Achoo

June 1st, 6:50 pm

Today I saw some pollen collected in a dent in our driveway. It looked like yellow powder. It came from the many maple trees surrounding our house.

I also saw some irises. They were white and purple, yellow, yellow and purple, and purple. They had streaked petals fanning out around them and some curled up in the middle. They were about one and a half feet tall.

Itchy itchy arrrrrrrgh

Those little bloodsucking monsters are back. I found a lot of mosquitoes in my backyard at around 6:00 today. These bloodthirsty beasts are about 3 mm long, with relatively long legs and a long thin spike on their head to suck blood. I couldn't get a picture though, because they fly too fast.

In addition, we planted baby onions with my dad in our neighbor's yard. They have a larger and sunnier yard that is better for gardening. The baby onions were about 3 cm long with the roots. The roots were white and the rest of the plant was green. They were very small and delicate.

Also, the neighbor's mint plants have leaves. They are spearmint plants. They vary from 6-12 inches tall. Their leaves are serrated (is that the right word to use?) and dark green. They have a strong minty odor and their surface isn't smooth. I brought about 4 home and put them into pots to keep for myself.

Those are all the signs of spring I saw.

Ps. camera battery died AGAIN! >:( pictures tomorrow...

Lilies, Rhododendrons, and a cut lawn.

A big sign of spring was when we first mowed the lawn. We did that yesterday at about 11 am. Now our lawn is about 2 inches high overall.

I also saw some daylilies that had opened early. They were bright orange. They had 5 triangular petals with dark streaks on the inside. The flowers' diameter was about 3 inches. They had long stems, about 9-11 inches long. We have more of these in our front yard too. By June most of them will probably be open.

The rhododendron bushes in my backyard have also opened their purplish-pink flowers. They have 5 petals. The flowers have darker streaks and spots on them. They are about 2 inches in diameter. They're a nice contrast to the dark green rhododendron leaves.

Additionally, this week it's been a lot warmer overall.

Azaleas and lilacs and bugs, oh my!

Yesterday around 3:00 in my front and back yard I observed that the azalea bushes had bloomed. On the pink bush in my backyard there were a lot of buds and one pink flower. It was light pink with a lot of petals and it had a round bowl shape.

The white azalea also has flowers. It's in better shape than the pink one and has lots of open flowers. Its flowers are similar to the pink ones, but they are bright white.

I noticed there that the mosquitos were back. The inchworms are also back. They melt my heart but I really hate them. They ate all the leaves off one of my favorite trees one year. The inchworms are about one and a half cm now. They're usually bright leaf green, with 4-6 legs. They're starting to invade my house now and I just found one hanging on the bookshelf. They're really irritating.

There are also ants. The big ones always get into my house.

Eurgh. :(

Finally, the lilacs have bloomed. They are lavender, with small 1 cm tall flowers. The flowers have four connected petals and come in big bunches on long, tall twigs of the bush. On the twigs below the flowers are scattered leaves.

Those are all the new things I saw yesterday.

Tulips galore

Today I saw the tulips in my front yard had bloomed. They were red, yellow, and purple. The purple were not totally bloomed. They were about a foot tall from the leaves to the tip of the flower. They were

closed and had a

teardrop shape. The leaves were about 7 or 7 and a half inches long and bright green.

Some of the tulips were streaked with red and orangy yellow and others were bright scarlet. The purple ones were a deep purple (the camera changed it a bit.) I also saw that some more apricot colored tulips had bloomed. Earlier they were yellow, but the new ones are more orange. Aren't they lovely :)

I also noticed that our white azalea bush is growing little flowers.

It's been raining a lot recently. Oh, well, you know what they say about April rain...

This was all observed about 6:30 pm on April 28 in my front and back yards.

Spring has definitely sprung :)

April 4, 2010 5:00 p.m My yard (Front and back)

Today I found a LOT of signs of spring. There were fully unfurled leaves on ALL the trees. The leaf I drew was about 4 square inches large.

It was a bright, light green color, with light veins on it. It had a few light red parts which were

turning green.

That's because maple leaves start red and turn green. It had one edge that was a bit reddish. It also had a few bite marks from the first inchworms.

God, I hate those worms. They almost killed the trees one year. Anyways, that leaf was similar to the thousands of other leaves on the trees in my

yard.

That leaf just sits there

Doing not one thing at all

Except being green.

I also found three tulips in my back garden! One was red, one was yellow, and one was a beautiful orange color. They were about 15 inches tall, and the red and yellow ones are not quite open yet. The orange one was streaked with red, yellow, and orange. It was mostly opened.

In addition, I also saw that the myrtle plants on the left and right edges of my yard had their pretty blue flowers bloomed. The flowers were about 4 square cm large.

They were a purplish-blue color. They had slightly rectangular petals and a hole with the pollen, etc.

I also found some white and violet violets in my yard.

In addition, I found some strange flower that was purplish-blue and had tiny round flowers coming out of the stem in a cone shape.

I found some unopened tulips in my front yard. At least, I think they were tulips.

Yay, tulips.

Finally, I saw that my whole yard was much greener!

Wowie...

There are a LOT of signs of spring around my house now. Today I observed the forsythia bush's flowers, some star-shaped blue and white flowers, pink hyacinths, pussy willows, and even an early daffodil!

The forsythia was in my front yard on the top left corner. It had many bright yellow flowers with four petals on its branches, but no leaves. The flowers were about 1 cm wide and 2 cm tall.

The star-shaped flowers are mystery flowers. There were light indigo, blue-and-white, and a few lavender clusters of flowers in my back yard. The flowers were about 1 square cm large and about 7 cm tall.

The hyacinths were a very pale pink, with 6 petals. The part closest to the stem was thin, then curved into 6 petals. They had a strong, sweet smell that was really good. They were about 2 cm tall and 1 cm wide. They were in my back garden.

The first fuzzes on the pussy willow have gone past the fuzzy part and more buds seem to be becoming fuzzy. The first ones are now about 3 cm tall and 1 cm wide, with little yellow things coming out of them, like a dandelion puff, but with flowers on the end. Are they flowers? do you know?

The daffodil is alone in the myrtle plants on the left side of my house. It is about 20 to 25 cm tall. The flower might be about 7 cm wide. The outer petals were pale yellow and there was a tube-shaped inner petal that was golden-yellow. I had to draw it from kind of far away because I couldn't get to it without squishing plants and invoking the wrath of my dad. He's into gardening and I don't think he'd like it if I prevented any more flowers from coming up.

I also saw a little chickadee land on the bird feeder really close to me. It looked right at me and it didn't fly away! It was really cute. It did its "chicka-dee-dee-dee" call and flew away. I couldn't draw it, though, because I didn't get a real good look at it.

Those are some of the many signs of spring I saw today around 6:30 pm at my house. By the way, happy Easter Mr. Williams!

Flowers!

Saturday was really nice. It was about 70 degrees and sunny. I went out of the house around 12pm and saw a bunch of flowers growing in my yard. I drew some of them, but not all. There were some spotted, bright yellow flowers, some purple and white crocuses, and some unidentified indigo flowers that hadn't opened yet.

Has spring sprung?

Today (3/8/10) was really warm, about 40-50 degrees. We all went outside after lunch for the first time since winter! I only needed a light jacket. I wore a t-shirt as well. Also, the buds on my pussy willow have some of the fuzzy bit sticking out. Unfortunately, I couldn't get very good pictures, because of the flash on the camera. I'll do a sketch tomorrow and put it on the blog.

Snowdrop!

Around 7:20 am last Monday, I walked out of my house and saw that there was a snowdrop in my garden. The snowdrop was a small white flower with a kind of a teardrop shape and long thin leaves, in a light green color. The flower, which wasn't open, was about a centimeter and a half tall, and a centimeter wide. It was under the rhododendron bush in my back yard. This spot is ideal for the snowdrop, which has been coming back up every spring for years, because it receives a lot of light. It gets direct light from the sun shining into he garden which isn't shaded by any trees, and it gets reflected light from the house in front of it. (My house reflects light because it is whitish-gray.) It was surprising to see a flower so early in spring, when spring isn't even official! Here is my sketch of the snowdrop, with the bush in the background.