January used to mean dark cold days full of ice and snow. After a few seasons here I don't dread it so much. This Christmas was the first we needed to use air conditioning as it was an astonishing 76 degrees and sunny.
Below is our darling grand Lea who has sparkles in her eyes this holiday season. Her Irish grandparents are visiting from Cork and she is super excited.
We've had a very rainy warm December and now that January is here I expect that will soon stop and the real winter will set it . The warmth has caused my 'Peggy Clarke ' Korean apricot to bloom as well as the daffodils .
I planted two new broadleaf evergreens - Korean 'Chindo ' viburnum and Cleyera, both reputed to be "deer resistant ." Although I usually spray all newly planted material the constant rain prevented me from doing so. Yesterday I noticed that the Cleyera had been stripped of all its leaves.
With the torrential rains came a lot of flooding with creeks and rivers overflowing their banks. I am still in the process of amending my soil and filling in low areas to prevent runoff. My house is at the bottom of a hill and all the neighbors runoff comes into my yard. He has dug a trench and created a berm along the property line between us and this has helped a lot but there's still much to be done on our landscape to remedy this problem.
With the New Year comes many plans for the garden. I will bring in lots of compost and local top soil to continue to improve the hard rocky clay we have and thereby improve its ability to absorb rain. I am beginning to see some small improvements on what I've done so far in this regard.
I will also continue to plant an underlayment of shrubs, perennials and bulbs in the woodland garden and add more perennials to the boulder and roadside garden.
I am very pleased with the roadside garden and how it looked good from Spring up to winter.
An amazing amount of blooms were present right up until the 2nd freeze in December.
While the season slows to a crawl I am enjoying feeding the birds and providing them with water. It's fun to watch the woodpeckers, cardinals and Bluejays .
Happy New Year to everyone . Hope your dreams and wishes come true.
