"Spring has sprung, the grass has riz..."

"...I wonder where the flowers is..."

It's not my favorite time of the year - you all know I'm a "Fall"- but Spring is a close second.  True to the craziness of the weather around the globe, the Valley isn't getting much rain.  While other areas in the East have been digging out of snow piles, we are drying up here like a raisin.

Though they promised rain on Easter Sunday, it was sunny and warm.  Mother Nature dumped a couple of inches of water on us the night before, amid huge claps of thunder and quite a lightening show - just enough rain to wet down the yard and allow for some great mud tracks on the carpet (that's what vacuum cleaners are for:)

Spring is a sign of renewal.  Spring is the color green. It's fresh...and what looked dead actually comes to life again...

Our first rose...

The frost has killed this banana tree every year, but it forges on...

I love to add some Spring touches around the house...

I'm not traditionally a big "Spring Cleaner", but I tried that cream of tarter paste thingie that I saw on Pinterest on my grimy toaster...like all Pinterest hints, some work, some not so much.  I'll give this hint an 8 out of 10.

And of course, with the warmer weather, Colette needed some new fashion...

I love Stone Mountain and Daughters fabrics in Berkeley, CA. I'm headed down there again next week with an old friend to pick up some more knits for summer.

And finally, a poem for you...for Spring.  I wanted to write it myself, but I am fresh out of wit this morning. This classic below, although considered rather "melancholy", actually gave me a little snicker...

Spring

By Edna St. Vincent Millay 1892–1950

To what purpose, April, do you return again?

Beauty is not enough.

You can no longer quiet me with the redness

Of little leaves opening stickily.

I know what I know.

The sun is hot on my neck as I observe

The spikes of the crocus.

The smell of the earth is good.

It is apparent that there is no death.

But what does that signify?

Not only under ground are the brains of men

Eaten by maggots.

Life in itself

Is nothing,

An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.

It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,

April comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers. 

Laurel. Bring ye the flowers, O yard...