Peach Trees & Blue Skies

My backyard never fails to bring me happiness.  It’s green and overgrown and just the way I like it.  

Some days, it’s nice to pause and admire the beauty that surrounds me, all here for the taking even when the world seems to be spinning out of my control.

These peaches are growing bigger by the day.  Though I fear that most will serve as squirrel snacks, I am hopeful that at least a few can be served at my supper table.  Each day moves us a little closer to that prospect.

Peach Blossoms and Sunshine

Though it’s stormy today, much of the last few weeks has brought enough sunshine and warmth to get my backyard peach tree blooming.  Every year is the same.  The peach tree gets a lot of sunlight and moves toward blooms sooner than most of the plants in the yard.  Even so, things start off slow.

Then one morning I look outside and there are pink flowers on all the branches.  This tree, and its showy pink flowers, are one of the nicest parts of early Spring.

Seen against the vibrant blue sky, the pink is simply splendid, some of Mother Nature’s nicest work.  That’s happy!

Garden Season

Summer has officially begun and right on schedule, tomatoes are blooming in my garden.  

The zinnia seedlings are coming along nicely.

The front yard hosta bed is lush and green, with blooms sustained by all the rain we’ve had this month.  

I can spy this garden from the front porch where I sit and sip my morning coffee and it always makes me smile.

The peach tree has served as a a handy squirrel snack bar but plenty of peaches remain on its limbs, ripening for later this summer.

At twilight, the lightening bugs in the backyard twinkle on and off against the green.  No matter how long I look at them, their glow always seems magical.  There is beauty in abundance as June prepares to slip into July and I am happy to soak it all up.

August 1: In the Backyard Neighborhood

Usually, August finds the backyard starting to look a little parched.  This year, the July rains have come often enough to cope with the heat, and so the plants in this corner of the yard have held on quite nicely.

There were no peaches on my tree this year.  Nearly a dozen set on but one night in June some critters (possums, I suspect), made quick work of my prospects.

Some years, that’s the case.  I try to be patient with such developments.  After all, there’s always next year and there is still plenty to enjoy in this corner of my garden world.

December 1st: Peach Tree

As our warm November came to a close, cold weather crept in.  Even so, the peach tree stubbornly held on to the last of its leaves, seemingly reluctant to admit that Winter is coming.

Last night, a rainstorm blew in and all of the peach tree leaves are gone.  The tree is stark and plain, guarding its corner and ready for Winter.  The days are getting shorter by the minute and the impulse to seek cover and rest grows stronger for me as well.  So I tuck under my down comforter as the tree holds its own in the corner of the yard.

November 1: Peach Tree

Plenty of leaves have fallen in the backyard, though the peach tree isn’t quite ready to let go.

The trees behind the garage ---- a mulberry, two apple trees, and a pear tree still have plenty of leaves and the raking chore can hold off for now.

We’ve had a warm fall, with days determined to hold on to the 70s.  The coming week promises more of the same, so perhaps it’s fitting that while Mother Nature stubbornly holds on to the warmth, the peach tree keeps it leaves.  Even so, daylight is shrinking and the sun is now setting an hour earlier.  Warm November days feel like a treat that won’t last.

October 1: Peach Tree

Leaves are just beginning to turn in my corner of the world.  Part of the change is due to the arrival of shorter days and cooler nights.  But part of it is also due to the stress of the warm, dry weather we’ve had for the last two months.  As the hosta bed behind the peach tree shows, the lack of rain has taken its toll.

The peach tree has earned some time off and I’m willing to bet that by this time next month, most of its leaves will be long gone, left on the grass for me to rake up.

I’ve reluctantly begun to acknowledge that summer can’t last forever.  Fall’s beauty makes that transition a little easier to bear.

September 1: Peach Tree

The peach harvest is long complete and August heat and absence of rain has all of my garden contemplating an early fall.  A few peach tree leaves have begun to turn.

The rest of the yard shares the peach tree’s sense that things are too dry for a lush fall.  This week's forecasted hazy and hot weather won't ease conditions.

A wet fall would aid in bringing color to the leaves but the longterm forecast doesn’t offer much hope on that front.  This week actually promises to be hotter than usual, just as I have less time to relax in the backyard.  This is perhaps fitting for days to be spent indoors getting ready for students to start classes, but I’m still sorry to see the summer end.

August 1: Peach Tree

I suppose that I could have waited until today to share the news of my big peach tree harvest but I was too excited about my first harvest to delay the news.  Now that the harvest is complete, my hard-working peach tree has earned the right to soak up the sun and relax.

The last week of July was very hot and we seem to have entered a patch of dry weather.  If the lack of rain continues, I’ll need to give the peach tree a big drink.  

As is nearly always the case come August, the summer is starting to droop along its edges.  Heat and limited rainstorms can do that.  Though the peach tree harvest is complete, there are plenty of other things yet to be harvested before the summer growing season is complete.  I plan to to enjoy every bit of the summer that remains even as I am grateful for what it’s given me thus far.

The Patient Peach

In the Spring of 2008, my dad sent me three dwarf fruit trees for my backyard.  I planted the two apple trees on either side of the pear tree.  Then I began to dream of the fruit I would one day harvest.  It takes two years for new trees to set on fruit and I knew that patience was the order of the day.

The first fruit set on on 2010 and I followed my dad’s directions and culled the fruit so that none of the branches would be overloaded.  Then, just when I was confident that I would be picking my first harvest, a backyard predator cleared out my crop.  

It would be like this for the next four years.  The fruit would set on and I’d get excited only to wake up one morning and discover that all of my fruit was gone.  I came to expect that my harvest would end up being one lone apple lying under the tree with a bite taken from it.  It was disheartening.  This summer, I expected the same outcome.  As usual, an abundant amount of fruit set on to the apples and pear trees and things looked great.

Even the peach tree, in just its second year in the backyard, looked quite promising.

I didn’t get my hopes up because every year my early crop prospects have ended with some kind of critter disaster.   But this year, as the growing season unfolded, things looked promising.  Each morning, I held my breath and checked to see that my fruit crops were still on the branches.  I held quietly to my hope for an actual harvest.  

The peaches were ready first.  As I stood at the tree I could smell their musky ripening.   After seven years of cultivating the fruit trees, I had my first tree fruit crop!  This past Sunday, I picked my crop of peaches.  They smelled amazing and tasted delicious.

I feel like my patience has been rewarded.  There is plenty of fruit on the apple and pear trees steadily moving toward ripeness.  I’m hopeful that actual apples and pears will follow.  Time will tell that story; for now I wait.  Good thing that I've had all those lessons in patience.

July 1: Peach Tree

We’re at that point in summer when things are green, lush, and growing quickly.  The warm, long, sunlit days are making the plants happy.  My peach tree has a few peaches (the rest have been gobbled by the backyard squirrels) but it’s otherwise flourishing in its corner of the yard.

The garden is at its most verdant and charming at this time of the year.  I have a few days off to enjoy it.  That’s most happy!

June 1: Peach Tree

The month of May brought plenty of blooms and green to my backyard.  The blossoms on the fruit trees were particularly lovely.

As the month wore on, despite the lack of rain, my peach tree leafed out.

The delicate pink blossoms grew into the start of fuzzy-skinned peaches.

There was heavy rain last night and more is expected this week.  My garden and I will be glad to have it.  The month of June always sees plenty of growth in the garden, as the leaves expand and Summer’s heat arrives.  In just a few days, the school year will be over and I’ll have more time to enjoy the outdoors and all the lovely things in my backyard. That’s just peachy!

May 1: Peach Tree

Thirty days ago, Spring was still toying with my emotions and blooms on my peach tree were more of a hope than a reality.  But in the last week, hope has bloomed all over the place.  Here is the peach tree last week, wearing delicate pink blooms.

Just a week later, green leaves are replacing the delicate flowers.

The apple and pear trees are getting in on the act as well.

Each day of sunlight and warmth, Spring’s blooms inch forward.  My backyard trees will soon be a canopy of green.  

I especially enjoy this part of Spring.  Each day I wake up to a new bloom.  The expectant urgency of the days brings energy at a time in the school year when I need it most.  

April Fool: Checking in with the Peach Tree

This year, I’ve been posting a picture of my backyard peach tree on the first of each month.  The arrival of March and the official start of Spring gave me a good deal of hope.  But the continuing cold (not to mention the spurts of snow last night) haven’t delivered much in terms of blooms.  The peach tree is holding its own.

Up close, there are small signs of progress.

The peach tree’s neighboring bulbs are pushing forward, a form of garden peer pressure.

Surely this month will bring some warmth and a resulting explosion of blooms and green.  I live in hope.

March 1: Peach Tree

Last week was cold but the days were sunny.  Winter is making a return today and the week’s forecast promises more snow and ice.  But I am treating the arrival of March like a treasured event.  It signals a lot of things worth celebrating: JT has started baseball practice; Spring Break starts on March 6; next weekend we move our clocks forward and enjoy more evening light; in 21 days, Spring officially arrives.  Spring.  In my world, those are some heady and most-welcome developments.  Even so, for now the backyard remains still.

The peach tree’s corner has snow.  More is on the way, confirming March’s reputation as the month that comes in like a Lion.  But we’ve turned our calendars nonetheless and that means the season of cold stillness is coming to a close.

February 1: Peach Tree

There was a point in January when a windy storm had brought down some tree branches and my back yard was soggy with ice and rain that couldn’t be absorbed by the frozen ground.  As I looked out the back window on that rather dreary day, Winter seemed like it stretched endlessly in front of us.  Today, the tree is surrounded by snow dropped by the storm from earlier this week.  The powder has stuck around thanks to the frigid cold which followed.  More snow is expected tonight and it will surely cover up the bunny tracks seen here in the snow.

I must confess that February’s status as the shortest month is always welcome in my world because the March that follows seems filled with promise, thanks to both the time change and the official arrival of Spring.  Of course there are still 28 days to be managed on my way to March.  Happily, I find February rather comforting despite the cold.  By the start of the month, the sunset is at 5:15, with light lingering after that in a way that fills me with hope.  In mid-February, we celebrate JT’s birthday and from there the month flies by, each day with just a bit more sunlight than the next.  

In my mind, I know that March won’t move as quickly toward warmth and blooms as I might like.  But in February my heart begins to think daily about the green shoots that seem like they are just around the corner.

This month, my peach tree remains patiently still, soaking in the moisture and sunlight it needs to bring forth its blooms.  It knows that there is more sunlight and warmth in its future.  That’s happy!

January 1: Peach Tree

It’s become my custom to select a part of my garden and feature it at the start of each month.  It’s a way to mark the seasons but it’s also more than that.  Changes that seem small each month add up to something greater when the year is complete and stopping to mark that passage of time makes me more aware of the subtleties in the world around me.  We’ve been in the front yard for the last few years but in 2015 we’re headed to the backyard again.

In 2013, I planted a dwarf redhead peach tree here at the intersection of the row of hostas, my clematis vine, and the red bird house at the corner of the garage.  Underneath, there is grass.  Spring will bring tulips and daffodils.  

The peach tree is coming along nicely; there may even be some fruit set on it this summer.  As the seasons of 2015 unfold, we’ll watch the peach tree’s monthly progress on the first of each month.

In January, the tree’s slim green leaves are long-gone and the branches look stark in the cold.  But if you look up close in the morning sunlight, there is evidence that the tree is already at work for the growing season that lies ahead.  

The tree has all the makings of a productive 2015.  That’s happy!