Mary Mary quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

I have never quite understood that nursery rhyme--why would anyone who has a garden be contrary?

5 weeks after planting, the squash and tomatoes have blossoms, the brocoli looks luscious and the cucumbers are putting out lots of runners.

Does anyone have fresh garden tomatoes yet?

On advice from Ruth I pruned the raspberries back to 18 inches in the spring and they are thriving.

A weekend full of Spring.

In some areas of the country, Memorial Day marks the beginning of Summer--Maine isn't necessarily one of these areas. But Memorial Day does mark the beginning of the visitors to our state, the opening of Antique stores that have been shuttered all winter and the day when we can safely put in our gardens.

Molly peacefully petted her pet rabbit, Thunder God, and kept me company while I planted in the new vegetable garden.

A truckload of topsoil wasn't really in the budget this year, so we went with Plan B. We had a load of compost that had been cooking since last summer, so we worked a little bit of the compost into each of the planting holes. Fingers crossed--maybe it will work--if not we'll live off the surplus of squash and tomatoes from our friends and neighbors. I actually kind of like the idea of making the soil rich with our compost even if it takes a couple of years to get it right.