It’s May! Happy May 1st !
Take up your trowels and hoes and wide-brimmed hats, it’s time to plant and weed and sow seed in the garden.
May starts as Spring with fat buds, fragrant new flowers and newly turned earth. It ends as Summer with abundant blooms, late sunsets, and the promise of many harvests.
In between this transition from Spring to Summer, I’ll be busy in the garden taking advantage of as many sunny days as come my way.
May is the month of lilacs and lily of the valley, of peonies and snowball bushes. It’s the month of lettuce and radishes, of planting out the rest of the garden.
If we get it right in May, we reap rewards through the rest of the growing season.
I don’t want to put too much pressure on this month of May or on myself. I promise to pace myself, to enjoy each day as it comes, and to remember to look up as I hoe each row to enjoy my garden from time to time.
Follow along with me, for some of the best days of gardening.
It’s May! Happy May 1st (and 2nd, and 3rd… all the way to the 31st!)
“Hoe while it is spring, and enjoy the best anticipations. It is not much matter if things do not turn out well.”- Charles Dudley Warner
And at the beginning of May, in my garden…
Blooms of the snowball bush, Viburnum opulus ‘Sterile’, are just about ready to turn from green to bright white. 
By mid-May, the ground around the snowball bush will be covered with the petals of these blooms, looking white as snow.
Peonies, anyone? I think these are definitely earlier than last year. 
You have to love a flower that always blooms in May.
The first radishes, small but good.
The radishes of May will be bigger and tastier.
Take note of the garden, ready for May planting.
By the end of May, it will be transformed with every bed planted and all the paths newly mulched.
Welcome to May. Welcome to my garden.
Happy May 1st!
My main concern is garden pond, that suffers currently from heavy algae attack – usual in the spring, as the algae grows faster than water plants..
Cheers,
Ewa
Hurrah – no dreaming for you this month Carol! Have a good May 🙂
I know May is your special month. Can’t wait to see the peonies fully opened. They are one of my favorite flowers, but, alas, I cannot grow them in this heat down here.
Jan
Always Growing
Happy May Day, Carol! May all your garden dreams come to fruition. 🙂
Frances
I can feel your excitement Carol. Happy May.
You are so very right about May, Carol. It is the month of fulfilled promises and the month of scent in the garden for many of us. Happy May Day!
Onward and upward!! You will be busy in that garden….love your blooms.
Happy May! I think I can almost smell the earth being upturned. =)
Carol, you sound like a gal who’s in love with the month of May. But then, aren’t we all? Your lily of the valley photo takes me back to when my mother had them growing all along the northside of her house. Smell so good!
May here is hoping it doesn’t snow again. The plants are just starting to green up and the soil in my backyard is still frozen.
Sigh.
Wow. You have a huge veggie garden. Enjoy!
I just love looking at those beds all ready for planting. We are a bit behind judging from my notes from last year. Only 40 degrees as I write this a.m. Hoping for some sun to help things along.
May is a wonderful, busy, frantic month. I love it even though I am already creaking. I love the Charles Dudley Warner quote and I can’t believe you already have edible radishes!
May is a wonderful month! Thanks for the photo of the snowball bush…I haven’t seen one of those since I was growing up in Ohio and we had one in our backyard. Happy May!
A beautiful description of the month of May, Carol! I know you’re going to be very busy this month and I look forward to seeing the fruits of your labors. Thanks for visiting, and I wanted to apologize–I meant to give you credit in my post, but forgot. For years I was a “line-em-up” kind of bulb planter, but thanks to one of your posts, I changed to clump planting last fall. So much prettier!
How wonderful! Well, I could do a “welcome to the dry season” piece here in CA, but we’re actually getting ready for a late-season storm. And besides, it’s raining…Happy May! Love the lily of the valley!
Happy May Day! Here’s hoping the transition from spring to summer is a little more gradual and smooth than it usually is. It is surprising that your Peony is that far along already.
I thought of you today when I saw it was May day – it must be the day you dream of all year! Just wanted to wish you a happy one!
Looks like things are well underway in your garden. How cool that you have radishes already!
Happy May Day to you! This is the month you dream of all year. I can close my eyes and almost smell those Lilacs
Merry May to you as well! I love the photo of the empty veggie beds. You always have the most incredible garden and I can’t wait to watch you fill it and harvest it. Best~Diana
A few years ago it was just a crazy notion of a gardener in Indiana. I get it now, deep into my bones. Hooray for May!
I love how large your garden is. I’m working on building mine. Hoping to add a few beds to the veggie garden this spring yet.
Happy May Day to you as well Carol. Since it’s the day I was born it’s very special to me as well.
May is indeed an exciting one in the garden and this May we are looking forward to having the Spring Fling gathering in Chicago.
I’ve been busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest trying to get my garden in order.
Looking forward to meeting you on the 30th!
Happy May to you, Carol! I’m sure we all think of you now when May rolls around.
May is our last comfortable month in Austin before the Death Star trains its heat beam on us, so this is our last hurrah of pleasant weather until mid-October. I’ll be enjoying it too!
Do your paths get mulched every year? The soil underneath must be magnificent.
May is so exciting, isn’t it? Everything is so fresh. You can smell the plants growing. Happy May!