In February it snows, and it rains.

I was hoping to greet you all with many pictures and words detailing the amazing number of things I’d done this week. But it was not to be.

I finished work on Monday, and was given a beautiful bay tree as a leaving present.

During Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, I waited for my wages to arrive. And whislt I waited, I ate, I ate, I watched Star Trek, and I cleaned, I baked rock cakes, and then Rich and I ate them all.

Friday arrived, and so did my pay packet. I whopped and cheered, and went shopping, safe in the knowledge that I’d have all weekend to get going with Things That I Have Wanted to Do for Weeks and Weeds. You know – composting, potting, sowing, planting, repairing. You see, I had cast an eye over the weather forecast a few days previously,  and was delighted to see that we were in for some sunny intervals. I didn’t check back. I should have done. Because today, it rained, and it rained, and it rained some more. Joyfulness.

I don’t mind rain at all, really. But it’s somewhat troublesome  when the volume of rainfall practically quadruples overnight, just when I really want to get on with some important jobs. It rendered me into a useless lump with nothing else to do. Well, I did go shopping. I bought a few clothes for my new job.

I’d also drafted a huge long blog entry a few days ago, tainted with hormonally-tinged rage about being stuck in the house and fed up with cleaning, clearing out and sorting. I couldn’t bring myself to publish it though.  The jist of that gargantuan, self-indulgent moan was that I’ve got as far as I can go on my own in the house. I have to wait for Rich to finish working his six million concurrently-running jobs before we can get on with the next (big) steps in our Quest to Live in a Normal, Nice House. We’re talking next steps like bringing down 100-year old cracked, saggy lath and plaster ceilings. Filthy work.

But, right now, every inch of me is willing spring to wake. I want be out there with it all erupting out around me. I want natural fragrance, warmth, growth, and green. And I can definitely feel it stirring – here in the east, that feeling of unrelenting bitter, biting cold is starting to edge away. The mornings and evenings are getting noticably lighter, and there are buds and shoots tentatively emerging.

But the rain has tripped me up this weekend – and having two missing panes in the roof of my greenhouse doesn’t exactly help matters. I can’t even get to work in there yet. Perhaps tomorrow I should head out and see if I can find some replacements? Not likely though, is it, on a Sunday afternoon? I think it might have to be a mail order job. For now we might have to just live with an unsightly but temporary tarpaulin greenhouse roof. I’m sure the neighbours will get over it. Good things come to those who wait. Or something.

I’m pretty desperate to get my raspberry canes in. Having read Kat’s blog entry about her Polka raspberries which fruit on the first year’s growth, I decided to get some of my own. But I’ve had them over a week (I shall blog in detail next time about my delivery from Victoriana Nursery Gardens – including why I’m going for wild plants this year), and I need to get them there canes in the ground quick smart. I think tomorrow I shall just have to brave the rain. I need to stop being a wuss. I’ll have to don the fetching combo of my oversized blue rain mac under a snowboarding jacket, leaky (spotty) wellies and woolly hat. Well, it can’t be any worse than my pyjama-spotty welly combo. That’s my usual morning summertime get up.

Oh, and I’m off out tomorrow to buy the wood for my greenhouse staging. Which Rich is going to build next week, he says. I think I might just fall over.

Hopefully I’ll have a more interesting update tomorrow!