This is the scene that greeted me this morning! After we had finally had beautiful Spring weather, sunny and warm, I couldn’t believe it. We had finally just planted peas this past Palm Sunday and I was afraid that we were a bit late — too warm for peas. But then winter reappeared last night! After more than two inches of rain all day yesterday, I awoke this morning to 25 degree temperatures with snow and ice everywhere, covering the garden and certainly punishing the daffodils that had just begun to poke up in the fields. No doubt the hellebores which had finally emerged in the Woodland Walk and begun to bloom were equally unhappy. Never mind us two footed types!
Our Golden Retriever was the only happy camper here. Indy loves the snow and had been guarding the last remnants of the snow piles on our terrace. She was delighted to find the terrace coated with ice this morning.
It has been the most punishing winter in years. So bad in fact, that our lovely Lord and Burnham Greenhouse which has been standing in the same spot for over twenty years (having been moved from Charlie’s Mother’s home in Pennsylvania) was smashed! A surprising monsoon of rain appears in late February and caused an avalanche of snow and ice to cascade off the roof and the new solar panels onto the greenhouse, destroying many of the panes of glass, especially the difficult to replace curved ones. Luckily, we were home when this happened and I discovered the disaster in the evening before we went to bed. Charlie heroically stood out in the rain to cover the open roof with a tarp to keep the temperatures inside warm enough so the plants could survive, while I shoveled sharp shards of glass and snow and ice into large garbage pails, extracting glass from as many plants as I could. The next day was blessedly dry and warm so Charlie and Steve Tabacinski, who keeps everything working here, managed to tape up thick layers of plastic until the repairs could be done. We thank Larry Reynolds of Glass Structures who came from Farmingham, Massachusetts to restore the greenhouse beautifully.
