Spring hopes eternal

This little phrase seems to work any way you say it.  Perhaps that is the point of the phrase.
3 nights ago, as I walked into the house after closing up the goats, chickens, ducks and Luke the Goose, I heard the rumble of spring from our back pasture. Say what?  We have this winter creek that runs the perimeter of our property and every spring, early in the spring season, the frogs ribbet by the thousands. They start just as it turns dark. Not dusk, not twilight, black dark. It's like a switch, once it is completely black outside they start. First just a few,  then a few more, maybe the alto section starts warming up, then the baritones and basses and suddenly it's a whole  croaking symphony!  Every year I go out to the winter creek in search of the frogs. They'll be singing away, chattering about who knows what, me sneaking across my pasture, not wanting to disturb them, I get more than half way across and suddenly they stop. Just stop. Silence. All at once, all 500 of them.  It sounded like 500. 200 feet of winter creek, full of ribbeting frogs and in ten years I have NEVER seen one.  Not one.

It seems a little early for frogs. I just planted the last of my bulbs. It is still January, isn't it? Kinda hard to tell when it is grey, gray, cloudy and it might rain. MIGHT?
On the other hand, Jen and I went out to the greenhouse  on January 6 and planted seeds on heat under lights.  Pea shoots, mache, wrinkled crinkled cress, lettuce, They all came up. This will be our 11th year growing and it is still magic to see the first little sprig of growth poking out of the soil.
Like many of us, I am now surrounded by seed catalogs, being seduced by the photos, the descriptions and my imagination. My imagination does not sleep, does not get a sore back and has ample room for every single vegetable, fruit and flower I want to grow.

Next email form me will be about this years'  Pay It Foward Farm Bucks Program (PIFFBP).  I am very happy to be offering a few delicious incentives for you to ponder as you begin imagining your garden and your spring/summer meals.

For now in the farm stand there is yogurt and cheese and some twig arrangements that remind me that  spring does hope eternal. The pussy willows are out and I gathered them with some red, yellow dogwoods and some curly willow. They look very happy and should hold up waiting for the daffodils to join them in a few more weeks.

Warm, wet winter wishes,
Karen