Another spring and summer come and gone, and autumn soon will join them! My dad says this is nothing - "wait 'til you're MY age!"

In the early days of summer 2006 it appeared we would have a stellar growing season. We had a protracted and gentle spring rather than our typical, sudden, early, tulip-blasting May heat wave. A little about the tulips, and then I'll get back to the growing season...

I am normally loath to lay out a tulip smorgasbord for our abundant field mice, but Breck's managed to catch me at a weak moment when they sent out their Spring 2005 catalogue. I quickly ordered three dozen of their boldest beauties and forgot all about it until they arrived in the fall. I planted them in a cold and driven late October rain, dropping a bulb, and a curse for my misspent vernal optimism, into every hole . Lo and behold! they survived the winter in spite of miserably inadequate drumlin valley drainage and great hordes of scavenging field mice, and then Old Sol smiled benignly upon my corner of the earth instead of toasting blossoms into premature age. Spring has never bloomed more lush and sensual.