Usually May is my favorite month. And it may well be this year, too, though we’ve had more than a normal number of cold days. The sun is shining today and flowers are blooming. Flame azaleas and sweet woodruff are looking lovely together. The purplish wild phlox does not blend in so well with orange, but ok. I will rejoice in what is. Somehow, it is difficult to believe summer is as close as it is, even though the peonies are full of the most promising buds!
Tomorrow, Alice, Andy and I will go to Chautauqua for three days and then Friday, most of us will go back for the Memorial Day weekend. I have the first Point Chautauqua Historical Preservation Society Meeting that Saturday. And on the 7th my dear friend Susan from Toronto is coming to visit for a few days. And I still have not planted my deck. I think I will wait until a week from tomorrow when I am back for a few days to take care of things! We had a few hard freezing days when people who trusted the traditional May 8th safe-to-plant by date lost plants they could not cover well enough.
No one got a good photo of Stephen in his cap and gown, but he has graduated from pre-school with great pride, and will be going to kindergarten in September. He wore the same outfit that his older brother did only a few years ago. A blue gown and a soft blue cap somewhat similar to a mortar board, with a gold tassel. I know I have a photo of this somewhere, but sadly, cannot find it. Maybe it is in a blog post from May 2010?
Right! There you go: https://thickethouse.wordpress.com/2010/05/29/graduation-time-and-spring-into-summer/
This weekend which was quite cold yesterday, Nathan and his Boy Scout Troop camped on Kelley’s Island in Lake Erie. I’m waiting to hear all about it! And today, Alice and Mike are celebrating their seventeenth wedding anniversary. All my thoughts about this are cliches! It doesn’t seem possible, but when I reflect on all that has happened in those years, it seems all too real.
And Alice and Mike, in the interests of collecting experiences rather than things, gave one another a cooking class together at the Western Reserve School of Cooking in Hudson. They learned about grilling fish and seafood. Alice loves to grill meals in the summer. They made and feasted on Asian spiced grilled shrimp, Cedar planked salmon, and mussels in white wine…Yummmm!
May and June are lovely months, aren’t they, with so much happening outdoors – even just looking at the cherry tree in front of my window, there are changes to observe nearly daily.
This year, May was much colder than usual for us, too, but it does not seem to have stopped the growth in gardens, fields and woods.
I never heard of pre-school graduations, but I know they have a small ceremony at the kindergarten where my Mum is a volunteer when the oldest kids leave for school: On their last day there, the “big kids” are to bring in their school bags to show they are ready for school. A large, soft gymnastics mat outside the door, then the leaving kids are taken by hand and feet and swung out of the door onto the mat, while the others sing songs about good-bye and “throwing” them out 🙂 It is of course not at all dangerous, done very gently, and the kids LOVE it, says my Mum.
Seems like you have lots of nice things coming up, too; the Historical Society sounds so interesting, and it’s lovely to have your friend coming over for a few days.
I also love May, my favourite month, although I do adore summer. Our school year doesn’t end until July, although my undergraduates finish this week. I really like the idea ceremony Mel describes :-).
Our May has been cold, peonies only just in bud despite one weekend when it hit 25oC which was wonderful. I was brought up to ‘never cast a clout until May be out’. Clout = clothing. The discussion always is around the meaning of the word May, in this case is it wait until the month of May is out (finished) or when the May blossom is over? My grandmother wouldn’t plant out non-hardy plants until the blossom had finished…
I’ve been to only one preschool graduation, of my grandson who will graduate from high school in a couple of weeks! I think he is the only preschool graduate in the family… I should mention that to him!
I think I recognize that picture as some kind of arum? It doesn’t look like my Italian Arum Lily, and you must not find it to be a weed or you wouldn’t show it looking all regal as it does.
You have so much going on this spring! I hope the traveling and visiting is invigorating and not too tiring. I just realized that I have so many trips scheduled, I don’t have time to plant seeds and to water them both, and will have to make do with the vegetables that are already growing. I’ll look forward to seeing pictures of what you do plant on your deck.
It is a jack in the pulpit, a native north American wild flower. Arisaema triphyllum. It is related to the Italian Arum.
I always loved May too. I love those adorable pre-school graduations. They wanted to get away from calling it a graduation from 5th grade to Middle School at our school so I think they started calling it ‘step up’ or something like that.