It's May and All's Well.

5-3-22 SHORT HILLS: We had a nice day after rain overnight, but it got cloudy in the afternoon. I did some weeding, and I planted an Itoh peony in the spot in the living room window bed where the failed crape myrtle had been. I moved the crape myrtle to a spot near the red-twig dogwood. The peony, Keiko, Paeonia [intersectional hybrid] x ‘Pink Double Dandy’, is about 1.5 feet in diameter and as tall with lots of big buds. 

The yard is looking good, the trees are about to leaf out, lots of blooms are on the verge of opening, the grass actually looks pretty good. 

There are open spots and spots where violets, dandelions, plantain, gill-over-the-ground, wild strawberries, and lots of other plants that don’t mind being three inches tall grow among the grasses—a freedom lawn. 

New blooms: acuba, Korean spice viburnum, nannyberry viburnum, sweet woodruff, clematis. 

The House Wrens are back in the bird house.

This is a quince, much smaller than the one by the back door, and the flower opened much later. I hope it gets as big someday.

The clematis by the kitchen door has lots of flowers this year.

Korean spice viburnum is the second viburnum to open and has a pleasing, complex aroma, but it makes no seeds and hasn't reproduced like most of the other viburnums.

White-throated sparrow in the lilac.