Wonderful weekend - lots of time spent with my dear Twinerik - some walking, lots of talking, laughing, hugging, attacking each other with wadded-up paper towel balls, and collapsing on the floor in hysterics. I may not have gotten enough work done, but all I can do is repeat - wonderful weekend!

Spring has sprung, and already the initial flush of blooms is fading, making way for the roses, peonies, and iris waiting in the wings.

I know it is a cliche, but I really do love this time of year. I never fail to be awe-struck by the beauty that surrounds us. Not the distant, melodramatic beauty of the Grand Canyon or Yosemite or Niagara Falls, but the unearthly beauty of a spray of roses or a lush peony right in one's own backyard. It is almost inconceivable.

My first rose bloom popped open the weekend of May 9; my old traditional red Blaze climber. Just in time to cheer me up and get me over the loss of my weeping wisterias and fragrant lilacs, which are drooping and losing color as well as petals.

This is the time of year when I hatch extravagant fantasies about what I would like to do in my bakckyard, which is, by the way, quite compact (read "tiny"). Build a very small house nestled in the roots of my fragrant honeysuckle, and people it with vintage ceramic gnome figures. Build a small castle turret out of stone with spaces to look out from the inside and enough room for a chair and a ladder to the top. Build a pergola for climbing roses and wisteria. Build a treehouse (note to self: small problem - no trees in backyard). Actually, what I need to do is tidy up, weed, prune, and water, but those are so humdrum and tedious . . .