Celebrating May and Art Tour!

It’s a rainy May Day, but after living through three major droughts in North Dakota, I've come to relish rainy days! And as I type this, I'm looking over our half-done garden project in the backyard. For the past week, we’ve been working on building a new garden - a place for me to transplant all the expanding perennial plants and grow tomatoes! Our soil has been classified as “dead” by area lawn pros, so over the past five years we've brought in lots and lots of dirt, manure and peat. It seems to be an annual challenge, but signs of earthworms and thriving plants give me hope! So even in this half-finished stage with the fruit trees mulched, my Dad’s garden bench in place under the big apple tree and of course, waiting on more dirt, it looks lovely. 

And Paul learned early in our relationship that it’s a dangerous thing to leave me - especially this time of year - unsupervised in garden centers! 😊 Our living room has five large windows on the east side, and over the past week or two, I’ve been accumulating plants. Four favorite roses, Larkspur, 2 new Clematis (pronounced clem'-a-tis in Downton Abbey land!) and Blue Queen Meadow Sage sit in pots ready to go out as soon as the weather warms up. 

And it’s a busy time of painting! The Earth Arts Spring Tour is May 3-5 at the Lamar Community Center in St. Croix, Falls. So in addition to the “greenhouse” plants in the living room, there are bins of paintings and booth set-up stuff lined up and ready to go! Download the Art Tour Brochure and Map here. 

This week’s painting, Sit a Spell! 11” x 15” on 300 lb. watercolor paper, seems to invite the visitor to have a seat, relax and take in the beauty of a light-filled day.