Ann’s Weblog

One herald of spring for me is the journey to pick up trees and shrubs for our little garden centre. Last April, after several years of having all nursery stock freighted in, I made a plan to pick up the biggest of my orders in my own truck and our small horse trailer. It worked well last year, and this year I travelled with a friend instead of alone, and it made the trip seem much faster and was so enjoyable. The drive was almost 16 hours long, but was uneventful except for having to brake HARD (laying rubber) for a moose, at which time I became more aware what a heavy load we were carrying.

Our little garden centre, called Blackwood Gardens, might not seem a serious enterprise to some, but one wholesale nursery salesman told me that “mom and pop operations” were every bit as important as the big names like Canadian Tire and Art Knapps. That fed my confidence a lot, because we do feel like we’re bringing a lovely product to the local population, to the best of our ability.

Even the cab of the truck had trees packed in; we couldn’t have brought home much more! It seemed quite an adventure, even getting the truck and trailer packed, as it is hard to judge the issues of space and size of containers, while placing an order. It’s not only me, and my inexperience… the men who loaded the stock, said at first, “Oh, it’s only 150 items, no problem…” and then they were starting to worry along with we ladies. We joked that Eunice almost had to ride home with pots all around her and on her lap.

In the photo of my truck and magnetic sign, I have changed my phone number. You who know us or need us will still be able to get hold of us… the real number has not changed.

I have a number of plants, trees and shrubs left over from last year… they looked dormant still, rather odd beside the “new” stock which is leafing out. I hope we don’t have an extremely hard frost again, although it was below freezing even Thursday night, the day we made the trip. And today, Saturday… it snowed.

Last week I was throwing the ball for Lady, and it seemed like Spring had arrived…

Lady is looking a bit portly (NOT poorly), as does her “mistress”, after a relaxing winter.

Time to turn my attention to a guy on TV who is potting up some container gardens. Glad to talk to you this morning, though… thank you for checking my blog.

Love, Ann