January lull

I haven't been doing a lot of gardening lately other than ogling my lemons, watching birds, and watching my potted amaryllis grow several inches a day on the kitchen windowsill. Its plump buds are just beginning to open. It was an 'Apple Blossom', plucked from the bottom of a nearly empty bin in the plumbing aisle at Emigh Hardware.

A couple years ago, I bought an 'Apple Blossom' amaryllis bulb for an aunt at Christmas. At first I thought, "Is this a lame gift? Am I projecting my gardening thing on her?" But then she raved about how it grew, and bloomed, and had several beautiful flowers. That left me wondering why I didn't buy one for myself. So this year I did. Oh, I thought about gifting it because who wouldn't want a fabulous amaryllis bulb for Christmas, right? Selfishness... and the rationalization that I could be hit by a bus tomorrow and die an amaryllis virgin... won in the end and I kept it for myself. And, hey, why hasn't anyone ever given me an amaryllis bulb for Christmas? Now who's selfish?

There isn't a lot to do in the garden right now except two important things-- pruning my roses and deciduous trees and applying dormant spray to my fruit trees. Not very glamorous, but both must be done. I sort of putzed on the winter veggie garden except for planting a bit lettuce and herbs and chard. I'm kind of sorry because I do enjoy watching my little dogs eat snap peas right off the vine, the little dorks.



I've also been experiencing some blog template weirdness and have been perusing the help boards a lot lately. I am trying to add a third column to my blog and in doing so, nuked some of the changes I had made to my template. Oh, I backed it up, but that doesn't save the stuff in the sidebar. My header is having issues too, so I took it down until I can get the third column up and running. Then I'll put a header back and do all sorts of other wonderful widgety, hacky stuff. Blogging is too fun. I might be starting a Dreamweaver class this month, so watch out for a revamped, revitalized, reborn gardening website as well in the coming year.