Planting Bulbs

Hey guys! I have to show you a few cute pictures we got for my scrapbook of my dad & I planting bulbs. This was my first experience with bulbs. I've done rose bushes and seeds but never bulbs. I still think it's weird to plant one bulb knowing only 1 plant will come of it. When you could just sprinkle some seeds. Obviously this is a rookie talking. I'm sure I'll learn the wonders and pros of bulbs.
If it wasn't hard enough to plant bulbs in my very rocky and clay like soil... add a toddler on your back..Hehe. She's just too cute. Sweet Grandma played with the kids while I got a gardening lesson from my experienced Daddy. I think he would be modest and say he's no pro but he's a wonderful gardener with over 10 years under his belt. And of course he has the most beautiful garden in the neighborhood. I can't wait to see the pink and white tulips and daffodils that come up next spring. (fingers crossed)

To go hand in hand with my Gardening lesson my Dad sat down with me to go through his really really cool gardening journal. One of his firsts when he started 10 years ago. There is even some mention of my hardheadedness as a teen in there:) After I cooked up a dinner and brought it to my parents house for a wonderful evening, my dad & I retired to the couch as my wonderful Mom played with the kids. We had Chamomile tea and Oatmeal/Chocolate Chip cookies (Thanks to my Aunt Ferny..Thank you! They were delicious!)

I teared up a few times at the amazing amount of wisdom and truth there was about life blended in with the gardening tips. Here is one of his great entries ....

January 15th 2000

I'm really getting anxious to get out in the yard. It's like therapy when I'm out in the sun working in the soil. It seems that I can concentrate on nothing but the task at hand when I'm out there. I think this is so because unlike other things you plan out, the garden has it's own ideas, or set of rules to abide by. Toss in the Lucky Excavation Co. (What Dad calls our Beagle Lucky) & his co workers (his other 2 beagles Molly and Charlie) & it's a cooperative effort. Since this is only my 3rd spring gardening, I've got alot of observing to do. A person only has so many springs, and the scope of things to learn about nature is beyond our ability to comprehend. So gardening is humbling as well. Stewardship may be the smartest way to approach a garden. Taking what nature gives, trying to enhance where possible. Accepting that there will be successes and failures & I must adhere to the rules that nature dictates. You see life played out in a myriad of ways. Nature can be cruel in it's disregard for one thing living to benefit another. There is an interplay of relationships that seems endless. How an insect affects a plant, how a predator removes the insect and at the same time is giving to the plant. How life is born from a seed, lives, gives it's gift & dies in a matter of months returning to the earth as much as it took from it. The daily life cycle of a Morning Glory bloom which opens one morning only to be closed a few hours later. It's a picture of life & death on an hourly, daily & seasonal basis. This teaches that our life is but one of millions that nature must balance each day. Victories and adversities are then seen as necessary parts of out life balance. Just as a plant uses all of it's resources to heal a wound, whether incurred from nature or beast. We must show that same survivability, for we know, as the plant does, there are reasons to be conquered in order to produce the fruit we were intended to bare.

Thank you so much to my Dad for sharing your time and knowledge with me and sharing your thoughts in this journal.