of the garden possibilities that (in my case) I lie awake at night.  When I finally do fall asleep, sugarplums don't dance through my head.  Plants and hardscape do. However, once things begin growing, and the actual labor starts, I have no trouble with sleep.  I nearly kill myself outside trying to get everything done at once.  I should take the advice from Dena, the Nashville Gardening Examiner and from Dan at Clearwater Landscapes.  Use the right tools and take it slow.  These days, I invest in great tools.  I did learn that lesson, but I just-can't-seem-to-slow-down. The sun...

Last week, Mary Ann in Idaho was still covered in snow, and Carol in Indiana felt like spring had switched into the "on" position.  I was babying my pepper, eggplant and tomato seedlings. For those of you just tuning in, this is our series of letters profiling our vegetable gardens (nearly 1,000 miles apart) in three different climate zones.  Please feel free to join in with your own garden group, and, if you do, tell us in a comment below. Dear Carol and Mary Ann, What a week Oklahoma had!  After our soaring temps came rain, sleet and even snow.  Above is the picture to prove it.  We get these freak March snowstorms occasionally.  Yesterday, the weather finally settled, and now, we're in a warm pattern.  It will make the seeds jump out of the soil I'm sure. The indoor babies are growing ever taller, and on warm days, like...

With the cold weather behind us (at least for present), the entire garden responded with joy to last week's rain and snow.  Peach trees which were in bud are now flaunting their colors, and it appears I'll be, once again, fighting the deer for peaches this summer.  The apple trees remain wary; their branches still appear dead and lifeless. Beauty is popping up everywhere.  The Roman blue Hyacinths I planted last fall are blooming, and Scott  from Old House Gardens was right.  They are more airy than traditional Hyacinths.  Don't you love that blue perfection?  Now, we'll see if they truly multiply. The dwarf flowering almond I planted last year is blooming, but the cold snap we had killed off some of its rosey pink blooms.  While looking at it, I noticed that one of the clematis had heaved itself up out of the soil.  I smooshed it back in,...