Thank you to all our readers who wrote to congratulate us on our 1,000th article. We’re pretty chuffed about it too.

As I’m typing, it’s raining and gray outside my window.

Again.

Oh, spring, I wish you would make up your mind. One moment it’s 80 degrees out, and I’ve got the Sweetheart putting my AC units in the windows, and the next moment, I’m turning the heat back on.  

We started the hustle and bustle of this year’s garden a couple of weeks ago, only to have it come to a grinding halt. We’ve had three late frosts this week. Anything I managed to get in the ground is mounded up with straw.

But the weeds are looking hardy and hale. Yeah, all that green you can see from the window…that’s white clover, dandelions and violets.

My Sweetie is chomping at the bit to install a new irrigation system he planned for the garden this year. He’s an engineer. I gave up on “keep it simple” years ago. These days, I pitch a problem his way and then stand back and watch in amazement.  

And it’s this bizarre period that happens every spring that sends me into the woods with my basket. My garden might still be asleep, but the woods are awake and alive with the fresh green that only happens this time of year.

All the pine trees are budded out with pollen cones and new tips. I always come home with a bit of stinging nettle and some daylily shoots for dinner. And I’ve got a batch of dandelion mead bubbling away in my pantry to carry me through the coming winter.  

It only takes me a walk in the woods before I’m back in the kitchen puttering and playing. I’m mixing up some potion to sip and enjoy once the heat finally decides to stay.

I got my hands on some rhubarb, and I’ve been making all kinds of concoctions and treats with it. (Some of which I’ll post on Almost a Homesteader later this week.) 

I even made my mom’s rhubarb custard pie which we will be having for breakfast because, technically, rhubarb is a vegetable and therefore, rhubarb pie counts as a healthy breakfast.  

But for now, let it be cold and rainy. I’ve got shrubs and bitters and tinctures and flowers and leaves to bottle up.

What are you up to while you wait for the weather to straighten out? Or do you live somewhere the weather is already playing nice?

Send us photos of your newly planted gardens or the first thing you’ve enjoyed on your table this year. (I promise, I’m not jealous.)

We always love hearing from our readers.