All in the Golden Afternoon

You can learn a lot of things from the flowers

For especially in the month of June

There's a wealth of happiness and romance

All in the golden afternoon

I've always loved the flower scene from Alice in Wonderland! It's so colorful and the flowers are all so pretty. I would be very pleased indeed if my garden could one day be as pretty and colorful. Maybe filled with bread-and-butterflies, a rocking horsefly or two, perhaps dog and caterpillars as well? Well not so much the dog and caterpillars but the rocking horseflies and bread-and-butterflies would sure be welcome. They could float around and kiss the tulips in the golden afternoon. Or any time really.

Slowly but surely that little garden is coming along. And It might not be June yet, but we can still learn a lot of things from the flowers. At least my kids can with help from the little garden we've been working on. The kids are loving being outside and helping plant the flowers. Its more like digging huge holes and making even bigger piles of dirt while I'm trying to plant everything. The point is they're having fun, even while ending up with more dirt on them than in the garden itself. And they're learning, bonus. Yesterday they helped plant several Marigolds that gave our little patch lots of beautiful yellow, gold, red and orange coloring. They learned that Marigolds are great in gardens because they repel animals and insects, as well as nematodes (microscopic worms). Oh yeah, Marigolds were definitely going in the garden. We also put in a lavender and a ton of seeds. I'm really hoping the seeds take because it's a really nice variety of perennials and wildflowers. It'll be a bit before we know whether or not they will, but the kids are already asking if they'll get to see them sprout tomorrow. Sorry kiddos, they're wildflowers not miracle flowers. While you wait for the seeds to sprout you can make time pass by looking for bread-and-butterflies, rocking horseflies, and learning a lot of things from the flowers... all in the golden afternoon.