....and heart-shaped, mirror-walled jacuzzi tub. 

This is holiday valley, western New York. It's a really neat little town and a family winter ski area. I wonder if they manufacture their own snow? Since it's been in the 60s and 70s up here recently, I find it hard to believe that snow from the last real snowfall (December?) would be left on the slopes..... 

Pennsylvania country barnside advertising...... 

This was the most fun event of my rapid-road-trip weekend: I found the optimal window configuaration that would result in my hair being sucked out of the sunroof! I'm posting this even at the risk of it being an otherwise really bad self-portrait. 

Spring is bringing forth a few more surprises in the yard, as it does. One of them is patches of mushrooms in the back yard. I'll have to look these up to see if they're edible. 

In a back corner of the yard, I noticed a familiar herb. It's spearmint! 

This is the patch of ground behind the neighbor's garage that backs up against the east side of my back yard. It's about 4 feet by 20 feet. I hoed it all up a few weeks ago, and noticed some baby potato and carrot plants. Maybe this was a vegetable patch in the past, but with all the rabbit activity in the yard, I'm not sure how much it really yeilded. So, when I hoed it up, I sprinkled three bagfulls of wildflower seeds in and watered them down. Right now I'm calling this my experimental patch, and will wait to see what comes up. There are a few sprouts here and there, but today has been super windy, so there is a lot of debris over the area. Regarding the bags of wildflower seeds - each was rated for NW Ohio, so they should be suited to grow here. And each bag contained approximately 10,000 seeds. We'll wait to see what the experimental patch of 30,000 wildflower seeds yields, if anything. I have low expectations. 

This is the Weeping Cherry tree. It was just buds yesterday - they exploded open today. 

...and a detail shot of the Weeping Cherry tree. 

These are some of the most interesting little wildflowers - they're actually a mint-green color. I've only seen green flowers during St. Patrick's day, after being dyed. 

Here are some blue things that look like Texas bluebonnets, but not quite, in the front yard. 

Mystery Tree. I thought this was a pussy willow tree because it looked a lot like the tree in my neighbor's yard, that definitely is one. However, this weekend, the bulb things bloomed out into flowers. My neighbor's pussy willow tree didn't do this - it created these small shaped bottle-brush type things that are shedding all over my back deck. They didn't flower at all. So now, I'm not sure what type of tree this is - there are very tiny leaf buds but they are few and frequent. It's definitely different. 

Here are a couple of the daffodils that have been hiding underground. With all the similar green shoots coming up I was hoping to see them across the whole front of the house. Turns out there are a total of 4 blooms, these three near the sunroom and one in the front. But they're nice to see nonetheless. 

Katman is watching me snap a few photos from the sunroom - this is his second-favorite daytime perch, with a view to the action out front and the squirrel and bird activity in the adjacent tree. 

Finally! A rain-free weekend. My maple tree is starting to bud out, and even without the leaves it provides a nice shade canopy. The most surprising thing about the back yard is how green the grass is. It's that super fine bluegrass stuff which I understand requires more frequent mowing than other types. Guess I need to get a mower.