Spring

Flowers on the local nature trail - only the true adventurers (or rude local teens) apparently try to take this trail. The trail starts at a park and immediately plunges under the pylons of a local road. The graffiti, trash and generally menacing atmosphere do not impress. If you persevere and continue on, there is a nice unpaved trail that runs through the woods and along a creek.

My hubby and I keep promising ourselves that we'll take trash bags next time and try to pick up some of the beer cans and bottles, cigarette packages and general trash next time we go.

A close-up of a hollow tree on the same nature trail - it's still leafing up, even though a gnome could take up residence inside. Yes, the hole goes all the way through.

A volunteer vine in the back yard. It doesn't do much but does spit out a few flowers in the spring.
A jasmine vine in the backyard - we planted it years ago but thought it had died. It came back and vined madly, but has only this year decided to bloom. This is the side over the fence - on the other side, it's covered in blooms. The yellow is so intense that my camera doesn't seem to handle it well.


Broken mosaic - I painstakingly laid this 5 or 6 years ago (my one and only mosaic project). A few rains and hard freezes later and the whole thing is just lying there - it has popped up from the concrete base. Might as well just leave it until it crumbles - I don't see myself trying to repair it.

The ubiquitous Carolina jasmine. A 'must have' in many local gardens. Covered in blooms in the spring and a darn nuisance the rest of the time.

Some people have garden gnomes - I have a garden gargoyle. He guards the garden for me, although I made the mistake of having him on a tree at first. The squirrels were chewing on him (how rude!) so he got moved to the back wall. I brought him back from a visit to the UK.

Wait a minute! I've got garden gnomes, too! Almost forgot about them... I'll try to get of picture of them later.