It's that season again

The sun has been out here in Seattle for days now. Days! It's gorgeous. I'm sunburned. It's only April. I could not be happier. 

As an obvious result, I've been pretty much parked on my patio, and have been puttering and freshening up garden pots. In the process, I've discovered that while I never really checked to see if my peas from last year were perennials...it's kind of looking like maybe they are. The pot in which (I assume, can't really remember) they were planted last year suddenly has a collection of pea-looking sprouts, without me having paid the slightest bit of attention. 

there are four or five of these - peas-to-be?

 All I've done is...I don't know, till? the soil to air it out after the winter, with intent to fertilize and reuse later in the season. I didn't think I even left any of the plant behind last year. But something is growing and it's not a weed or a stray birdseed (not the current finch families are leaving much behind to begin with), so maybe I'm lucking into another crop. It's a mystery.

Meanwhile it appears I'm going to have some sort of tomato bonanza. Last year I planted 9-10 seeds and got something sad like 1 sprout, and had to purchase a start from a local farm at the farmers' market to make sure I had a crop at all. This year I planted 16 seeds, and so far I have 9 - nine! - sprouts. I'm going to have to buy more pots. The mint won't die, the thyme seems to have created a baby thyme at the side of the pot, the sage looks like winter never even happened, and even the rosemary is doing well. This is all before this week, when we've had nearly a full week of stunning weather (did I mention that I'm sunburned). This week the arugula has popped up all over the place and three new orchid buds have bloomed. The only thing not busting out is the violet hybrid I seeded in pots - which is probably fine since now I'm going to need those pots for tomatoes. I love spring. 

itty bitty tomato sprout...one of many