Those Bloody Plants

Our warm spring has coaxed out some early blooms in the garden. For some reason, the first ones are always the "bloody" plants--Bleeding Heart and Bloodroot. Sounds kind of awful, doesn't it? But they are beautiful. And mostly effortless growers.

This Bleeding Heart was rescued from a neighbor's garden many years ago after they realized that it was a plant that would not bloom all summer. They did their best to kill it, but it was stubborn, so I took pity on it and popped it in my garden. It's been happily growing for me ever since.

The Bloodroot is from my Mom's garden, and she probably got it from her Mom, who got it from her Mom, etc. You never know where this one will show up. I've heard that ants help spread the seeds around, which makes sense since it tends to like to grow next to rocks or around tree roots.

These are the last two for the season. I found them hiding in a shadier and cooler part of the garden.

And my last garden news is that my arbor arrived. Yea! It took me a while to get it put together and anchored into the ground, but I love it. It's a PVC plastic which means no more painting! Whoo-hoo!

It's a huge relief to have this big project behind me. I'm especially glad that I was able to get it done and still have a little time to recover from all the hard work before I have to get all the rest of the plantings in for the summer.

Although I haven't had much energy in the evenings, I have made some progress on my Must-Have Cardigan. Apparently, this is the Clapotis of cable knits since there are over 400 knitters on Ravelry who have cast on this project. I guess that figures since I found the pattern on the rack at JoAnn Fabrics.

This Cascade 220 Heather yarn called "Lichen" is greener than it appears in the photo and has small flecks of other colors. Love this, too. The only change I have made in the pattern so far was to mirror the crossovers in the largest pattern rather than have them both cross in the same direction. What can I say? I like symmetry. Now I just have to remember that I did that when I knit the front pieces.