Finally winter and cold gave in to a marvelous month
of warmth and color as Wisconsin experienced a “fast forward spring” and the birds
returned amid a succession of bloom which was both intoxicating and
invigorating. From the first bloodroot
to trilliums to tulips and anemones, Mark and Hilde enjoyed them all.
The fruit trees were glorious and stayed full
of blossom for quite a while. Hilde
finished up her slew of doctor and dental appointments and Mark carefully
hardened off his great crop of tomatoes (three varieties) and peppers (two
types) in preparation for planting. With
plenty of rain, the asparagus started and flourished providing many meals with delicious
veggies.
The garden got planted in one long day this
year. Mark and Hilde put in 7 rows of
corn, plus beans, zucchini, cucumbers, carrots, three rows of onions,
eggplants, flowers, rutabaga, 18 peppers and 20 tomatoes. Then a second day was spent fencing the
entire area, weeding the summer raspberries and cleaning up the
blueberries. It felt very good to get
into the summer routine of outside chores, with weeding, mowing and trimming.
The month also brought three very different kinds of
celebrations. First, Mark and Hilde,
with all the St. Paul’s congregation, said farewell to Pastor Baur and wife
Rachel as he retired and moved to Dubuque.
Mid-month, Dr. Stevens returned to the YMCA classes for a “Founder’s
Day” celebration with self-defense review and birthday cake. And then a grand
gathering of cousins of all degrees for the funeral of Lynette Altenburg, 93
years old.
Mark and Hilde headed down to Palatine for the
Mother’s Day weekend and delighted in cuddling little Hazel, who is growing and
cooing and sweet. It was nice to take
care of her and let her parents go out for a movie together.
At the end of the month, Mark and Hilde went
to Sussex for a different grandparenting gig while Jim was teaching in Grenada. Grandpa Mark took kids to and from school (as
his grandfather did for him a long time ago!) and worked on minor repairs and
mowing. Hilde enjoyed feeding and caring
for the grandkids, weeding the raspberries and taking lots of pictures.
It was a very welcome surprise for both Henkels when
a neighbor renting the field to the west of them cleaned up the three piles of
rocks which had impeded their western view for all 29 years in Rudolph. In doing so, he flushed out an old skunk (which
Mark took care of) and gave them a much more attractive perspective for sunsets
and other times. Mark also cut off major chunks of an old pine which was
shading that asparagus patch, trimmed other trees and even got a little legal
work in around all the outside stuff.
The return of warmth and sunshine has invigorated both Henkels. |
| No rock and weed pile on the horizon! |
No comments:
Post a Comment