Oh garden how I love thee...

The sun is shining and so the delightful work outside begins again.  I say delightful because I am a fair weather gardener.  I have a very difficult time motivating my gardening self when it is cloudy.  Sunny and cool, no problem.  In fact all the better.  Got myself a new pair of clippers and heavy work gloves then set to work on my unruly wild roses.  They are now pruned to within an inch of their thorny little lives.  I know, I probably waited a little too long to prune them back but honestly I am not getting out there in February with the wind, rain and slush to prune.  So now it is up to them.  Thrive or 'you're out'.  I'm brutal.

We took out a huge butterfly bush that had grown way to big for it's britches...it was stealing the sun from some other more treasured plantings so, 'you're out'!  This is the Mr.  taking care of the last of the branches while I was pruning another area of wild roses.  I did not prune them to within an inch of their lives as I am performing a nature experiment.  I will report on my findings as the spring and summer progress.

Certain areas have been overtaken by this...I think it is vinca minor.  I would hate to see what it would do if it were v. major!  It is so pretty but it has gone where it was not meant to be and now I am torn.  Pull a lot of it out or let is survive.  Time will tell.

I also (cover your eyes if you love snails and slugs) lay down the law and a huge box of 'slug death'.  Yes, I am the Grim Reaper to the slug population of my yard.  I don't care what anyone says, they are not going to eat my yard this year!  And just to prove how serious I am about this, are you listening slugs?  Because you may want to move along to another yard, I bought another huge box of death at the nursery today.  And I plan on using it.  Frequently.  Unmercifully.  Which reminds me of a story about death to slugs.  Many years ago I worked in the ER with another nurse who not only hated slugs as much as me, she was willing to get down to hand-to-hand combat with the slimy creatures.  Early in the morning when the dew was fresh and the slugs were munching to their hearts content, she would slip out of the house, quietly wielding her scissors and yes!  She ran around her yard maniacally cutting the slugs in half.  Yuck!  This still makes me want to throw up just a little.  She reveled in it however.  She was tough as nails.  I was a little afraid of her.  So my method which is still killing, seems a little less violent.

I love gardening.