daffodils

Our first daffodils are in bloom! Actually they opened up last week, but today was the first day I was home to take a photo while the sun was out.

These aren't the ones we planted last year; those are coming up but not blooming yet. These are a few that have been there since we moved in. They're right under the exhaust vent for the water heater. I was worried that the exhaust would give off fumes that would hurt plants, but it seems like maybe the warm air encouraged the daffodils to bloom early. I'm going to plant a bay leaf right by that vent in spring and see how it does.

Speaking of spring, some more seeds arrived today! The dwarf sunflowers and the tall zinnias. Which makes me all the more anxious to get that bed ready in the side yard. I got another hour's work done on it today. The bad news is, I found another slab of concrete. That makes three intact slabs, one missing, and one partly broken. Each one looks to be 2×6', which makes the whole septic tank 6×10'. I wonder how deep it is? I guess we'll find out soon enough.

The good news is, I got the new slab almost completely uncovered in an hour. The clay was almost perfect today: still damp enough to break up easily, but not wet enough to be quite so heavy. While I was dumping soil I saw the little girl next door. She asked me what I was doing, and I told her I was moving dirt. We agreed that moving dirt was hard work. I told her I was using the dirt to fill in holes the dogs had made. She told me I should save some dirt in case the dog had a bone to hide and dug another hole. I thought that was pretty clever!