afternoon at home

Afternoons at home are a real treat that I don't often get to enjoy. Today I am getting ready to go to Lincoln for my annual teaching adventure. This time last year Mo and I were heading out with the baby MoHo for our first cross country trip. This year, I am flying instead. My iris finally opened. Last year they opened as I left and by the time I returned they were finished. I am watching the dark purple ones on the other side of the driveway. so far, maybe half an inch of purple is showing. will I see them before Monday when I leave? Will they still be blooming when I return mid May? I wanted to capture the poppies as well this afternoon. They are so incredibly brilliant, blooming all over the hillsides, and right here along my pathway on the east side of the house.







Of course, I can never resist the hostas. I looked back over my photos, and they are like pictures of my children, every year, the same ones, incredibly photogenic children at that! The big one in the pot on the front porch has a history. She is called "Great Expectations" I saw this hosta for the first time in 2002 before I left Spokane at my favorite perennial nursery there. They had more than 300 varities of hostas, and this one was growing in a great old Italian urn under the shade house. It was so incredibly magnificent, and I had never seen hostas in pots before. I bought one tiny plant. The nurserman warned me that it was a slow grower. He was right. I have nursed this baby along for years in Klamath in the ground, then in this pot, moved her down to Jimtown with me, and now, finally for the first time, Great Expectations is living up to my expectations! Something about the huge leaves and the way the light and water plays on the leaves captures me totally. It's a hosta thing. Only hosta lovers probably have any clue what I mean.