As an end of the year gift one year, my students gave me a gift certificate from Headrick’s Nursery to purchase a tree. This is the second year the tree has been planted, but part of my Mother’s Day gift was to make a flower/herb ring at the base. We used reclaimed bricks from a building that was torn down in Mullinville and some of my new compost. I transplanted a plant from another location in my yard.

Unfortunately, right after it was planted, Blondie (the Wonder Dog) decided to take a walk and take in the new aromas from my exquisite compost.

We also filled the new vegetable bed with the new compost. I can hardly wait to start planting.

It ended not being as bad as we had anticipated, but our yard flooded a bit and we had small hail. Originally the weather report indicated that the hail would miss us, but we knew better than to not protect the plants.

Herbs

Not the clearest of photos, but you can see some of the small hail.

Looking south from the front of our house.

I thought this would show up better, but you can still see a bit of the hail, rain, and lightning.

This is after the storm had passed and headed toward Greensburg.

The other day while I was in the backyard, I had the bejeebers scared out of me by my first little toad of the season. I am not afraid of toads, but there was unexpected movement as I was walking down our “half-built” walkway and it not only startled me, but I was afraid I was about to step on it. Of course by now you know that I wanted to share a photo, but the little darling had disappeared by the time I returned with my camera.

Tonight, as the storms were about to arrive, DH and I were out covering my new plantings and the baby came back out…along with three other friends. They have all been hanging out in my rock pile. Who knew that I had inadvertently created a frog/toad habitat by stacking my stones? As soon as this weather clears out, I will have to make them an acceptable abode post haste. I am certain I have some broken pots that can be placed deeply into my herb garden for a cool, shady spot.